This chapter examines the expansion of public spaces in Rio at the expense of private property, focusing on the case of case of Central Avenue, completed in 1906. City officials began to reform and create streets as purposeful spaces, with design features, such as aesthetic paving, vetted facades, and street furniture, created to express the city's modernization and progress. The phrase of the day was "Rio civilizes itself." The stated motives for its construction emphasized orderly circulation and immaculate hygiene, but for those who used the street, its percieved beauty and the expansion of the commons were themes of broad popularity. The elite came to realize that while they had the power to shape civil spaces, largely by aping European aesthetic standards, they still could not eradicate uncivilized, plebiean behavior on those spaces, nor could they impose order. The chapter also outlines the development of the city's public transportation, emphasizing the success of horse trams, which were introduced in the late 1860s, and the conflicts between new modes of transporation, namely electric streetcars, and the handcarters laborers who inisted on sharing the rails.