Impacts of Urbanization

  • Urbanization   * Creation and growth of urban areas or cities and their surrounding developed land   * Urban growth     * The rate of increase of urban populations     * Urban areas grow in two ways       * Natural increase       * Immigration   * Rural people are pulled to urban areas in search of jobs, housing, educational opportunities, health care, entertainment, and freedom from religious, racial, and political conflicts   * Main advantages     * Access to education     * Sanitation     * Access to health care     * More jobs     * Better transportation   * Main disadvantages     * Worse air quality     * High population density       * Increase spread of communicable disease     * Noise pollution       * High levels of stress     * High crime rate
  • Advantages of Urbanization   * Cities     * Centers of economic development, innovation, education, industry, commerce, transportation, and jobs       * Better access to medical care, family planning, education, and social services   * Recycling is more economically feasible because concentrations of recyclable materials   * Concentrating people in cities helps preserve biodiversity by reducing the stress of wildlife habitats   * Central cities can save energy if residents rely more on energy-efficient mass transportation
  • Disadvantages of Urbanization   * Huge ecological footprints   * Lack of vegetation   * Water problems   * Concentrate air pollution   * Health issues   * Excessive noise   * Create different climates   * Light pollution
  • Phases of Urbanization   * People migrated from rural ares to large central cities   * Many people migrated from large central cities to suburbs and smaller cities   * Some people fled both cities and suburbs and migrated to developed rural areas
  • Urban Sprawl   * The growth of low-density development on the edges of cities and towns   * Major factors that promoted urban sprawl in the U.S.     * Ample land was available for most cities to spread outward     * Federal government loan guarantees for new single family homes for WWII veterans stimulated the development of suburbs starting around 1950     * Low cost gasoline and federal and state funding of highways encourages automobile use and the development of outlying tracts of land     * Technology has made possible to work from home     * Goof suburban school districts     * More space to raise children     * Higher quality of life
  • Environmental Problems   * Building homes in preserved areas causes habitat destruction/fragmentation   * Problems related to the high usage of fossil fuels, since more people drive to work and other places
  • Ecological Footprints   * Urban populations only occupy around 2% of the earth’s land are, but they consume 75% of its resources and produce 75% of all carbon dioxide emissions from human activities   * Most of the world’s cities are not self-sustaining systems   * Large areas of land must be destroyed and degrade to provide for the urban people, which results in the lowering of biodiversity   * Most urban dwellers live in an artificial environment that isolates themselves from natural areas that contain biodiversity
  • Lack of Vegetation   * Most trees, shrubs, and other plants are destroyed in urban areas in order to make way for development   * Vegetation is important because it absorbs air pollutants, gives off oxygen, cools the air through transpiration, provides shade, muffles noise, and provides habitats
  • Water Pollution   * As water demands increase, expensive reservoirs must be built, and deeper wells must be drilled     * Can deprive rural and wild ares of surface water and deplete groundwater   * Covering land with asphalt and concrete causes precipitation to runoff quickly and overload storm drains, causing flooding   * Global warming is causing urban dwellers in arid areas to have a shortage of water
  • Pollution   * High population densities and high resource consumption causes cities to produce most of the world’s air pollution, water pollution, and waste   * Pollution is produces in a small area and cannot be dispersed and diluted as easily as pollution in rural areas   * Most of the CO2 from human related sources are due to urban areas   * Nitrogen nutrients in runoff can disrupt the nitrogen cycle
  • Excessive Noise   * Urban dwellers are subject to noise pollution     * Any unwanted, disturbing, or harmful sound that impairs or interferes with hearing, causes stress, hampers concentration and work efficiency, or causes accidents   * Too much noise can kill someone and cause permanent hearing damage
  • Light Pollution   * The artificial light created   * Affects some plant and animal species     * Migrating birds       * Lured off course by the lights of a high rise building       * Fatally collide with the buildings
  • Heat Island Effect   * Cities are generally warmer than the suburbs and rural areas   * Causes     * The enormous amount of heat created by cars, factories, air conditioners, and heat-absorbing dark roofs and streets in cities creates an urban heat island, surrounded by cooler rural and suburban areas   * Consequences of the heat island effect     * Increases the formation of photochemical smog     * Increases dependence on air conditioning for cooling     * Increases energy consumption
  • Transportation   * Motor vehicles have many harmful effects on people and the environment     * Automobile accidents kill approximately 1.2 million people a year and injure another 15 million     * Kill about 50 million wild animals and family pets a year   * World’s largest source of outdoor pollution, and cause 30,000 to 60,000 premature deaths per year in the U.S.   * Fastest growing source of climate changing CO2 emissions   * Account for ⅔ of oil used in the form of gasoline in the U.S. and ⅓ of the world   * At least a third of urban land worldwide, and half in the U.S. is devoted to roads, parking lots, gasoline stations, and other automobile related uses
  • Reducing Automobile Use   * Charge a tax on gasoline to cover the estimated harmful cost of driving     * Such a tax would amount to about $3.18 per liter of gasoline in the U.S.
  • Alternatives to Car Ownership   * Mass transit rail     * Advantages       * Uses less energy       * Produces less air pollution       * Requires less land       * Causes fewer injuries and deaths       * Reduces car congestion in cities     * Disadvantages       * Expensive       * Commits riders to a schedule       * Causes noise and vibration   * Bicycles     * Advantages       * Affordable       * No pollution       * Quiet       * Require little parking space       * Easy to maneuver in traffic       * Require few resources     * Disadvantages       * Little protection in an accident       * No protection from bad weather       * Impractical for long trips       * Tiring       * Lack of secure parking   * Buses     * Advantages       * Can be rerouted       * Cost less to develop and maintain       * Can reduce car use and air pollution     * Disadvantages       * Can lose money due to low fares       * Can get caught in traffic and add to pollution       * Commits riders to a schedule       * Noisy   * Rapid Rail     * Advantages       * Reduce travel by car and plane       * Ideal for long trips       * Energy efficient     * Disadvantages       * Expensive       * Must operate along heavily used routes       * Cause noise and vibration
  • Conventional Land-Use Planning   * Urban and rural areas use some form of land-use planning to determine the best present and future use of each parcel of land     * Encourage future population growth and economic development, regardless of the environmental and social consequences   * Leads poorly controlled urban growth and sprawl     * 90% of the revenue of local governments used to provide public services comes from property taxes levied on building/property based on economic value   * Zoning     * Most widely used approach in which various parcels of land are designated for certain uses       * Can be used to control growth and protect areas from some types of development       * Disadvantages         * Threatens/destroys environment         * Favors high-priced housing over protecting environmentally sensitive areas and low-priced housing because of property tax revenue from high-priced developments
  • Smart Growth   * Limits and regulations     * Limit building permits     * Urban growth boundaries     * Greenbelts around cities     * Public review of new development   * Zoning     * Encourage mixed use of housing and small businesses     * Concentrate development along mass transportation routes     * Promote high-density clutter housing developments   * Planning     * Ecological land use planning     * Environmental impact analysis     * Integrated regional planning     * State and national planning   * Protection     * Preserve existing open space     * Buy new open space     * Buy development rights that prohibit certain types of development on land parcels   * Taxes     * Tax land, not buildings     * Tax land on value of use   * Tax breaks     * For owners not agreeing to allow certain types of developments     * For cleaning up and developing abandoned urban sites   * Revitalization and New Growth     * Revitalize existing cities/towns     * Build well-planned new towns and villages within cities