Syntax of the square space as sign for urban tourism regeneration: Mauá Square and XV Square, Rio de Janeiro

Abstract The research had as its themes: urban regeneration, tourist urbanization, and public space; the object of the research was the squares XV and Mauá, of the urban tourist destination of the city of Rio de Janeiro (RJ, Brazil). The aim of the research was to demonstrate the role of space syntax as an attribute for tourist urban regeneration, in view of the discussion predominantly guided by socioeconomic criticism within the themes involved. To this end, as methodological procedures we used a bibliographic review based on bibliographic metrics about the themes and object of research, document analysis, and surveys of the use of space were adopted when taking the instruments of the Theory of Space Syntax as method of approaching the data collected. The results showed that the Theory of Space Syntax can be contributory to the Henri Lefebvre theory of space production; at the same time that the theory of the production of space, in its aspect of “perceived space”, can use the Theory of Space Syntax as instrumentality. The need to insert the Henri Lefebvre categories of space production is pointed out in the face of an essentially syntactic analysis of space or an essentially socioeconomic analysis of the tourist territory; it seems that it would be a simplification or a reductionism to point out only spatial attributes or only social attributes (socio-economic in most cases) as responsible for the performance of the public space of squares in urban tourist destinations.