APHG Unit 6 Vocab

Annexation

Annexation

Legally adding land area to a city in the United States.

Boomburbs

A sprawling suburban area experiencing significant growth in population and prosperity

Borchert’s Model

Consists of 5 epochs that refer to 5 distinct periods in the history of US urbanization. Each epoch is characterized by the impact of a particular transport technology on the creation and differential rates of growth of American cities.

Brownfields

Transition zones near the CBD that are abandoned industrial and commercial facilities where expansion is sometimes complicated by real or perceived environmental contamination.

Census Tract

An area delineated by the US bureau of the Census for which statistics are published; in urbanized areas, they correspond roughly to neighborhoods.

Edge Cities

A large node of office and retail activities on the edge of an urban area.

Entrepot

A port or trading post where merchandise can be imported and then exported without paying import duties

Exurbia

The small communities lying beyond the suburbs of a city

Filtering

A process of change in the use of a house, from single-family owner-occupancy to abandonment.

Galactic City

A model of  an inner city with large suburban residential and business areas surrounding it. These areas are tied together by transportation nodes, like beltways, to avoid traffic congestion

Gentrification

A process of converting an urban neighborhood from a predominantly low-income, renter-occupied area to a predominantly middle-class, owner-occupied area.

Greenbelt

A ring of land maintained as parks, agriculture, or other types of open space to limit the sprawl of an urban area.

Infill

The rededication of land in an urban environment, usually open-space, to new construction.

Megacity

A city with 10 million or more people

Metacity

A massive sprawling conurbation of more than 20 million people

Megalopolis

An extensive urban area resulting from the expansion of several cities or towns so that they coalesce

Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA)

In the United States, a central city of at least 50,000 population, the country within which the city is located, and adjacent counties meeting one of several tests indicating a functional connection to the central city.

Micropolitan Statistical Area

An urbanized area of between 10,000 and 50,000 inhabitants, the county in which it is found, and adjacent counties tied to the city.

NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard)

Opposition by residents to a proposal for a new development close to them.

Public Housing

Housing owned by the government; in the United States, it is rented to residents with low incomes and the rents are set at 30% of the families’ incomes.

Redlining

A process by which banks draw lines on a map and refuse to lend money to purchase or improve property within the boundaries.

Renovated Housing

An alternative to demolishing housing that instead fixes up and improves the housing.

Scattered Site Housing

Public housing built throughout an urban area rather than being concentrated in a single neighborhood.

Smart Growth

Legislation and regulations to limit suburban sprawl and preserve farmland.

Suburban Sprawl

Progressive spread of development over the suburban landscape, often not contiguous.

Squatter Settlement

An area within a city in a less developed country in which people illegally establish residences on land they do not own or rent and erect homemade structures.

Suburbanization

Migration from cities to the area surrounding them.

Underclass

A group in society prevented from participating in the material benefits of a more developed society because of a variety of social and economic characteristics.

Urban Heat Island

Metropolitan areas that have higher temperatures than the locations around them

Urbanization

An increase in the percentage of the number of people living in urban settlements.

Urban Renewal

A program in which cities identify blighted inner-city neighborhoods, acquire the properties from private owners, relocate the residents and businesses, clear the site, build new roads and utilities, and turn the land over to private developers.

Zone In Transition

Area between the CBD and working class housing that has a mixture of industry and public housing.

Zoning

Dividing land into allowable uses such as residential, commercial, or industrial.

Urban Cluster

An urban area with between 2500 and 50,000 inhabitants

New Urbanism

Urban design movement that promotes environmentally friendly habits by creating walkable neighborhoods containing a wide range of housing and job types

Slow Growth Cities

Urban communities where the planners have put into place smart growth initiatives to decrease the rate at which the city grows horizontally to avoid the adverse effects of sprawl

Basic Industries

Industries that sell their products or services primarily to consumers outside the settlements.

Business Services

Services that primarily meet the needs of other businesses, including professional, financial, and transportation services.

CBD

The area of a city where retail and office activities are clustered.

Christaller’s Central Place Theory

A theory that explains the distribution of services, based on the fact that settlements serve as centers of market areas for services; larger settlements are fewer and farther apart than smaller settlements and provide services for a larger number of people who are willing to travel farther.

Density Gradient

The change in density in an urban area from the center to the periphery.

Economic Base

A community’s collection of basic industries

Market Area (Hinterland)

The area surrounding a central place from which people are attracted to use the place’s goods and services.

Nonbasic Industries

Industries that sell their products primarily to consumers in the community.

Offshore Financial Services

A country that encourages foreign companies to conduct financial transactions in their territory by providing very low tax rates and varying degrees of institutional secrecy.

Back-Office Functions

An office or center in which the administrative work of a business is carried out, as opposed to its dealings with customers, typically in LDCs.

Primate City

The largest settlement in a country, if it has more than twice as many people as the second-ranking settlement.

Primate City Rule

A pattern of settlements in a country such that the largest settlement has more than twice as many people as the second-ranking settlement.

Public Services

Services offered by the government to provide security and protection for citizens and businesses.

Range (of a service)

The maximum distance people are willing to travel to use a service.

Rank-Size Rule

A pattern of settlements in a country, such that the nth largest settlement is 1/n the population of the largest settlement.

City

An urban settlement that has been legally incorporated into an independent, self-governing unit.

Blockbusting

A process by which real estate agents convince white property owners to sell their houses at low prices out of fear that persons of color will soon move into the neighborhood.

Gravity Model

A model that holds that the potential use of a service at a particular location is directly related to the number of people in a location and inversely related to the distance people must travel to reach the service.

White Flight

The phenomenon of white people moving out of urban neighborhoods that are becoming racially or ethnically diverse, often to suburban areas

Command and Control Centers

The city level below world cities that are important service centers at a regional or subregional scale. These may contain major corporation headquarters, important banking facilities and educational, medical, and public institutions.

Consumer Services

Businesses that provide services primarily to individual consumers, including retail services and education, health, and leisure services,

Dependent Centers

Cities that provide relatively unskilled jobs and depend on decisions made by cities higher in the hierarchy.

Specialized Product-Service Centers

Cities that provide a narrow and highly specialized variety of services, serving as a node for a particular industry.

Bid Rent Theory

The theory that the value of the land is influenced by its relationship to the market. Most desirable and accessible land is near the market and costs the most.