APHUG Urban Geography

Ecumene

The permanently inhabited portion of the Earth’s surface

Urbanization

The process of developing towns and cities; the process does not end after city is formed

City-State

Historically made up of an urban center (the city) and its surrounding territory and agricultural villages

Urban Hearth

Area generally associated with defensible sites and river valleys in which seasonal floods and fertile soils allowed for an agricultural surplus

Metropolitan Area

A collection of adjacent cities to central city in which population density is high and continuous

Metropolitan Statistical Area

Another way to define a city in which it states that the city has at least 50,000 people, includes the county in which it is located, and includes the adjacent counties that have a high degree of social and economic integration or connection with urban core

Borchert’s transportation model

Model developed to describe urban growth based on transportation technology. There are four periods called epochs

Suburbanization

The process of people moving, usually from cities to residential areas on the outskirts of cities

Sprawl

The rapid expansion of the spatial extent of a city

Leap-frog development

Developers purchase land and build communities beyond the periphery of the city’s built area, encouraging sprawl

Boomburbs

Rapidly growing communities (over 10% per 10 years) have a total population of over 100,000 people, and are not the largest city in the metro area

Edge Cities

Nodes of economic activity that have developed in the periphery of large cities

Counterurbanization

Counterflow of urban residents leaving cities

Exurbs

Prosperous residential districts beyond the suburbs

Reurbanization

Suburbanites returning to live in a city

Megacities

World’s largest cities and typically have more than 10 million people

Metacities (hypercities)

Either 1) continuous urban area with a population greater than 20 million people, or 2) attributes of a network of urban areas that have grown together to form a large interconnected urban system

Megalopolis

Describes a chain of connected cities

Conurbation

Merging of cities into a single, uninterrupted urban area

World Cities (global cities)

Cities that exert influence far beyond their national boundaries

Urban Hierarchy

Ranking of a city based on influence or population size

Rank-Size Rule

The nth largest city in any region will be 1/n the size of the largest city

Primate City

The largest city in an urban system that is more than twice as large as the next largest city

Gravity Model

Places that are larger that close together will have a greater interaction than places that are smaller and further away from each other

Central Place Theory

Explains the distribution of cities of different sixes across a region, developed by German geographer Walter Christaller

Threshold

Size of population necessary for any particular service to exist and remain profitable

Range

The distance people will travel to obtain specific goods and services

Functional Zonation

Idea that portion of an urban area- regions, or zone within the city have specific and distinct purposes

Central Business District

The commercial heart of the city will have a higher value than land farther away from the city’s center

Concentric Zone Model

Describes a city as a series of rings that surround a central business district

Sector Model

Way of looking at cities in which we see how different types of land use and housing were all located near the CBD early in a city’s history and each grows outward as the city expands, creating wedges (rather than rings)

Multiple Nuclei Model

Suggested that functional zonation occurred around multiple centers or nodes of a city- city has a patchwork of land uses where each has its own center or nucleus

Galactic City Model

Describes the spread of cities outwards from the central business district to suburbs, leaving a declining inner city

Edge Cities

Mini-downtowns of hotels malls restaurants and office complexes emerged at key locations along transportation routes, nodes of economic activity that developed in the periphery of large cities

Griffin-Ford Model

Often used to describe Latin American cities, placing a two part CBD at the center of the city- traditional market center adjacent to a modern high rise center

Commercial Spine

High quality housing in the Griffin-Ford model, surrounded by theaters, restaurants, parks and other amenities

Favelas

Neighborhoods in Latin American cities in which extreme poverty, homelessness, and lawlessness are common

Informal Economic Zone

Area that thrives with curbside, car-side, and stall-based businesses that often hire people temporarily and do not follow all business regulations

Squatter Settlements

Growth of informal settlements built, densely populated areas built without coordinated planning and sufficient public services for electricity, water, and sewage. Often results from rapid influx of migrants to cities who reside wherever they can find space

McGee Model

Describes the land use in many of the larger cities in SE Asia where the focus of the modern city is often a former colonial port zone

Zoning Ordinances

Regulations that define how property in specific geographic regions can be used

Urban Planning

A process of promoting growth and controlling changes in land use

Filtering

Houses pass from one social group to another- often as the wealthiest move to new homes, less wealthy move into the homes that they leave

Urban Infill

A way to reduce urban sprawl on the outer edges of a city

Infrastructure

Facilities and systems that serve the population, critical to the functioning of any city

Municipal

The local government, or the services provided by the local government

Annexation

Process of adding land to a city’s legally defined territory

Unincorporated Areas

Populated regions that do not fall within the legal boundary of any city or municipality

Public Transportation

Movement of people by buses, subway, light rail, and train within a city that is operated by a government agency

Smart-growth policies

Urban planners and developers use these to combat urban sprawl and create a new vision for cities that are more sustainable and equitable

Greenbelts

Areas of undeveloped land around an urban area

Slow-growth cities

Cities that adopt policies to slow the outward spread of urban areas and place limits on building permits to encourage a denser, more compact city

Mixed-use neighborhoods

Largely walkable areas where there is unlikely to be a clear separation between residential and commercial uses

Redlining

Process by which banks refuse loans to those who want to purchase and improve properties in certain urban areas

Blockbusting

People of one ethnic group, usually middle-class whites, could be frightened into selling their homes at low prices among hearing that a family of another group was moving into the neighborhood

Gentrification

The process of wealthier residents moving into a neighborhood and making it unaffordable for existing residents

Environmental Justice

Disproportionate exposure of minorities and the poor to pollution and its impact, plus unequal protection of their rights under the law

Gated Communities

Building of walled or fenced neighborhoods with limited access and entry points

Ecological Footprint

The impact of human activity on the environment

Brownfield

Dilapidated building and polluted or contaminated soils on the landscape