For me, one of those most interesting things we have done on our trip is exploring downtown. A city really reveals itself inside of it’s core. Business, art, culture, and infrastructure are all on display downtown, with no one more dominating than the others.
The cathedral is right in the mix of all of the company towers and definitely holds it´s own as a religious icon. The culture of the city is definitely different than the beach areas we had explored until that point. Rather than a casual carefree dress and atitude, most of the people there were dressed professionally and were in a rush like any other downtown area. However, I did appreciate that it was kind of a mix between a gridded plan and a circuitous European style city. There were definitely main plazas and straight main roads, but in between were some interweaved alley ways that had some nice places hidden within. In my opinion, this allows a little more expression within the city such as street art and facade art work that can be appreciated rather than destroying.
The infrastucture was also very present as both good and bad. I saw that there were plenty of busses that were a viable and speedy transportation option. They weren´t overcrowded and seemed to get through the streets well. However, they were also putting in the underground train system, which congested the city quite a bit. I believe it will be a good thing eventually, but I think it was a bit of a lost opportunity that it didn´t get done before. It should be the goal of the city to better itself for the sake of being better as well as for the people. Instead, it was put off until absolutely necessary. I think public transportation planning involves some gambling and needs to be proactive rather than reactive to be truly successful. 
Sara this is great. It’s very true that downtown Rio has the feel of being both metropolitan like New York City and the scattered streets and alleys like Paris, or Rome. I thought it was crazy that amid the business rush of all the people there were tons and tons of people on the sidewalks trying to sell their wares. Not just every block or so like there might be in New York, but all throughout the sidewalks. The market was literally brought into the city.
I thought you’re comments on the public transportation of the city were also accurate. It’s so hard to plan ahead for how transportation might be used, especially if the city wants to make a profit from it immediately. So that could have been a reason why it was never really thought of untill fairly recently. It does suck and is fairly inefficient that you have to walk up to 20 minutes before you get to a subway station. The most should be maybe 10 minutes. Also I found the boat system of transporting people from Niteroi to Rio the most efficient. While its unlike a lot of sight-seeing ferrys. It does what it’s meant to do, which is transport as many people as comfortably as possible across the bay, because most people who take the ferry would be riding it almost everyday and just want to nap.