Apartment City

RIO DE JANEIRO ― Seven years ago, Vila Autódromo was little more than a tranquil fishing village on the edge of Jacarepagua Lagoon, next to the racetrack for which it was named. Like the hundreds of other favelas that dot Rio de Janeiro ’s landscape, it had long been neglected by the city government , and it lacked many basic public services that are standard in the fast- growing wealthier neighborhoods just across the water. But to the more than 600 families that lived there, it was home. “This was a paradise,” said Luiz Cláudio Silva, who lived in Autódromo for more than 20 years. “I thought that I would live here for the rest of my life.” By the time the Rio Olympics are over, just 20 of the families who lived in Autódromo in 2009, the year the International Olympic Committee chose the city to host the games, will remain. The community, which sits less than a mile away from Rio’s Olympic Park, was crushed so that the city could build new access roads to connect Olympic venues . ...

Atlanta is a city of change, with construction constantly reshaping the urban realm. Buildings rise, buildings fall, and as the population of the city grows, so too has the skyline. Now, RentCafe has assembled 10 amazing, interactive “then-and-now” photos to highlight how Atlanta has been reshaped over the last 150 years. While some scenes are hardly recognizable, others illustrate how the city has actually saved some of its oldest structures. Off to the visual journey: ^ The first view is of Margaret Mitchell Square at the intersection of Peachtree and Forsyth Streets in the heart of downtown. The Candler Building in the background still stands today and is being converted into a hotel, while the narrow tower in the foreground of the 1938 image was reduced to just three stories to prevent its collapse during construction of Peachtree Center MARTA Station , which sits below the site. ^ Nothing remains today from this view of Whitehall Street in 1864. Now known as Peachtree, the road...