y.
7e
id
1e
ly
18
da Costa, Sandra
Year Urban Growth Urban Area | Urban Population
(km?) Growth Rate | Growth Rate*
1953 up to 1962 4.8 250.0 113.8
1962 up to 1973 7.6 77.5 132.9
1973 up to 1985 21.1 120.7 109.0
1985 up to 1997 17.1 444 67.1
Table 1. Urban Population and Urban Area Growth Rate Between 1950 and 1997
42 Theurban growth and the environment
The topography of the urban site is predominantly formed by plateaus (Figure 4). These plateaus were produced by the
deposition of sediments of the Paraíba river, the main one in this area, along thousands of years. The southern and
northern zones have the most undulated terrain and the central area, where was the first place occupied, has the best
topography: very flat, with low slope (Figure 5).
1st settlement N
Figure 4 - 3D model of the urban perimeter
It is easy to see, in Figure 5, that most of the urban perimeter does not have problems associated to the slope. Actually,
58.7% of the area is located in the class 0 up to 5°, and 34.8% in the class 6 up to 15%, meaning that it is predominantly
flat.
The map of urban growth was overlaid to the slope map to provide information about the relationship between growth
and environment, in this case represented by the slope (Table 2).
According to the Table 2, it is possible to visualize that the city occupied the best site up to 1985. It means that more
than 80% of the urban area, in each year, was located at the class 0 up to 5' It still happened even in 1997, when most of
the urban area was located in the class 0 up to 5° (97.7%). The highest value of slope are located at the southeast and at
the north of the urban perimeter, which were not effectively occupied.
' The period considered to calculate the urban population rate is not the same considered to calculate the urban area
growth rate: 1950 up to 1960, 1960 up to 1970, 1970 up to 1980, and 1980 up to 1996 (census data).
International Archives of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing. Vol. XXXIII, Part B7. Amsterdam 2000. 299
