15.1 The Origin and Influences of Urbanization

The Growth of Cities

• For most of human history, the vast majority of people lived in rural areas.

• During the Neolithic period, agriculture enables people to live in more permanent settlements.

  • People would settle in these clusters for trade, defense, religion, and more.

• Urbanization is the process of the development of dense concentrations of people into settlements.

  • Historically, this leads to the rise of places like the Nile River Valley, the Indus River Valley, and the Wei River Valley in China.

  • For thousands of years, only a small portion of humans were urban dwellers.

• Urbanization increased rapidly during the Industrial Revolution.

  • As factories were built in cities, people were attracted to the jobs they offered.

• Since then, new cities have developed all over the world and old ones have grown further.

• The UN projects that by 2050, 68% of the world population will be urban.

• The growth of cities occurred quickly, going from 751 million to 4.2 billion urban dwellers; 1950-2018.

  • Depending on how one defines an urban center, those numbers may be even higher.

  • After analyzing satellite images, some estimate as high as 85% of people live in cities.

• All in all, cities are an important part of how humans live and an important topic in human geography.

  • Urban area: A city and its surrounding suburbs

• Beyond this basic definition, the concept of what is urban varies considerably.

• Many entities define ‘urban’ on the basis of how many people are living in a cluster, but not a set area.

  • India, uniquely, classifies as urban area as any place in which fewer than 25 percent of working men are employed in agriculture.

• Only a few countries consider population density as a measure of urbanization.

• Cities and towns provide for their residents in a number of ways.

  • Political, medical, financial, educational services, infrastructure, transportation, and communication are all reasonably expected.

• While a city has set boundaries, its area of influence often extends beyond those boundaries.

• Metropolitan area: A city and the surrounding areas that are influenced economically and culturally by the city

  • Suburbs are less densely populated residential and commercial areas around a city.

  • Many people who live in suburbs commute into the city to work and associate themselves with the city’s culture.

Sites and Situation

• The origin, functions, and growth of a city depend in varying degrees on its site and situation.

  • Recall that site is the actual place or location of the settlement and land it was built upon.

  • Situation refers to the connections between its site and other sites.

Site

• Certain sites are more likely to attract settlements than others.

• Features such as favorable topography, resources, locations on trade routes, and easily defendable land are appealing.

  • Generally, flat land is preferable for building, but if defense is an issue, they may choose sites better suited for those needs.

• Key natural resources like iron, coal, and a good water supply fuel the growth of settlements.

  • Settlements also grow around places with rare materials. In areas with gold rushes, towns seem to pop up overnight.

• Sites located on transportation systems attract settlements as well.

• Early settlements often developed on islands and natural harbors.

  • Islands offer access to water routes and are defensible.

  • Harbors provide boats and ships with good docking opportunities, therefore being a good place for trade.

• Trade routes also played a significant role in the sites where cities are located.

  • Rivers are historically important avenues for trade. Cities often grew where two or more would meet.

• Cities also grow where routes converge, such as the mouth of a river, where they pour into a lake or sea.

  • With the advent of railroads, junctions also became influential in dictating new sites.

• Businesses want to be on trade routes as it decreases the time for transporting goods.

• Cities also grow where goods had to be moved from one mode of transport to another.

  • People were needed for the labor, and warehouses were built for the goods to be stored between journeys.

• Factors that make for a quality site can change as technology advances.

  • The development of waterpower resulted in settlements developing along fall lines with waterfalls or rapids.

Situation

• A city’s situation is equally important to its origins, functions, and growth or decline.

  • The relative location of a city often dictates its functions.

  • Given the importance of trade, cities are often along major trade networks.

• A city’s situation might change over time as new technology lessens the impact of old connections.

  • New connections may make some positions more advantageous than they had been.

• As trade networks change, cities develop to respond to these new connections.

• As globalization fuels the transport of goods across the ocean, growth often occurs is cities with ports.

15.2 Factors that Influence Urban Growth

Transportation and Community Networks

• One of the most influential factors in urban growth is transportation.

• Waterways, railroads, and highways provide a way for raw materials to get to factories, goods to get to market, and for workers to get to jobs.

  • Ongoing advancements in transportation and communication continue to influence urban growth.

• For centuries, the main communication networks were trade routes, as information traveled alongside goods.

  • This changed in the 19th century with the telegraph, and later, the telephone.

• These and later advances in telecommunication technology revolutionized business, how people lived, and worked.

• The telephone made business more efficient.

  • Factories could take orders from customers far away.

  • This increased production, which subsequently increased the need for labor.

  • Today, high-speed internet and wi-fi services allow businesses to instantly communicate.

• Advances in communication do not affect all areas equally.

  • Because there are more customers in urban areas, companies provide services to them first.

  • New businesses look for areas with already strong networks.

• Access to the internet is just as important as access to rivers and highways was in the past.

• The telecommunication industry also fuels urban growth.

  • The industry is huge and employs tens of thousands of people.

  • They tend to locate where there is access to an educated workforce.

  • Today’s technological hubs draw workers from other areas like factories did a century ago.

  • This economic pull factor contributes to further urbanization.

Population Growth and Migration

• Rural-to-urban migration causes urbanization due to a combination of push and pull factors.

  • As the population of a rural area increases, there are typically less economic opportunities there.

  • For farmers, environmental or economic push factors may cause them to move.

• Cities offer jobs, or least the perception of better work, for potential migrants.

  • For some, cities offer more freedom, safety, better schools, healthcare, and more.

• As countries develop economically, urbanization follows.

• Today, rural-to-urban migration mainly drives urbanization in peripheral and semi-peripheral countries.

Economic Development

• Although economies vary from country to country, all cities serve important economic functions.

  • A city’s functions depend largely on its location and its history.

• The largest, more influential cities tend to be centers of diverse business services and government or public-service centers.

  • Other cities serve specific functions, like Washington, D.C. and its purpose of government.

• Some cities are military centers, some are processing sites for mines, and some are known for manufacturing.

• Others can be consumer-oriented centers, like cities that attract retirees or resort communities.

• Foundational economic activity, or basic industry, gives rise to secondary industries that meet people’s needs for housing, food, transportation, etc.

  • Together, they contribute to a city’s economic development.

• The functions of a city tend to change overtime as a result of advances or changes in economic or population trends.

• While most cities have expanded as the world’s population has grown and urbanized, some cities face decline when their specialties are no longer relevant.

  • Manufacturing cities in the U.S., for example, fell into economic and population decline as the industry moved to the southern U.S. or other countries.

Government Policies

• Government policies can also influence urbanization.

  • Governments at all levels seek to attract businesses and boost the economy.

  • Regionally, city governments may compete by offering tax or financial incentives for businesses to relocate.

  • Local governments may join together to market a region’s advantages for economic development.

  • Together with a variety of other policies, businesses can be drawn to a city.

• Anything that makes a city more attractive will contribute to its growth.

  • Safety and security are important to businesses and residents alike, so cities with adequate policing and safety or judicial services may grow faster.

• Policies that encourage livability, the combination of factors that make one place a better place to live, also aid in cities’ growth.

  • Livability factors include housing, transportation, the environment, health and public services, civic life, and economic opportunities.

  • Governments can improve it by providing access to transportation, quality education, and reliable and efficient city services.

Suburbanization, Sprawl, and Decentralization

• In the United States, changes in urban transportation during the 19th and 20th centuries led cities to grow as people moved outward from the city center.

  • With the development of trolleys, workers no longer needed to live within walking distance of their work.

  • This decentralization caused new areas to develop outside of the core areas of cities.

• Further innovations such as rail lines and highways allow people to live increasingly further from their place of work.

  • The process of suburbanization causes the space of a metropolitan area to expand, but the population of the central city does not necessarily grow.

  • As cities grow outward, the amount of land per person increases.

• The land surrounding cities is relatively inexpensive which allows developers to build neighborhoods of single-family homes.

  • Upper- and middle-class families were drawn to the suburbs by the promise of low crime, good schools, and larger homes.

• Sometimes urban areas expand in an unplanned and uncontrolled way, covering large expanses in housing, commercial development, and roads.

  • Urban sprawl: Areas of poorly planned, low-density development surrounding a city

  • While central cities are generally compact and well-planned, the sprawl is the result of chaotic urban growth.

• As land developed on the edge of cities, often with no plan, infrastructure may not keep up.

  • Urban sprawl has become common in U.S. metropolitan areas, particularly in cities that developed alongside freeway expansion.

• It was only after World War II that urban sprawl became an issue.

  • The growing popularity and affordability of cars meant that residential areas were not limited to near streetcars or rail lines.

  • The postwar baby boom meant that many families were looking for single-family homes with a yard.

• The expansion of cities has given rise to new land-use forms.

• Edge city: A type of community located on the outskirts of a larger city with commercial centers with office space, retail complexes, and other amenities typical of an urban center

• Over the years, developers have built residential housing in edge cities as well.

  • Edge cities are perceived as destinations for work, shopping, entertainment, and housing.

• Boomburb: A suburb that has grown rapidly into a large and sprawling city with more than 100,000 residents

  • The population of boomburbs often exceeds that of nearby big cities.

  • Unlike edge cities, boomburbs are often made up of many planned communities that have begun to merge together.

• Exurb: A typically fast-growing community outside of or on the edge of a metropolitan area where the residents and community are closely connected to the central city and suburbs

  • Exurbs are often low-density residential communities that may include wealthy estates or small rural towns.

• Critics attribute a number of negative effects to suburbanization, such as a lack of identity or sense of place.

• The dependence on automobiles contributes to traffic congestion, air pollution, and other environmental issues.

Reducing Sprawl

• Urban planners have undertaken efforts to address urban sprawl.

  • In many places, revitalization and redevelopment of decaying areas have helped to lure people back inside city limits.

  • Revitalizing focuses on instilling new life into a community through beatification measures.

• Redevelopment involves converting an existing property to another, more desirable use.

  • It can help address sprawl be created mixed-use neighborhoods where people can walk to any service they want or need.

• Infill: Redevelopment that identifies and develops vacant parcels of land within previously built areas

  • Infill is another method used to counter sprawl. It focuses on areas already connected by transportation and other public infrastructure.

15.3 The Size and Distribution of Cities

Patterns of Urban Location

• Cities and towns do not operate independently, but instead as a network of interdependent systems that function at many scales.

  • The urban system includes networks of human interactions and connections with both natural and artificial environments.

• Urban places evolve according to the linkages among them.

  • Traditionally, the most important links were transportation routes between/within cities.

  • More recently, communication links have become equally as important.

• Individual cities within any urban system differ in size and influence.

  • Historical cities often competed for power and wealth. They gained it by conquering surrounding areas and subjugating other cities.

• As in ancient times, modern cities operate within an interconnected urban hierarchy.

• Different cities have different functions in the system, with larger, more influential cities landing higher.

  • Cities may function as centers of finance, commerce, arts, education, or tourism.

• Geographers have identified common attributes and features and developed models to describe the urban network.

Gravity Model

• In urban geography, the gravity model is used to discuss the degree to which two places interact with one another.

  • According to the model, cities have an area of influence based on their size.

  • Commerce, traffic, the number of visitors, and communication linkages are all affected by how large a city is.

• The model assumes that the interaction of people and goods between cities is proportional to the product of their populations/output of goods, and inversely proportional to the distance between them.

• The gravity model has been used to predict whether people will be more likely to visit, shop, or do business in one city or another.

• It’s important to note that this model, like the other theories in this section, are based on the assumption that there are no other forces on the cities.

  • This is obviously not realistic, so the model only works as a large generalization.

Rank-Size Rule

• The places people live are linked to form interconnected, interdependent urban systems.

  • These urban systems consist of hierarchies of places of different sizes, each serving different functions.

• The patterns of functional interaction between most places result in predictable relationships between population size and their rank in the urban system.

• Rank-size rule: Explanation of size of cities within a country; states the second-largest city will be one-half the size of the largest, the third largest will be one-third the size of the largest, and so on

  • The rule explains how the population size of cities within a country may be distributed.

• It uses a country’s largest city as a baseline and ranks all other cities in relation to it.

  • The rule states that the second largest city will be one-half the size of the largest city, the third largest city will be one-third the size of the largest city, and so on.

• Not all countries exhibit such patterns; some follow the primate-city rule, which you’ll learn about below.

  • Libya, Nigeria, Australia, and Brazil are examples of countries in which the rank-size rule is fairly accurate.

• The rule is not exact, and fits some countries more than others.

  • The model does not take into account a country’s size or distance between cities.

Primate-City Rule

• In some countries, the rank-size rule does not apply because of the disproportionate size of one city.

• Primate city: The largest city in a country, which far exceeds the next city in population size and importance

  • Where a primate city exists, the country will have few or no other large or medium-sized cities.

• The existence of a primate city implied an unbalanced level of development.

  • The population is pulled disproportionately pulled to the city for economic opportunities.

• Primate cities have so much more influence that they can skew development throughout the country.

• Many primate cities can trace their origin to colonialism, as colonists concentrated political and economic activities in one place.

Central Place Theory

• Central place theory: A theory used to describe the spatial relationship between cities and their surrounding communities

  • Developed by German geographer Walter Christaller in 1933.

• The theory states that there is a central place as a settlement that provides goods and services for the surrounding area.

• There are several types of settlements within an urban hierarchy.

  • The city is a large central place with smaller towns, villages, and hamlets surrounding it.

• Central place theory observes a pattern and order in this distribution.

• The pattern is based on consumers’ behavior and decisions regarding goods and services they spend their money on.

• According to the theory, the main function of cities and towns is to provide goods and services to the people in the area.

• The size and location of a central place is determined by the market’s threshold and range

  • Threshold: In central place theory, the number of people needed to support a certain good or service

  • Range: In central place theory, the distance that someone is willing to travel for a good or service

    • High-order goods + services which are more expensive and desirable have large thresholds and lower ranges.

    • High-order goods + services are located in cities that have the minimum threshold to support them.

• These desirables draw people in from the towns, smaller settlements, and rural areas.

• Low-order goods include those found in grocery stores and other common retail stores.

  • Consumers are less willing to travel long distances for these.

• These consumer choices create a hierarchy of places, from many small settlements offering low-order goods and fewer large towns with high-orders.

  • Within this urban hierarchy, cities serve larger populations and are far from one another.

    • Towns and other small communities are closer and distributed among cities.

• Cities provide more than towns, so they become the core around which everything else is found.

  • Moving outward from the city, settlements become increasingly smaller and service less people.

• The pattern that results is best illustrated as a series of hexagons with the city in the center.

• Central place theory has limitations. The theory doesn’t account for real-world geography.

  • It is based on a flat surface with no natural, political, or other barriers.

• In reality, natural features like waterways or mountains often act as deterrents to the regular spacing of communities.

  • Transportation is also not even, so the range for goods + services is not the same in every direction.

• The theory also assumes that the retail market is the most important influence, but cities actually serve various purposes such as administrative centers.

• Central place theory is still useful for gaining an understanding about the hierarchy between cities and patterns in their spatial distribution.

  • Larger cities are generally spaced farther apart than are smaller towns and villages.

• This urban distribution is connected to population size, distances between the centers, and commerce.

15.4 Cities and Globalization

Cities Around the World

• Cities exist on every continent except Antarctica.

  • Tokyo, Japan, with 37 million people, is the largest city in the world, followed by New Delhi with 29 million.

• The number and size of urban places are increasing worldwide, but they are growing fastest in peripheral countries.

  • Cities have grown especially rapidly in the last several decades.

    • In 1950, only New York and Tokyo had populations over 10 million people.

• Megacity: A city with a population of more than 10 million

  • According to the United Nations, there were 33 megacities in 2018, and by 2030 that number will have risen to 43.

    • Many cities approaching megacity status are in Asia and Africa.

• With the growth not stopping in megacities, a new term was coined.

• Metacity: A city with a population of more than 20 million

  • In 2020, there were nine metropolitan areas that had achieved metacity status.

    • Note that these population measurements refer to the metropolitan area, not the city boundaries.

• The primary driving force behind massive urban growth in the periphery is population growth.

  • Many peripheral countries have birth rates far above replacement levels.

  • Many rural-to-urban migrants are young people who are likely to start families.

• In many peripheral countries, push factors include the lack of employment in rural areas.

• Farmers may give up land because they cannot make a living or because of the pull factor of of better employment opportunities in metropolitan areas.

  • People who live in poverty in the city often are far better off than those in poverty in rural areas.

What Makes a World City

• World city: A city that wields political, cultural, and economic influence on a global scale

  • World cities are at the top of the global urban hierarchy.

• They have influence not only over their country or region, but also across the globe.

• World cities act as focal points of economic, social, and informational networks.

• World cities provide multiple functions to people in their region of influence.

  • They are major centers of communication, commerce, and markets.

• Trade and professional associations as well as nongovernmental organizations are concentrated in world cities.

  • Many of the world’s most powerful media organizations are headquartered in world cities.

• These cities also are home to fashion, design, entertainment, and cultural industries.

• World cities are not necessarily the largest in population. Rather, they are the most influential.

  • World cities have international airports and serve as destinations for both visitors and migrants.

• World cities also have many connections and interactions with other cities across the globe.

• Geographers commonly group world cities into tiers depending on the extent of their influence.

  • London and New York City make up the top tier, some include Tokyo and Paris, and even Shanghai.

• Other world cities lead for other reasons.

  • Seats of government like Moscow and Washington, D.C.

  • Centers of culture, such as Los Angeles and Toronto.

  • Global financial services, such as Hong Kong and Frankfurt, Germany.

How are World Cities Linked?

• All cities are part of a interconnected urban system, world cities especially.

• As centers of innovation and trade, world cities give rise to new ideas, goods, and services, which then diffuse to other parts of the world.

  • Goods are typically manufactured in or around cities and pass through several more cities as they make their way to their final destination

  • Global events, such as the Olympics or the World’s Fair, are usually held in world cities.

• Cities up and down the world city hierarchy compete in multiple ways to gain a more prominent role in that hierarchy.

• More prominence draws in business, investment, and human talent.

• A world city’s role on the global stage affects its identity and its culture.

  • Certain elements within a world city can become intertwined with its identity, such as landmarks or notable places.