São Paulo

São Paulo has the first subway in Brazil.

Its trains run under the busy streets. Many, many cars fill the roads. Big airports send airplanes all over the world.

São Paulo's subway, the Metrô, was the first in Brazil. It began carrying passengers on September 14, 1974, between the Jabaquara and Vila Mariana stations, and new lines have kept being added since.

The city has very heavy car traffic, and long expressways run beside its rivers. Three major airports serve the city: Congonhas, inside the city, Cumbica to the east and Viracopos to the northwest. Ships use the port of Santos on the coast, linked to the city by railroads and highways.

Construction of the subway began in the late 1960s to fight congestion; commercial service, the first in Brazil, began on September 14, 1974, on the Jabaquara–Vila Mariana section, and lines continue to be added. Expressways were built along the canalized Tietê and Pinheiros rivers in 1967, and the first freeway inside the city opened in 1969, yet congestion remains a major and growing problem, adding to air and noise pollution.

Major routes radiate in all directions. The three main airports are Congonhas within the city, Cumbica 25 km east and Viracopos 100 km northwest. São Paulo is a railroad hub, including a transcontinental line from Santos to Antofagasta, Chile, and highways reach Rio de Janeiro and almost every Brazilian state.

In São Paulo, summer comes in January and February.

Summers are warm and rainy. Winters are cool and drier. Sometimes a misty haze hangs over the city.

The Tropic of Capricorn, an imaginary line around the Earth, passes through São Paulo. But because the city is high up, its climate is mild rather than tropical. São Paulo is south of the equator, so February is one of the warmest months and July the coldest.

On a typical February day, the high is about 28 °C and the low about 19 °C. In July, highs average about 22 °C and lows about 12 °C, and there is occasional frost. Most rain falls from October to March, about 1,450 millimeters in a year.

The Tropic of Capricorn, at about 23°27′ S, passes through São Paulo, roughly the boundary between tropical and temperate South America; because of its elevation, Britannica says, the city has a distinctly temperate climate, with July the coldest month (average about 14 °C, occasional frost) and February the warmest (about 21 °C).

WMO normals for 1961–1990 give mean daily maxima and minima of 28.0 °C and 18.8 °C in February and 21.8 °C and 11.7 °C in July. The monthly totals add up to about 1,455 mm, wettest in January (about 239 mm) and driest in August (about 39 mm). Humidity and air pollution combine into a mist that often hangs over the city.

Families in São Paulo came from all over the world.

Some came from Italy, Portugal, Spain and Germany. Others came from Japan and Lebanon. Many people love soccer, and the city has a giant zoo.

When coffee farms grew in the late 1800s, huge numbers of people moved to São Paulo, mostly from Italy, but also from Portugal, Spain, Germany and eastern Europe. In the early 1900s others came from Japan and the Middle East, and more Japanese people live in São Paulo than in any other community outside Japan. Later, many families arrived from northeastern Brazil.

Soccer is the favorite sport, played in giant stadiums such as Morumbi and Pacaembu. Car races roar around the Interlagos track, and the São Paulo Zoo, opened in 1958, is one of the largest in the world.

Coffee-era immigration from Europe, then from Japan and the Middle East, internal migration from northeastern Brazil from the 1930s (including many descendants of enslaved Africans) and later Korean and Bolivian arrivals produced a city where, Britannica notes, ethnic communities are highly assimilated and dispersed; more Japanese live here than in any other community outside Japan. Portuguese is the main language.

São Paulo became an intellectual center after its College of Law opened in 1827, and its 1922 Modern Art Week, held in the Municipal Theatre, introduced Modernism to Brazilian arts. The University of São Paulo (1934) enrolls a very high proportion of Brazil's doctoral students, and the affiliated Butantan Institute is famous for research on snakes and for producing toxins and antitoxins. Major newspapers, magazine publishers and TV networks are based here. Soccer dominates sport, Interlagos is one of the world's largest racetracks, and the São Paulo Zoo (1958) is one of the world's largest. Since a 2006 law removed outdoor advertising, massive murals by street artists decorate many buildings.