The Urban Survey of the Surroundings of the Housing Units, carried out in the pre-data collection operation of the 2010 Population Census, included innovations concerning the collection of information related to the characteristics of the neighborhood of every housing unit. At that time, demands not associated with the levels of information traditionally collected, i.e., those related to households, families or persons were identified. The diagnosis of the immediate surrounding of the housing units was required. Therefore, ten variables were collected, highlighted by aspects related to circulation and environment, specifically: identification of the address, public lighting, paving, sidewalk, curb, manhole/storm drain, wheelchair ramp, forestation, open sewage and accumulation of garbage.

For the 2022 Census, the IBGE resumes the Survey of the Surroundings with some changes. The first change is the merger of the Survey of the Surroundings with the Survey of Territorial Information (LIT), applied in 2010 in a single territorial survey. This change arose from the need to portray the situation of all the urban households in Brazil, located either in enumeration areas with well-defined blocks and faces or in special enumeration areas, like the subnormal agglomerates and traditional peoples and communities.

Another change was in the items investigated in the questionnaire. The 2022 Urban Survey of the Surroundings of the Housing Units will raise information on the capacity of circulation and paving of thoroughfares; public lighting; road infrastructure; urban mobility and accessibility; rainwater drainage and forestation. The items will be raised by means of direct observation by the data collection supervisor, according to three types of criteria. The criterion of existence (minimum) meets seven items included in the 2010 Urban Characteristics of the Surroundings of the Housing Units. The criterion of predominance is used in the items “capacity of circulation” and “thoroughfare paving” and, lastly, counting for the item “forestation”, included to improve the methodology of the survey, thus guaranteeing the comparability between the 2010 and 2022 information.

The goals of the 2022 Urban Survey of the Surroundings of the Housing Units are: to provide inputs to improve the quality of the coverage in the data collection of the 2022 Population Census and to collect infrastructure data to produce statistical data of the urban space. The data collected in this survey will allow to build a nationally-comparable picture of the urban areas in Brazil, providing the federal, state and municipal planning agencies with information to implement public policies and investments, as well as they will contribute to map public actions for spaces lacking urban elements key to integrate different social segments to the cities, and might be used by the private sector for decision taking as well.

The results of the Survey of the Surroundings strengthen the constitutional commitment of the Federative Republic of Brazil. Articles 182 and 183 of the Federal Constitution of 1988 deal with urban policies, aiming at organizing the complete development of the social functions of the cities and guarantee the welfare of their inhabitants. In addition, some items of the survey check the service level of the municipalities concerning the National Policy of Urban Mobility (Law no. 12,587/2012), such as universal accessibility, priority of non-motor transportation means over motor vehicles, as well as of collective public transportation services over individual motor vehicles, quality of sidewalks and road safety.

This survey aims at providing information to also meet some of the demands of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities) and of the New Urban Agenda, internationally committed by Brazil.