It is true that São Paulo is Brasil’s largest city, but that does _not_ make it the cap­i­tal. This is still Brasília.

Amen. It’s like a breath of fresh air.

Right you are, Ronald. I left out the word “eco­nomic”. Thanks for the cor­rec­tion.

I never thought some­thing like this could/would ever happen. I’m a big advo­cate of the quiet space. My respect and praise to Sao Paulo! Let it be a model for future cities.

Ban­ning all out­door sig­nage may refresh the urban land­scape but what about the visual blight of the remain­ing infra­struc­ture? It may make for inter­est­ing pho­tographs, both on a formal and con­cep­tual level, how­ever it isn’t always the case that out­door sig­nage is detri­men­tal to the visual cul­ture of a city. The spec­ta­cle of New York City’s Times Square and Tokyo’s Rop­pongi dis­trict at night are exam­ples. And what about all of the design­ers and busi­nesses that are harmed or put out of busi­ness by the ban? Wouldn’t it have been better to reg­u­late the sig­nage, per­haps by employ­ing a com­mit­tee of design­ers, archi­tects and other con­cerned cit­i­zens to review pro­posed sig­nage.

New­pathde­sign par­tially agree with you. The case of Sao Paulo is par­tic­u­lar. It was really caothic sit­u­a­tion. Many mayors tried to reg­u­late the bussi­ness with no results (maybe no will as well). I think it’s too early to say, the city is still adapt­ing to the new leg­is­la­tion. I guess the idea was, let’s clean up this mess and after that we create other exemp­tion instru­ments for some deter­mined areas, as done in New York or Tokio. I hope it goes this way!