Mobilidade urbana e organização sócio-espacial na região metropolitana funcional de Natal

Abstract

Due to the complexity that evolves the development of the urban space, the concept of social organization of space becomes a guideline towards the comprehension of the simultaneous processes of production and functioning of that space. The real model of urban development is created by the conexion of the structures present in space. These structures result of the actions of many social agents. Therefore, this research focused on the comprehension of urban mobility by the perspective of the social organization of space, looking for the limitations that are imposed to the Urban Public Collective Transport Network, within the Functional Metropolitan Area of Natal, from 2010 to 2017. In order to achieve that, the analyses that took place were: a) the combined analysis of the circulation structure and the distribution of the population, which allowed the delimitation of the areas for the variables demographic density and average monthly income; b) the analyses of centralities, by identifying the formation and consolidation of new centralities – in a metropolitan scale – as flux generating (or intensifying) poles. This last analysis was based on the identification of the areas where the local units that generate jobs are concentrated and on the comprehension of the space interaction of the cities that compose the Functional Metropolitan Area of Natal considering the pendular movement created by the course residence-job; c) the identification of the effects that the social organization of space (circling structures, distribution of the population and centralities) has over the Urban Public Collective Transport Network, focusing only in its modality regular bus transport. With the support of space analysis tools and the use of primary and secondary data collected from private and public sources between the years of 2010 and 2017, it was possible to see the influence that the conjunct of circling structures, distribution of the population and centralities have over the Public Collective Transport Network. As a result of such influence, emerges a development model marked by inequality and by access difficulties to the metropolitan citizen.