Situações geográficas em movimento nas praias da área de proteção ambiental de Jenipabu: das ideologias ambientais ao território usado pelo circuito inferior do turismo

The Área de Proteção Ambiental de Jenipabu was created by Decreto 12,620/95, covering the beaches of Redinha Nova, Santa Rita and Jenipabu and Campina communities in the municipality of Extremoz, and Africa community fragment, in Natal. This protected area was created in the context of expansion of tourism in Rio Grande do Norte, in the 1990s, in which PRODETUR investments made possible the installation of infrastructure equipment, mainly in the Via Costeira and Ponta Negra beach in Natal by inserting it in the sun and sea tourism route to Northeast Brazil. In this context the beach Jenipabu in Extremoz, became one of the main attractions for those visiting Natal, due to the natural elements of its landscape, its dune field, which is offered to tourists the buggy ride. In December 1994 the excess buggy rides held in these dunes led to IBAMA ban their access to buggy for carrying out environmental study. This measure resulted in the creation of APAJ in 1995 with the goal of ordering the use and occupation to protect its ecosystems, especially the dunes, the disordered tourism. Given this context, this work aims to analyze the process of creating the APAJ and changes in the geographic space of its beaches, Redinha Nova, Santa Rita and Jenipabu, from the materialization of tourism process, as well as their implications for its residents. To this end, this paper presents a discussion of environmental currents that developed in the western portion of the globe, focusing on the need to regulate small areas of the national territory in protected areas, and an analysis of public policies that enabled the implementation tourism in APAJ as well as the laws and decrees governing the process of creation and management. Using the theory of circuits of urban economy of the Santos (2008) to analyze the territory used by tourism on the beaches of Redinha Nova, Santa Rita and Jenipabu, showing their dependent relationship with the territory used by the upper circuit on the Via Costeira and in the Ponta Negra beach and its influence on the APAJ urbanization process. Ending with the analysis of the influence of the materialization of tourism in the transformation of stocks ways of being-in-space and space-be of the Santa Rita and Jenipabu beaches in each geographical situation of APAJ among the first decades of the twentieth century to the 2014. Fieldwork was conducted between 2012 and 2014, performing actions of qualitative interviews with older residents of Santa Rita and Jenipabu beaches, interviews with structured questionnaire with merchants of APAJ and collecting GPS points trades, identifying and mapping the territory used by the lower circuit in APAJ beaches.