The Tietê River Basin, in the State of São Paulo, Brazil, has been shaped throughout centuries into a highly-industrialized agriculture landscape. Originally almost entirely covered by the Atlantic Rainforest, a rich tropical biome that stretches through most of the Brazilian eastern coast, the basin is now mostly covered by urbanized landscapes, associated with spaces of intense production. First heavily altered by the coffee economic cycles during the 19 and 20th centuries, the Basin has since then been deprived of most of its natural ecological conditions and has lost its ability to regulate and support ecological cycles in this region of southeastern Brazil. Since the 2000s the basin has been going through a process of specialization in the plantation of sugar-cane by extensive monocultures, mostly for biofuels production (alongside the rest of the hinterland of the State of São Paulo). The sterilization of the land and changes in land-use patterns across the region and other neighboring areas by industrial agriculture (such as the Amazon and Atlantic forests) are disrupting to micro and macroclimates, and the effect of such intense exploitation of the soil is already clearly noted in the form of catastrophes. Some of the countless externalities observed in the region are shifting rainfall patterns across the continent, heatwaves, cold spells, wildfires, and issues directly related to health, cause by, among other reasons, the intensive use of pesticides in the latifundia. As the new climate conditions increasingly become a reality, conventional land use patterns must be challenged. Natural resources and the capacity of natural systems to bounce back must be protected. Looking for possibilities of economic stability, in synch with the environment and welfare through the creation of new production systems, distributing the gains and burdens of climate change are among the goals of the project. A literature review, a series of cartographies, and research through design are some of the methods chosen as an attempt to research ways in which the peri-urban landscape of the State of São Paulo can change during the upcoming decades. This project arguments for the necessity of revaluation of the current pivots of the Paulista economy, currently based on the accumulation of wealth by extractive industries and agriculture, and what changes to the urban and peri-urban fabric would be necessary to accommodate this shift.

Currently the Construction & Demolition (C&D) sector in South Holland produces 2.581.840 tons of waste every year, it is also responsible for 50% of raw material usage and 35% of CO2 emissions. This issue is aggravated when considering the 200.000 houses that still need to be built in the region in the upcoming decade, increasing the amount of waste and pollution produced, not only by the construction of new houses, but also by new infrastructure. The province government has multiple obligations to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions and so has committed to achieving an entirely circular economy by 2050.This report focuses on the Construction and Demolition sector and its implications on the province’s spatial structure, focusing on three key themes: housing, socio-spatial justice, and the C&D Sector.By using methods and practices found in Soft Planning theories, such as soft spaces, horizontal structure of stakeholders and open-ended proposals and design policies, the outcome of this research provides new perspectives on how to tackle social and spatial inequalities for the province of South Holland, whilst shaping the C&D Sector towards more sustainable, circular practices. The soft transition takes the existing initiatives within the construction sector into account and aims for utmost collaboration with all stakeholders. Particular attention is paid to low-income neighborhoods that bear the brunt of construction companies’ externalities and do not directly benefit from their proximity to educational institutions and job opportunities. Resultantly, a set of patterns is formulated in order to set the stage for co-creation and facilitate the collaboration of the different actors at the scale of province, city and neighborhood. The report further details how these patterns could be applied on a contextual basis, and explores these scenarios in two locations within the province; Binckhorst, in The Hague, and Dordrecht.