Form and appropriation of the public space in urban nuclei resulted of the tourist development process in the Island of Santa Catarina - Brazil

Abstract

This work presents and discusses spatial structures of coastal urban nuclei, resulted or affected by the tourist development process of the island of Santa Catarina, situated in the south of Brazil. The analysis is realised on a very specific point of view: the public space is studied which are becoming to take form in these nuclei, as well as its daily appropriation on tourists and local inhabitants. The spatial configurations of three of these nuclei are presented, which express different processes of urban growing. The comparison of their spatial structures show a gradual impoverishment in their public places of collective use, keeping in mind their possibilities of favouring interfaces between the different social agents of the tourist scene. These social and spatial differences are under discussion, in order to understand their meaning in the present and to create subsidies which sets fire to a process of planning and qualification of coastal tourist nuclei.