Structure, Urban Image, Transport and Mobility through the years in Guayaquil

Abstract

The entire process of urban renewal generates an impact on a social, physical, economic, environmental level and depending on the particularities of the context, defining the most specific strategies to develop a project, especially those that are directly linked to transport in cities (Naranjo, Y. & Arellano, B., 2018).

Guayaquil and its urban transport have been linked to the growth of the city due to the increase in its population and its economy to the fines of the 19th century. The city and its center were sometimes in a process of commercial densification from the 1960s. Previously, its relationship with the Guayas River, a fundamental reason for its creation and existence, which ceased to be vital due to the decrease in economic activities that take place on the banks of the river. All these events associated with a growing migration of the population to the new residential neighborhoods developed in the periphery, and laid the groundwork for a decrease in the city center, largely limited to banking and public commercial activities.

In 2006, the Municipality of Guayaquil, implemented the integral Urban Mass Transportation System "Metrovía" and the city began to be subject to new physical transformations, in this case with the implementation of the new mass public transport system, which corresponds to a BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) system presented with sustainable visions, that is to say reduction of vehicular congestion, movement of greater amount of passengers and in less time than urban buses, reduction of environmental pollution and comfort in its displacement.

Its main objective is to analyze the impact and changes that have taken place in the urban structure of Guayaquil with transport, an investigation that aims to justifiably understand the parameters mentioned above, in turn the desire to know the mobility of the city as the main actor of public space, the way people are placed and moved from one place to another on foot, by bicycle or in a mass transit system.

The methodology used is qualitative - descriptive, with sources of information posed by a review of the current “Guayaquil mobility plan”, the goals and actions that have been established and to what extent they have been implemented or developed, as well as contrast with the objectives that the Government has raised in the public document of the "Plan of Good Living". The literature review plays an important role in contrasting the changes that have occurred over the years in the mobility of the population.

Cities do not die, grow and transform, as a result of the local economy, the needs of their inhabitants and the response capacity of the entities that have competences on the improvement of their quality of life. As a result of growth, the city has sought to implement a mechanism that represents greater benefits in terms of time, money and quality of service, but perhaps leaving aside the study of those peculiarities that denote a respect for the built environment (Naranjo, Y & Arellano, B., 2018).

In conclusion, in the city of Guayaquil, from the urban car company to the Metrovía mass public transport system, great changes have been obtained, however these changes have not offered, nor have they guaranteed a mobility that allows intermodality to be established or that generates spaces where the Pedestrian be the main protagonist. The mobility plan raised between its goals and actions mentioned a project with equity, integration, balance and articulation of the different modes of transport, however, until this year there have been no such improvements.