RIOOLYMPICS

Rio Olympics [or how to utilize the olympics opportunistically to accelerate change] is a project about developing a strategy for using the Olympic games in Rio de Janeiro as an opportunity to accelerate a self-propelling process for change. The report consists of three parts: First, the case of Barcelona '92 is studied and its success explained, showing how, by contrast, Rio is lacking ambition and scope in its Olympic plan; second, by applying the model of Barcelona to Rio, opportunities are to be found in the backstage of this city: the discovery of a city behind the city and of an event behind the event. Finally, based on the first two parts, a systemic strategy for Rio is developed for avoiding the Olympic hangover and triggering change. This strategy is embodied at the urban scale with a set of interventions on a specific site. This project was the result of a studio at Harvard GSD led by Bjarke Ingels and Paul Nakazawa.