Rio World Cup demolitions leave favela families trapped in ghost town

Homes are being torn down and pests and squatters are taking over the rubble of Favela do Metrô, but hundreds of families remain with nowhere else to go…

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/26/favela-ghost-town-rio-world-cup

Demolition of London housing estate to begin

Demolition teams are to move in to one of Britain’s best known housing estates on Friday.

The sprawling Heygate estate in Walworth, south-east London, is close to the Aylesbury estate, which Tony Blair visited hours after his 1997 election victory. In his first leadership speech he described the residents as the “forgotten people” and pledged to tackle social exclusion in the are.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/apr/15/demolition-london-housing-estate-begins

Housing estates – Pruitt Igoe in Saint-Louis, Missouri

Housing Estates – Park Hill Estate in Sheffield

The Park Hill estate, Sheffield: Europe’s largest Grade 2 listed building
Park Hill in Sheffield is a large council estate comprising 995 flats. The structure was inspired by the famous architect Le Corbusier. Leading architectural and historic buildings expert Dan Cruickshank shows us the structure and explains its history. We learn how each floor had broad aisles wide enough for milk floats and how the complex also incorporated a primary school and shopping precinct. Constructed of reinforced concrete combined with yellow, orange and red brick curtain walling, it demonstrates ‘brutalist’ modernism on a European scale. The estate was initially very popular and successful but decayed over time to become an inner city sink estate, described by some as a ‘mugger’s paradise’ or ‘concrete prison’. (from BBC, learning zone)

Clip of the Park Hill housing estate (on BBC)