<P> The rooftop chase across favelas was filmed in Puerto Rico, where the production could have more control over the area . The main and second filming units began filming in and around the capital, San Juan . The island's mixture of tropical greenery and wide streets allowed the production to re-create the densely populated favelas of Rio while completing the larger action and external scenes without incident . Production designer Peter Wenham had the task of transforming Puerto Rico and Atlanta into the previously scouted Rio locations in four weeks, as the production deemed Rio unsuitable for filming many of the larger scenes . Wenham had to reinforce buildings to support the heavy camera equipment, and to alter the colors of more than 30 buildings in the city to make them suitable for filming . His team needed to alter the buildings and strew debris to make the area look disheveled and appear as a Rio shantytown . Wenham remarked that, though the development was difficult, in part due to the heat, it was "a walk in the park" compared with filming in the Rio favelas themselves . Wenham aimed to maintain a monochromatic color scheme for the film, with muted blacks and grays, including his choice of colors for the cars used . He only chose to add a multitude of colors in the favela set . The Teodoro Moscosco bridge connecting San Juan to neighboring Isla Verde was used to film the final showdown between Dom and Reyes, while a U.S. Navy base pier 60 miles outside San Juan stood in for the bridge for scenes involving the vault smashing cars . Action scenes were also filmed in the Hato Rey and Río Piedras districts of San Juan . </P> <P> A foot pursuit in which Diesel, Brewster and Walker are chased across favela rooftops by Johnson and his team was filmed over the course of a week in the small hillside town of Naranjito, Puerto Rico . The scene was considered difficult to shoot, as pathways were slippery from moist tropical heat and the scene involved actors and stunt doubles running while avoiding dogs, chickens and other stray animals loose in the area . To capture the scene, a 420 - foot cable - camera rig was used to allow for a fast moving, birds - eye view of the action, and cameras on cranes were set up on rooftops and in alleyways . Walker and Brewster made multiple takes of the conclusion of the scene, requiring them to jump nearly 30 feet from a building onto a waiting safety mat . In total the production employed 236 technicians, 13,145 extras, and generated 16,824 room nights at hotels, contributing $27 million to the Puerto Rican community . </P> <P> Filming moved to Atlanta, Georgia for the final phase . Wenham and his team transformed a defunct train yard into an abandoned auto plant used by the protagonists as their headquarters . Redesigning the train yard took place over several months . It was required to allow enough space for stunt drivers to drive into the building, and it had to include an integrated lighting system . The design team removed walls, hauled out old railway cars, suspended rusted car parts and auto - plant car rails, and constructed smaller buildings within the main building to transform the site . With twenty - five pages of script to shoot in a limited time, cinematographer Stephen Windon and his team spent three weeks setting up a series of high - powered, motorized lights in the rafters of the building, that could be controlled remotely to allow lighting to be altered quickly while fully illuminating the set . An exterior scene involving Diesel and Walker attending a car party, involving several high - performance cars, was filmed near the Georgia Dome . The train heist scene was filmed in Rice, California over three weeks . </P> <P> A brawl scene between Johnson's and Diesel's characters was considered difficult to choreograph . The characters were written to be equally formidable, so the fight was punctuated with moments of character development, as Moritz felt this made the fight more exciting . The scene required several weeks of rehearsal and more than a week of filming by the actors and their stunt doubles, who incurred several minor injuries . </P>

Where was the train scene in fast five filmed