“The greatest tangible legacy of the Rio 2016™ Olympic and Paralympic Games will be in transport”. Regina Oliveira summarizes with this sentence her responsibility and her work ahead of one of the most complex operations of the biggest sporting event in the planet. Director of Transport and also responsible for the City Operations Area, she will have the mission of guaranteeing the mobility of thousands of people, including the Olympic family, athletes, support team, media and authorities.

By land, sea and air, with cars, buses, motorcycles, motorboats and bicycles, she will count on the support of the tree levels of government and the concessionaires in harbours, airports, highways, railroads in order to, in her own words, “operate an Olympic city within a regular city”.

Since 2010, she commands a team that, in addition to plan the operation of the Games, has the mission of monitoring the compliance of the governmental commitments regarding transport issues made during the bid. In order to accomplish this mission, the experience of 25 years in this sector, always working in Rio de Janeiro, is of great value.

“The opportunity was very attractive. I am a dreamer and this characteristic has motivated me to work in the Organising Committee. I want to change and improve the city, as well as the quality of life of the population. During the last 25 years, I could get to know Rio as it is, I could go to distant regions, during the day and during the night, so I could see how people live”, said the Director. For eight years, she worked in management positions in SuperVia, the passenger Trains Company concessionaire that operates in the metropolitan region of Rio. She has also worked for five years in Metrô (Subway Company).

Working by regions

Still in the conceptual phase, the planning developed by the Rio 2016™ Department of Transport is divided by regions. Each one of them (Barra, Deodoro, Copacabana and Maracanã) is led by one Manager, who works in constant interaction with Venues and Security areas.

The numbers of the operation will be reviewed after London 2012 and they are subjected to modification in the next few years, but the order of magnitude is already impressive. We estimate the workforce to be of 15 thousand people under the leadership of the Transport Area and City Operations, among them volunteers, third-parts and employees. It will be 1.500 buses and more than 5.000 cars working for the Olympic and Paralympic Games. Although the Olympic competitions are held during 17 days and the Paralympic competitions are held during 11 days, the impact on the city is of 60 days.

We don’t have a consolidated calculation in terms of quantity of fuel to be used, but it is a priority to organise sustainable Games in environmental terms.

“In Transport, especially regarding our fleet, we have the opportunity of making the Games as “green” as possible, considering the Brazilian matrix of clean energy, using biodiesel and alcohol”, says Regina. “Furthermore, the bid commitment includes the buses adapted to people with disabilities and clean fuel. The City Hall is doing its best efforts in this direction”.

City transformation

According to the 2010 Census, the city of Rio de Janeiro has more than 6,3 million inhabitants and almost 12 million people lives in the Rio de Janeiro Metropolitan Region. Regarding Transport, the municipalities around are important due to the workforce and the audience, that will move every day from there to the Olympic city. This way, the rationalisation of the quantity of vehicles in transit is one of the main objectives, both for big events and for the legacy.

“You can manage to rationalise the use of the cars during the events, given the fact that Rio is still a city where people use public transportation quite a lot. The percentage in Rio is 70% of public transportation and 30% of private transportation. In São Paulo, for instance, it is 51% of private transportation and 49% of public transportation. Due to the expansion of credit during the last years, the number of cars has increased. The habits have also changed. We ended up following the North American model of city regarding usage of cars”, says the Director.

“In the next four years, with the interventions in course, we will be talking about an increase from 13% to 46% of passengers that use mass transportation in Rio de Janeiro. The regular bus and the LRT are not considered as mass transportation. We are mainly talking about the BRT, about the recovered train and subways with more wagons, therefore reducing the length of time. It will be an integrated network. The public transportation of good quality will motivate people to leave the car at home. Due to this transformation, the most tangible legacy of the Games will be the transport”, concludes Regina.

In the next few months, a technician of the Transport Department will move to London, where he will be working full time in the local Organising Committee. Then, he will bring his experience and knowledge back to Rio 2016™. In the meantime, the working groups of the Organising Committee together with the city, state and federal governments will keep periodic meetings. The operation of an Olympic City inside a city is a work in several fronts. Intense. And meant for dreamers.