Abstract: This study reviews the literature concerning the general impact of the physical environment on social disorganization, crime, and juvenile delinquency, with a specific focus on the relationship between household density, building density-design, and juvenile delinquency. Two perspectives on control are shown to have developed in an environmental context. One emphasizes the capacity of the built environment to impair informal social control, and the other focuses on the attraction of the same environments for agents of formal social control (the police). A path model is presented. showing that building density-design is an independent predictor of marijuana use and supporting the view that the physical environment can affect informal control. The model also shows that building density-design is a significant predictor of police presence. thus giving empirical support to the notion that the physical environment can affect formal control.

Abstract: THE 19TH CENTURY is a key period in Brazilian history. In addition to witnessing the inauguration of independent political life, it gave rise to several prominent initiatives affecting the existing spatial forms. Contemporary Brazilian experience is marked by an effort to develop a comprehensive nationwide urban policy, with heavy emphasis on metropolitan areas (Schmidt 1979). Considering the policies developed in the last century in the course of a general drive towards the modernization of a country emerging from colonialism under mercantile capitalism, the analyst can detect some resemblances between past and present. This historical continuity has been effected by private and public actors responding to incentives created by international economic forces and national interests. As Gardner (1972) has acutely observed, perhaps more apparent than anything else in this long process is the fact that "the determination to settle the interior amounts to a national passion." Seeking to grasp the meaning of this movement, Morse (1971, 1975) has called attention to the fact that urbanization in countries like Brazil is closely associated with the development of regional centers of economic growth. In a comparison of the development of two core industrial centers of the contemporary capitalist world, Manchester and Sao Paulo, Roberts (1978) underlines the fact that the Brazilian city contrasts sharply with Manchester because of two consequences of urbanization-cum-immigration: the development of an efficient state apparatus and a class structure marked by an alliance between industrialists and landowners and a lack of solidarity within the working class. Brazilian history was not marked by the existence of urban forms of civilization, as were Mexico, Peru, and other areas of Latin America with sophisticated pre-Columbian cultures (Hardoy 1964), until the massive exploitation of the gold mines of Minas Gerais during the 18th century. Therefore, the experience of Mexico under the Bourbons, which included considerable decentralization of the economy and an effort to make New Spain the world's largest producer of silver, was not to be faced by Brazil until later (Moreno Toscano and Florescano 1976). The Mexican state played a prominent role in centralizing control over economic activities and extending lines of production throughout the interior. Rather than being only a reaction to the "corporatism" favored by the Habsburgs, the reform undertaken by the Bourbons was designed to increase mining output and "to fragment the Viceroy's power by strengthening Royal power through the creation of a select group of administrators to be chosen in Spain" (Moreno Toscano and Florescano 1976:72, my translation). Brazilian modernization and urbanization, based on the construction of new spatial forms, must be seen as a gigantic attempt to realize late-developmental goals. In this framework, the creation of a built environment2 befitting the modernized-society-to-come took a central place, and throughout this process the state played a salient role. Three intertwined issues become apparent through examination of the historical evolution of urbanization in Brazil in the late 19th and early 20th centuries: (1) the implications of public works projects for the shaping and occupation of the country; (2) the key role played by the state, as manager of the social capital, in the construction of the built environment; and (3) the gradual emergence of the issue of uneven regional development through the unfolding of contradictions generated by the establishment of the railway network in Sao Paulo, the construction of Belo Horizonte as capital of Minas Gerais, and the decision to build a new capital at Brasilia.

Abstract: The built environment in which we live, work and play is pervasive. We rarely escape it. Architecture is man’s attempt to tame this environment, render it functional,1 and make it aesthetically pleasing. For most people it contributes greatly to improving the quality of their lives. But for a significant portion of our population, the built environment tames their abilities and is dysfunctional for it is filled with barriers. Thus, there is a disparity between the physical environment as we have erected it about ourselves and the environment as it should be constructed to permit the large numbers of physically disabled persons2 to live and work in equality with their fellow citizens.3

Abstract: This article explores ways of offering equal opportunities to the blind and partially sighted, the deaf and hard of hearing, and all other people with some kind of physical disability or handicap. An outline history of government policies towards mobility up to the Transport Act 1978 and similarly towards the built environment, is presented. The special provisions required for the handicapped person are considered, and details are graphically presented of a number of studies carried out of privately and publicly owned buildings. The author considers mobility problems that result from the location of services, and the need for routeway design based on the needs of handicapped persons. Different methods of transport e.g. Private car and public transport, and their availability for the handicapped are evaluated. Some lessons for future policy-making regarding the disabled are drawn from the studies, ranging from financial allowances to the overhauling of public transport. The need for centralised facilities of all kinds for people whose mobility is restricted is emphasised.