87952 Brazilian Journal of Development The urban area of the Verde River Basin and the environmental impacts caused by the urbanization of Ponta Grossa – PR – Brasil A área urbana da bacia do rio Verde e os impactos ambientais provocados pela urbanização de Ponta Grossa - PR – Brasil DOI:10.34117/bjdv6n11-280 Recebimento dos originais:08/10/2020 Aceitação para publicação:13/11/2020 Gilson Campos Ferreira da Cruz PhD in Geography Department of Geosciences / State University of Ponta Grossa, Paraná, Brazil Rua Joaquim Procópio de Souza e Castro, 32. Ponta Grossa. Paraná. Brasil E mail: [email protected] ABSTRACT The goal of the present paper was to search for elements to understand how the urban growth and the urbanization process of a city cause environmental impacts in a hydrographic basin on which it develops. In order to reach the goal, several methodological procedures and research techniques were defined to identify the environmental impacts present in the urban part of the Verde River hydrographic basin, caused by the development of the city of Ponta Grossa, Paraná State, Brazil. The growth of the city over the Verde River basin has been occurring since its inception, initially in the sub-basins of Pilão de Pedra stream and Lageado Grande stream, later in Francelina stream, as well as directly on the Verde River. The identified environmental impacts range from the presence of rubbish on the banks and riverbed, to sewage dumped directly into the streams and into the river. The situation found in the three urbanized streams is worrisome, but the impacts found directly on the larger Verde River are more alarming, as they indicate a tendency to transform at least part of the river into an open sewer, due to pollution resulting from the impacts of urban growth and urbanization. Keywords: Hydrographic Basin, Environmental Impact, Environment, Pollution. RESUMO O objetivo do presente trabalho foi de buscar elementos para entender como o crescimento urbano e a processo de urbanização de uma cidade provocam impactos ambientais em uma bacia hidrográfica sobre a qual se desenvolve. Para alcançar o objetivo, foram definidos vários procedimentos metodológicos e técnicas de pesquisa, que permitissem identificar os impactos ambientais presentes na parte urbana da bacia hidrográfica do rio Verde, provocados pelo desenvolvimento da cidade de Ponta Grossa, estado do Paraná, Brasil. O crescimento da cidade sobre a bacia do rio Verde vem ocorrendo desde o início do seu surgimento, inicialmente nas sub-bacias do arroio Pilão de Pedra e do arroio Lageado Grande, posteriormente do arroio Francelina e assim como diretamente no rio Verde. Os impactos ambientais identificados vão desde a presença de lixo nas margens e no leito do rio, até esgoto inatura despejado diretamente nos arroios e no rio. A situação encontrada nos três arroios urbanizados é preocupante, porém os impactos encontrados diretamente no rio Verde, que é de maior porte, são mais preocupantes, pois indicam uma tendência de transformação, de pelo menos parte do rio em um esgoto a céu aberto, devido a poluição resultante dos impactos do crescimento urbano e urbanização. Palavras chave: Bacia hidrográfica, impacto ambiental, meio ambiente, poluição. Braz. J. of Develop., Curitiba, v. 6, n. 11, p.87916-87934, nov. 2020. ISSN 2525-8761 87953 Brazilian Journal of Development 1 INTRODUCTION The relationship between human being and the environment in which it lives in can be analyzed and observed in different ways, in space and over time. Most of the time, man leaves marks that remain for a long time in the natural landscape, which, from the perspective of geography, assumes the condition of artificial landscape or geographical landscape. Looking at the use and occupation of land in a hydrographic basin, we realize how the relationship between man and nature occurs, especially regarding the impacts on rivers and vegetation. For the present paper, a watershed is understood as the drainage area of a region, delimited by water dividers that separate it from other drainage areas and where all the precipitation that happens flows to its center, which may contain a river or just a valley (TUCCI, 1997). The Verde River basin in Ponta Grossa - PR, fits the concept presented, with a particularity, which is that part of the basin is occupied by the urban area of the city, since the first occupation of the region. This urban area of the city, which occupies the watershed, is the area of study of this research. The city of Ponta Grossa is located according to Cruz (1999), in Parana Eastern Center geographic mesoregion, located on the Second Plateau, on the coordinates 25 º 05 '42' 'S; 50 º 09 '43' 'W, with an average elevation of 975 meters. The total area of the city is 2,025.697 km², and the occupied urban area is 917.2 km², where more than 97% of the total population live (IPARDES, 2020). The urban area is the result of the occupation process that occurred in the region and in the city that, according to Cruz (2009) happened spontaneously, that is, without proper planning, the first master plan only happened from 1967 onwards. From the earliest moments of the formation of the city, the center of Ponta Grossa was built, partly on the springs of some of the affluents of the left bank of the Verde River, and then the city developed along three axes, in the North, South, East, along the water dividers, where the main circulation routes were opened. By the year 1900 the eastern portion of the city was known as Potreiro de Uvaranas or Colonia Uvaranas, which was divided into several farms, that later gave rise to the neighborhood and to the villages that became the region. At the beginning of the occupation of the land, the city center was more than 5 km from the Verde River, however today the urbanization has already surpassed the river and the occupation is already with its limits to more than 7 km from the city center (MILÉO, MARTINS E STASIAK, 1986). The main link between the city center and the Uvaranas district in the east is General Carlos Cavalcanti Avenue, which in certain sections is on a watershed between Olarias stream and Pilão de Pedra stream basins, one of the tributaries of the Verde River. The settlement occurred without planning, largely due to the region's attractions, such as the Jockey Club, where horse races were taking place, and the army barracks that were installed in the region, as well as due to the low slope Braz. J. of Develop., Curitiba, v. 6, n. 11, p.87916-87934, nov. 2020. ISSN 2525-8761 87954 Brazilian Journal of Development relief, favorable to the development of housing expansion, which enabled the emergence of the Neves neighborhood in 1967 (GOMES, 2009). From the 1967 municipal master plan CODEM (1967) and its consolidation, the development of the Uvaranas neighborhood, in the middle of the Verde River basin, begins to go through a new phase of occupation of its lands, with the construction of the housing March 31, as a result of real estate speculation destined for the population with lower purchasing power, the emergence of new neighborhoods and nuclei happens in this region and soon after comes the Dal Col housing complex with 187 housing units, David Federmann with 197 housing units, and Rio Verde with a larger number totaling 770 units in 1981 in addition to the consolidation of old villages, such as Jardim Paraiso, among others. The environmental impacts caused by the human being, refer to all actions that result in some form of degradation of terrestrial and aquatic environment, in the most different dimensions. In Brazil, the pollution of watercourses has been considerably aggravated by the increase of solid urban waste and industrial activity. Also unplanned land use, deforestation and mining, has increasingly eroded, silting the rivers and tributaries of the most different types of watershed. These actions and factors, added to the occurrence of precipitation, tend to significantly impact rivers and streams (GUERRA e CUNHA, 2001). Urbanization and urban growth are directly related to the environmental impacts that the formation of cities causes on the environment. Vegetation removal, soil sealing, and river silting are some of the transformations that result from the process. According to Luz et all (2020) the loss of environmental quality is evident in the river Claro basin region in the interior of São Paulo, due to the expansion of agricultural and urban boundaries without planning, based on a study carried out to identify areas of environmental vulnerability. in the region. The human activities developed in cities, necessary for the development and maintenance of life also result in environmental impacts directly or indirectly, as in the case of commercial, transportation, and industrial activities. However, two consequences of the emergence of cities and their population which has a major impact on river basins, are the production of solid waste and sewage. When solid waste and sewage are not properly collected and properly disposed of, the result is pollution of the valley bottoms and rivers, which is the fate of everything that is improperly disposed of in the urban environment, transported by the wind or rain. The goal of the research was to identify and analyze the impacts of urbanization and urban growth of the city of Ponta Grossa in the Verde River basin. Braz. J. of Develop., Curitiba, v. 6, n. 11, p.87916-87934, nov. 2020. ISSN 2525-8761 87955 Brazilian Journal of Development 2 MATERIAL AND METHODS 2.1 STUDY AREA The urban portion of the Verde River Basin constitutes the study area of this research. For the production of cartograms, data, satellite images and cartographic base maps of different institutions were used.