Urban Environments (Geography IB)

Urban

An area of habitation that provides services for payment to the surrounding countryside. Offers a variety of services to the public, can include manufacturing, or breadth of shops available for consumers

Rural

Dwelling or group of dwellings which solely function as housing for farm workers. Lacks public services

Settlement

All types of places where people live

Site

Physical location of the settlement on a global scale.

Site factors include terrain, climate, vegetation etc

Situation

Location of a place relative to its surroundings.

Hinterland

The area surrounding an urban place

Primary industry

Obtain natural resources sourced directly from earth

Agriculture, mining, forestry

Secondary industry

Converts raw materials provided by primary industries into products for consumers.

Manufacturing processes → processing and fabricating

Tertiary industry

Provides services

Health, banking, accounting and restaurants

Quaternary industry

Provide knowledge-based services such as information technology, information generation and sharing, research and development, education and design

Threshold population

Amount of people needed for a settlement to be viable

Urban hierarchy

A reflection of the different sized settlements which reflects the ranges and threshold populations of goods and services that people demand within the area

High order goods (low frequency)

Goods purchased less frequently. Generally expensive goods

Low order goods (high frequency)

Goods and services that people demand locally, therefore have a short range

Primate city

The largest city in a country, which has a population of half or a third of the nations entire population

Bid-rent theory

Retailers are able to pay a high rent cost, but are only willing to do so when in a highly accessible location. As a means of making profit, being in an accessible location with high foot traffic is important for retailers

Distance decay

Willingness to travel diminishes as distance increases

Urban growth

Shanty housing

Settlement of impoverished people who live in poor housing conditions

• Houses constructed with cheap materials (corrugated iron, fabric or wood)

• Found in abandoned areas (near train stations, rivers)

Urbanisation

Measurement of the proportion of the population living in urban areas at a given time

Urban growth

Raw increase in the quantity of people living in urban places

Centripetal movement (inward)

refers to the movement of people to urban areas. Includes rural-urban migration, gentrification and re-urbanisation

Centrifugal movement (outward)

refers to the movement of people out of urban areas. Includes urban sprawl, suburbanisation and counter urbanisation

Gentrification

middle class residents chose to move to run down inner city areas for the intention of renovating old infrastructure. Old building are then restored to their original quality, therefore providing them with considerable profit.

Example: Port Melbourne, New York

Rural-urban migration

Movement of people from rural areas to urban areas.

Examples: China, Papua New Guinea

Re-urbanisation

when people move back into inner city areas where populations had previously declined due to a range of social, economic and environmental issues

Examples: Docklands

Counter urbanisation

Suburbanisation

Overall movement and resettlement of people from inner city locations to vast new areas of housing further from the CBD

Urban sprawl

Rapid expansion of the geographic extent of cities and towns

Exurbanisation

Affluent people move from the city to rural places

Green infrastructure

Structures which work with nature to bring environmental benefits to the population

Examples: Central Park NY, Melbourne Botanical gardens

Grey infrastructure

Determine a city’s layout or urban morphology

Examples: Princes Highway in Melbourne, Pacific Coast Highway California

Deindustrialisation

The long-term, absolute decline in employment in the manufacturing sectors of an economy. It refers to a loss of jobs rather than a decline in productivity

Causes of deindustrialisation

Globalisation

Consumer preference

Technological advancements

Government policies

Urban microclimate

climate of any small area that is different to it's surrounding area

Urban heat island

 a type of urban microclimates in which an urban area becomes warmer than the surrounding area

Traffic congestion

When the density of cars on a road excess the carrying capacity of the road. This is evident in slower travel speed for vehicles, longer travel times and queues of vehicles

Factors of traffic congestion

• More cars on the road

• Road works → detour

• Peak hour

• Accidents / crashes

• Weather

Resilient city

Capacity of people, communities, businesses and systems within a city to survive, adapt and thrive no matter what kind of chronic stresses and acute shocks they experience

Eco city

a human settlement modeled on the self-sustaining resilient structure and function of natural ecosystems