Reaching for the Sky

I was first told to begin looking for them while my plane was landing; that they were a rare sight to see.  Luckily, my flight was not full and when the pilot gave my fellow travelers and me the ability to grab open seating, I darted for the nearest window seat.  It would be a long flight though, 12 hours from Detroit to Sao Paulo, so I killed time off and slowly let myself drift into an uncomfortable economy class sleep.  In the wee early hours of the morning I awoke and thanked my internal clock for doing so; now I could be prepared to catch a glimpse of them upon arriving. 

The plane cabin was dark except for the sole shaft of the sun’s early gingery rays shining through my window.  The stewardess politely told me in Portuguese to close my window because people were trying to sleep.  I thought she was crazy; how could such a radiant beam disturb them?  I feigned ignorance so she tried again in English but, there was no way she was going to get me to shut it.  Fellow passengers be damned, I wanted to witness this rare sight.

The plane signaled its descent with an unmistakable de-revving of the engines and I could notice the clouds approaching the belly of the aircraft.  It would not be long now.  My warm ray of sunlight suddenly, sadly turned to the dull gray of the blanket of clouds as we dipped into them.  The plane pushed through the haze, the light returned and there they were in front of me; buildings.  Tall, enormous buildings, stretching endlessly to the horizon line like thousands of little fingers reaching up to scrape the sky.  I quickly forgot all about the majestic sunrise and simply stared.  As the plane banked through the air it offered more views of the sprawling metropolis below.  No matter which direction I glanced, the city carried on illimitable. 

Just a glimpse of Sao Paulo.  CLICK the picture for a larger image.

Buildings in Sao Paulo are part of what make this city so astonishing.  A tall, proud man can feel mighty short standing among these immense creations.  From one end of the compass to the other and across, if you look up and spin you are guaranteed to be treated to an assortment of great structures.  Sao Paulo is ranked 23rd in the world for the most amounts of skyscrapers tallying 63, according to Emporis.com, a corporation that indexes building information from around the globe.  By Emporis.com’s indexes, Hong Kong leads the world in skyscrapers with 1,256 and New York City is second with 562, closely followed by Tokyo, Chicago and Shanghai. 

But what defines a building as a skyscraper?  Many definitions are vague, various and cite an assortment of qualifications like a certain amount of meters high; most commonly 100 meters.  I believe, surely the best way to name a building as a skyscraper is any building that stands above all the other buildings in its area, thus changing the skyline.  For the sake of argument though, let us say a building of roughly 300 feet or approximately 100 meters qualifies it as such. 

Having said that, Sao Paulo has a multitude of other tall buildings that fall just mere meters short of our established definition.  In fact, Sao Paulo has 5,672 “tall buildings” with almost another 500 planned or under construction, according to Emporis.com.  New York City has 5,953 with only 100 planned.  Which is unfair, seeing how NYC is stuck building on an island with 304.8 square miles of land, according to the Department of City Planning of New York City.  Sao Paulo on the other hand has grown to such a size that its city limits and skyscrapers border its neighboring city’s buildings on all borders, which is what gives that impression of a never ending city. 

I have ridden the metro from one end of the city to the other and at every stop that offers a view it appears as if the city extends out farther and more unchecked than the previous.  At night from a distance the city glitters with flashing lights and it is difficult not to be awed by its grand expansiveness.    

Unfortunately, the city suffers from a lack of urban planning.  If a new apartment needs to be put up so people can live or a company wants to move into the city, little thought seems to be put into where the new giant will go.  Have space; will build.  This is great because it gives those people somewhere to lay their head at night but, it does so at the cost of negatively effecting the city’s already poor traffic situation and raises other potential problems in the future.  If a pedestrian is not too busy being shocked by another building around the bend, this can cause one’s hope for the future of the city to become lugubrious and disheartened.  

Recently, problems with poor urban development appeared to assist in the problems caused by flooding that claimed many lives in Rio de Janeiro this past year.  According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, illegal construction, deforestation and unregulated housing are to blame in part for the devastating effects of the flooding. Over 700 lives were lost and thousands left homeless.  Can this happen to Sao Paulo?  Maybe not exactly as Sao Paulo does not possess the same climate or land layout Rio de Janeiro does but, poor urban planning in the city will surely cause more problems than it is currently solving. 

Poor urban planning is but an afterthought to me though; I am way to busy trying to keep my jaw shut as I crane my head upwards.  It is simply stunning what man can do with a bit of math, steel and concrete.