São Paulo’s historic centre has fallen into crime-ridden decay. Can it be revived?

Shortly after moving to São Paulo’s historic centre, Lincoln Paiva attended a residents’ meeting in his new apartment building, expecting it to focus on typical issues such as noisy neighbours and electricity bills.

“Here, no. Here the discussion was about whether to buy batons to defend against home invasions or whether to pay the local gang [protection money] or not,” said the architect. “I was horrified.”

The largest city in the Americas, São Paulo is a financial, commercial and cultural hub that draws immigrants from across the region. Its rich history, dating back to the mid-16th century, saturates the city centre; a mix of neoclassical, gothic revival and modernist landmarks evoke the various architectural phases — and periodic economic booms — that have washed over the metropolis of 11.5mn.

But the historical centre, known as Centro, has been in a long period of decline. A plan to devote some of the city’s $6.2bn cash pile to revitalising the troubled area has left residents hoping it can emulate city centres like that of New York in the previous century, returning from a period of decay, poverty and crime to prosperity and at least relative safety.

That would require reversing the economic trend of 30 years. Drawn by tax breaks and looser regulations, new construction works in the city have over three decades gradually shifted west and then south, moving the economic heart of São Paulo from Centro to areas such as Faria Lima, today Brazil’s equivalent of Wall Street.

Absent an economic motor, large parts of Centro have decayed. Thousands of properties, including historic buildings, have been abandoned or taken over illegally by so-called occupations. Homelessness is ubiquitous and crime has soared.

In the first nine months of this year, more than 16,500 robberies and muggings were reported in the area — the highest level in 22 years and an average of about 60 a day, according to police. A further 40,000 incidents of pickpocketing were reported.

For some urbanists, the decay recalls Manhattan in the mid-20th century, when suburban flight and deindustrialisation hollowed out parts of the island and crime soared.

“New York recovered from the decay in the 1970s [thanks to] partnerships between public authorities, the private sector and civil society,” said Philip Yang, founder of the Institute of Urbanism and Studies for the Metropolis.

But he cautioned that São Paulo’s path would be even more difficult because “levels of poverty in a megacity of the global south are much higher”.

The most stark example of Centro’s problems is an area known as Cracolândia — literally Crackland — which hosts a roving mass of people engaged in open-air drug dealing and use. Once a commercial hub and home to a mix of economic classes, the neighbourhood is today largely seen as off-limits by other residents of São Paulo.

“People don’t come here any more. No one comes to Centro,” said the owner of a hardware store near Cracolândia, who declined to be named out of concern for their personal safety. “People talk about respecting the human rights of the drug addicts, but what about our right to be able to come and go?”

The comments were echoed by Valdevino Pereira, who was shining shoes at the foot of the beaux-arts Martinelli building, the tallest building in Latin America when it opened in 1929.

“The clients are no longer coming. The criminals target elderly people on the street because they know they can’t escape easily,” he said. “They need to revitalise the area.”

Revitalisation is an issue that has hung over city hall throughout successive governments, with multiple mayors — from both left and right — trying and failing to reverse the decay.

Like his predecessors, the current mayor, Ricardo Nunes, has a plan. Unlike them, however, he has resources to back it up. Following a pension reform in 2017, and years of privatisations and austerity budgets during the past decade, city hall is reported to be sitting on a cash pile of about R$30bn (US$6.2bn).

Officials have rolled out a package of subsidies, tax incentives and reductions in planning fees to encourage investment and building works in Centro. They have also increased the police presence and improved lighting and sanitation services.

“The idea is to attract 200,000 new people to live in Centro in the next 10 years,” said Fabrício Cobra, chief secretary at city hall’s executive office.

This would be an increase of almost 50 per cent on the area’s estimated current population of 400,000.

“The mayor himself justifies these benefits as recompense for everything the city did to Centro in the past. What it once took away from the region, it now has to return through benefits,” Cobra added.

Most prominent among the city’s plans is a R$1bn subsidy package for companies that renovate old or abandoned buildings. Cobra — who says 14 such projects have already been approved, with 20 more under consideration — hopes residents will opt to live in these refurbished buildings rather than commute long distances from São Paulo’s sprawling suburbs. The total metro area has a population of more than 22mn.

But critics say such investments will do nothing for Centro’s most deprived residents, for whom modern residences are far beyond their economic reach.

“The most important point is the issue of people living on the streets,” said Débora Lima, a co-ordinator of the activist Homeless Workers’ Movement. “The city hall has a plan to serve 3,000, but the issue involves 53,000 families [living rough in São Paulo].”

Paiva, the architect, agreed, saying it would be impossible to revitalise the centre without first addressing deep social problems such as ubiquitous homelessness and drug use. Experts say that requires co-ordination between politicians, law enforcement and social and healthcare workers. Solutions must be tailored to individuals in need of help, Paiva added.

Cobra said city hall viewed the drug problem as a public health issue that required healthcare solutions, while police would focus on tackling the networks behind narcotics trafficking.

Some in Centro want law enforcement to take a firmer line.

“Good people can’t defend themselves any more,” said another small business owner near Cracolândia. “You have to follow the law. Taking drugs on the streets is illegal, so they should take the addicts away.”

Yet Cracolândia defies easy solutions. When police clear large encampments, users simply filter into other parts of the city, stoking complaints from residents there.

Two large public plazas near Cracolândia have been cordoned off to prevent homeless people from camping. In the once bustling neighbourhood of Santa Ifigênia, lit crack pipes are common.

The juxtapositions in São Paulo’s historical centre are best captured by the Júlio Prestes train station, an imposing neoclassical edifice that opened in 1938 with money from Brazil’s coffee boom and has since been renovated. It is now home to one of the country’s top classical music venues.

But attendees must enter concerts using a rear or underground entrance; the venue closes its main door at 6pm because the streets outside are occupied by drug users.

“The city centre has continued to decay in spite of this cultural district,” said Yang, the urbanist.

“The same way that Paris or many European cities are cities of the 18th and 19th centuries, São Paulo is a city of the 20th century,” making it vital to revive the historic area, he said. “If we don’t recover the centre, we will be lost in terms of who we are as paulistanos.”

Additional reporting by Beatriz Langella