An Olympic Tragedy

The motto for the 2016 Summer Olympic Games in Rio was "A New World". At the time in Rio, it seemed as though this New World had little room for the low-income inhabitants of the city. To make room for an access road to its main Olympic Park, the city evicted hundreds of residents from their Favelas (the Brazilian term for a slum) and leveled these buildings, many of which were built by the inhabitants themselves. In many cases, the city neglected to tell the inhabitants they had to leave; instead, they discovered it for themselves from the sounds of construction equipment. While many of the residents were relocated to housing in 'more favorable conditions' these new homes were often far removed from the neighborhoods these residents called home for decades. After the Olympic games this space was designated for 'luxury condos'. Today, the space sits empty and abandoned, not yet recovered from the Olympic Games. It appears that the New World was planned to be without ordinary structures. As it sits empty today, I wonder if the city would rather have hundreds of happy residents in slum-style housing or hundreds of angry residents with their home site sitting abandoned.