Urban environments

Question 1

Urbanisation

Answer 1

Urbanisation is the process by which an increasing percentage of a country’s population comes to live in towns and cities

Question 2

How do urban settlements differ from rural ones?

Answer 2

Way of life: faster-paced
Size: larger
Density of buildings and people: compact and high
Economy and employment: finance, service, and manufacturing

Question 3

The growth of urban populations

Answer 3

is due to:
* The decline of industry in developed countries as the industries moved overseas to emerging countries (cheaper workforce, incentives, tax breaks, etc)
* This led to industrial growth in emerging countries and ‘pulled’ people from rural regions to urban areas with the hope of a better life and employment.

Question 4

High rates of urbanisation occur in developing countries because…

Answer 4

• Most new economic development is concentrated in the big cities.
• **Push-pull **factors lead to high rates of rural-to-urban migration
• Cities are experiencing higher levels of natural increase in population

Question 5

What is a megacity?

Answer 5

A city with a population of more than **10million **people.
Eg. Tokyo, Beijing, New york, Los Angeles, Buenos Aires

Question 6

What is a millionaire city?

Answer 6

A city with a population of more than a million people

Question 7

Causes of rapid urban growth

Answer 7

• Natural increase - decreased DR and higher BR
• Urban pull facotrs (improved education, more job opportunities)
• Rural push factors (limitied healthcare, Lack of opportunities, monotonous lifestyle)

Question 8

Urbanisation pathway

Answer 8

1. Developing - largely rural population of subsistence farmers.
2. Emerging - Rapid rural to urban migration leads to accelerating rate of urbanisation.
3. **Emerged **- Rates of urbanisation continue but start to slacken off; suburban spread.
4. **Developed **- Percentage of urban peaks and most people now live in towns.
5. Counter urbanisation - In advanced economies decentralisation sets in; people move to smaller towns & cities & semi-rural areas

Question 9

Urban process timeline

Answer 9

• Urban settlements first appear as a result of agglomeration.
• As towns grow, they expand outwards by a process known as suburbanisation.
• Urban settlements continue to prosper and grow, people move out of the city/towm and commute to work. (dormitory settlements > transport links)
• **Counter-urbanisation **
  * Urban regeneration - investment of capital in the revival of old urban areas by either improving what is there or clearing away and rebuilding.
• Urban re-imaging - changing the image and reputation of an urban area and the way people view it.

Question 10

Counter-urbanisation

Answer 10

The movement of people from an urban area into the surrounding rural region.
Causes:
* Mobility and accessibility: increase in public transport and road developemt making it easier to access to rural areas.
* Increased wealth= housing and travel more affordable.
* Agricultural decline: more land becomes available for housing.
* Green belt: people need to go further out to get the rural life they are looking for.
* Second homes and early retirement

Question 11

Factors affecting the rate of urbanisation

Answer 11

* Speed of economic development - faster the growth of secondary and tertiary sectors, the faster the growth of urbanisation.
* Rate of population growth - economic growth needs a supply of labour. This demand can be met by natural increase in urban population or rural-urban migration

Question 12

Reasons for the growth of megacities

Answer 12

• Economic development - act as service centres within the formal economic sector.
• Population growth - young people are drawn in to live in megacities. This leads to internal growth where people who have moved have children.
• Economies of scale - cheaper to provide goods and services in one place. Commincation and transport are centralised.
• Multiplier effect - As a city prospers is draws more people and business in > inward investment > further need for skills and labour > cycle multiplies the positive effects > growth continues.

Question 13

World/global cities

Answer 13

• World or global cities can be any size but exert particular influences around the globe.
• They are considered prestigious, with status and power .
• They are critical hubs in the global economy.
• The three top (alpha) world cities are London, New York, and Tokyo. These are the financial centres of the world.
• There are only four world cities in the southern hemisphere:
  Sydney
  Rio de Janeiro
  Sao Paulo
  Buenos Aires

Question 14

Issues of Urbanisation

Answer 14

• Congestion- lack of housing,transportation issues, informal settlements -> overcrowding.
• Transport - Transport systems become easily overcrowded, high number of vehicles create high levels of pollution.
• Housing - housing is expensive > leading to people living in cramped conditions with poor sanitation.
• Employment - high levels of unemployment, underemployment, self-employment, informal employment.
• Crime - due to lack of job opportunites and unemployment
  * Education - rapid growth means lack of schools, colleges and uni’s
• Environmental issues - waste disposal, no sanitation, air pollutiom, water pollution, water shortages, noise pollution, visual pollution, unregualted urban spread into surrounding countryside.

Question 15

Urban land values

Answer 15

All urban settlements have recurring features:
*A central business district (CBD)
* Industrial areas
* Different residential districts
* Shopping centres
* High-rise buildings
* Cultural and leisure areas
* Multi-storey car parks
* Bus and railway stations
These features have created segregated land use over time

Question 16

Distribution of urban Land values

Two main reasons

Answer 16

• The value of the land: land value varies across urban area - usually decreasing from the centre outwards.
• Higher land prices are found along main roads, urban hubs, around ring roads.
• **The location of the land: **
• Location is very important to value
• The closer to key functions, the higher the value.
• Accessiblity and desirability increase land value.

Question 17

Four zones in a town/city

Answer 17

All cities and towns grow outwards and expand due to it’s development overtime.
* A central core: the oldest part of a city, (CBD) e.g. banks, retail and commercial offices
An inner-city ring: also known as the twilight zone. Older, terraced ‘worker’ housing. Older industrial areas. Areas are centred around transport links.
A suburban ring: residential area. Semi and detached housing with gardens.
Smaller retail premises.
An urban fringe: outer edges of the city. Housing is clustered into estates
Some industrial land use. Accessibility is best.
This model is simple as different cities have the same features but different characteristics based on its development and uses.

Question 18

Residential pattern

Answer 18

• People will often live near to others they consider the same: ethnicity, religion ect.
• Creating self-organised segregation.
• Wealthier peole buy large homes in the best locations > forcing less well-off people to live in cramped housing in the worst areas.
• Many are forced to live in small spaces creating high-density residential areas and unequal sorting in an urban area.

Question 19

Urban challenges in Developed cities

Social

Answer 19

• Social services and housing
• Poverty and deprivation
• Ethnic segregation
• Quality of life
• Ageing population
• Tourism and crime

Question 20

Urban challenges in Developed cities

Economic

Answer 20

• Globalisation
• Food supply
• Transport and traffic
• Energy supply
• Deindustrialisation
• Service provision

Question 21

Urban challenges in Developed cities

Environmental

Answer 21

• Pollution and waste disposal
• Sustainability
• Ecological footprint
• Energy, land, water
• Hazard risk
• Green space

Question 22

Urban challenges in Emerging cities

Housing issues

Answer 22

• Availability and affordability of housing cannot keep up with the rate of the urban population increase.
• This leads to informal settlements. Usually found: areas of no economic value, urban fringes, along main roads/railways, clinging to sides of slopes.

Question 23

Informal settlements or Squatter settlements

Answer 23

Are also called:
Favelas in Brazil
**Shanty towns **in the West Indies and Canada
Bustees on the Indian subcontinent
Skid row in the USA
Townships in South Africa

Question 24

Mega-slums

Answer 24

some cities have ‘mega slums’, these are very large overcrowded areas usually within megacities. eg. Mumbai India, Neza Mexico city.

Question 25

Things squatter settlements suffer from

Answer 25

• Poor, overcrowded, small housing, built very close together using inadequate material.
• restricted access to water supplies
• Little to no sanitation facilities and no solid waste disposal, which leads to a polluted and degraded local environment.
• There are inadequate health facilities which, along with poor living conditions, increase sickness and death rates.

Question 26

Issues of the Informal Economy

Answer 26

• Megacities have rapidly growing populations and job creation cannot match the pace of growth = unemployment and underemployment
• People will often work on street corners doing informal work. eg. shining shoes, giving haircuts, selling food
• These jobs are often unskilled and labour-intensive and require little money to set up.
• The informal economy leaves cities without revenue to provide adequate services as workers pay no taxes.
• It also makes wages and working conditions difficult to regulate

Question 27

Urban pollution in megacities

Answer 27

• Energy supplies - electricity supplies are unreliable increasing power outages.
• Sanitation & water supplies - 1 bill people don’t have access to adequate supply of fresh, clean drinking water. 2 bill don’t have access to sanitation facilities. This is a serious health risk.
• Transportation - congestion due to too many different types of vechicles, adding to pollution and smog.

Question 28

Cycle of poverty

Answer 28

1. Child grows up in poverty
2. Disadvantaged in education and skills
3. Struggles to get a formal job
4. Fails to escape the povery cycle
5. Family remains in poverty

Question 29

Deprivation

Answer 29

Deprivation occurs when a person’s well-being falls below an acceptable minimum standard. The minimum standard, varies from country to country.
In the UK, there is a multiple deprivation index (MDI)
The UK MDI has 7 different indicators:
1. Income
2. Employment
3. Health
4. Education
5. Access to housing and services
6. Crime
7. Living environment
It is more than just not having enough money.

Question 30

Quality of life index

Answer 30

The Quality of Life Index (QLI) looks at the availability of eight different variables:
1. Political and economic stability
2. Legal system and civil rights
3. Health and medical services
4. Safety
5. Climate
6. Costs and incomes
7. Education
* The Index reflects the differences between emerging, developing and developed countries
* The higher the index number the better the quality of living in that area

Question 31

low quality of life

Answer 31

• Poverty and deprivation are passed on from one generation to the next.
• Children will tend to get less parental support and usually have to attend inadequate schools.
• They also tend to leave school early with few qualifications.
• Lack of qualifications means they cannot find well-paid employment.
• Children they have will be born into this cycle and so families remain ‘trapped’ and unable to improve their circumstances.
• This feeds into a lower quality of life

Question 32

Rural-Urban fringe

also called the urban fringe

Answer 32

• It’s where green open spaces meet built up areas of towns/cities.
• Growth at the urban fringe is due to counter-urbanisation, population growth, lack of space and land costs.
• These can be divided into push (negative factors causing people/businesses to leave. central urban areas)
• pull factors (positive factors pulling people/businesses to the rural-urban fringe)

Question 33

Push factors - The urban fringe

Answer 33

• Housing is old, congested, expensive
• Environmental pollution(noise,air)
• Companies (shops, offices, factories) cannot expand
• Brownfield sites are expensive to build on

Question 34

Pull factors - The urban fringe

Answer 34

• Land is cheaper (houses are larger, gardens)
• Factories can be more spacious + more parking
• Closeness to main roads allows quicker and easier commutes
• More flexible working

Question 35

What is found along the urban fringe?

Answer 35

Retail parks - large sphere of influence due to being easily accessible, free parking, the concentration of businesses in one place, longer opening hours, large choice of goods
Industrial estates - space for expansion, purpose-built road networks, cheaper land, sited away from housing.
Business parks - space is created for a nicer working environment, easier access and commute for workers.
Science parks - purpose-built to encourage research and development, high-tech industries and quaternary activities, close to a university.
Airports - increase in air traffic and low-cost carriers + airports feed into businesses on the fringe through imports and exports.

Question 36

Greenbelt

Answer 36

Green belts are a buffer between urban areas, as well as between the town/city and the countryside. It is a planning restriction to prevent urban sprawl.

Question 37

Brownfield site - Advantages

Answer 37

• Revises old and disused urban areas.
• Reduces the loss of countryside for agricultural or recreational use.
• Services (water, electricity) already in place.
• Located near main areas of employment.
• Reduces risk of squatter settlements developing.

Question 38

Brownfield site - Disadvantages

Answer 38

• More expensive because old building have to be cleared and made free of pollution.
• Often surrounded by rundown areas (not appealing).
• Higher levels of pollution

Question 39

Greenfield - advantages

Answer 39

• healthier environment
• Close to countryside leisure.
• Layout is not restricted.
• Quite cheap
• Rate of house building is faster
• Access and infrastructure easier to build.

Question 40

Greenfield - Disadvantages

Answer 40

• Valuable farmland lost
• Encourages further suburban sprawl
• Widlife and habitats lost or disturbed
• Recreational space lost
• Lacks access to public transport
• Development causes noise and light pollution for surrounding people.
• Cost of installing services (water, electricity)

Question 41

Sustainable Urban living

Definition

Answer 41

A town or city plans and develops itself in a way that offers a good quality of live to it’s residents without reducing the opportunities for future generations to enjou.

Question 42

Activities Urban areas can attempt to achieve sustainable living

Answer 42

• Reduce the reliance on fossil fuels through the use of renewable
• Energy efficient goods in public buildings, homes, offices and shops
• Use public rather than private transport to reduce pollution
• Provide green spaces for families to use
• Recycle water to conserve supplies
• Conserve cultural/historical buildings and environmental sites for future generations
• Minimise the use of greenfield sites and use brownfield sites instead
• Involve local communities and provide a range of employment

Question 43

Urban agriculture

Answer 43

• Urban agriculture- reduces poverty, improves health of community, creates a safe space.
• It is of particular benefit to women, and the urban poor, and adds to the ‘greening’ of the city along with reusing urban waste.
• eg. Brisbane, Australia includes both urban agriculture and green roofs in their action plan to meet predicted global climate change challenges.
• For places such as Kibera, and Nairobi, urban agriculture can be a way for mothers to introduce nutritional foods to their families, all of which improves social sustainability in a sprawling city.

Question 44

Economic sustainability

Answer 44

**Economic sustainability is where economic growth is supported without negatively impacting the environment, society or culture. **
* Many companies are starting to attempt to reduce their carbon footprint by focusing on how their business affects the environment.
Some methods include:
* Reduce the amount of packaging
* Recyclable packaging
* Trading locally
* Using renewable energy and other low-energy devices

Question 45

Masdar City in Abu Dhabi - Economic sustainability

Answer 45

• It is an economic free-zone commercial city with a high quality of life; and the lowest global environmental footprint which is all powered through renewable energy.
• The city is a mixed-use, sustainable community, including employment-generating land uses, residential areas, parks, plazas and neighbourhood amenities.
• There is total pedestrianisation within the city, with the transport network below ground.
• Streets and buildings are designed to help reduce the need for air conditioning, heating, and artificial light.
• Waste is as near to zero as possible, achieved through encouraging changes in behaviour and regulating materials which can be present in the city.
• All residents have to undertake 5 hours of sustainability education each year.

Question 46

Environmental sustainability

Answer 46

Urban environmental sustainability is looking at the whole of the city, from food to energy to waste management to green spaces and transport and infrastructure.
* public transport > reduces pollution and congestion.
* Encourage the use of** bicycles** eg. Bristol was the UK’s first city to promote cycling, investing in cycle lanes.
* Promote car sharing > dedicated carpool lanes makes getting around the city easier and quicker.
* Many cities have congestion charges for people who decide to drive into the city centre. eg. London has a strict congestion charge and has reduced its levels of pollution by approximately 25%.
* Ecotown developments - All homes have energy-saving measures, triple-glazed homes, extra insulation, solar panels and low energy lightbulbs and kitchen appliances, Green spaces to protect and enhance wildlife.

Question 47

Urban mangers

Answer 47

Stakeholders - an individual, group or organisation. Involved or intrested in the urban regeneration process.
For instance:
* Local planners and politicians that want change will help with any obstacles.
* Partnerships between local councils
* Property developers
* Businesses
* Local people
* Government
Effective urban management relies on three things:
1. Vision
2. Capital
3. Good relationships between public and private enterprise

Question 48

Stakeholders - level of involvement

Answer 48

• Choice of management option will depend on local stakeholders
• National governments either support or oppose the choice
  * International stakeholders may become involved once the decision has been made
• Charities/NGOs will most likely help when management involves self-help or re-development

Question 49

Stakeholders - Local level

Answer 49

• Residents of squatter settlements will support any project that will improve their living conditions.
• Nearby residents will be keen to have the squatter settlements removed.
• Urban planner’s vision will impact the squatter settlements.
• City councils will have the most influence on choice and resource management.
• Utility suppliers have to decide if services can be provided and at what cost.

Question 50

Stakeholders - National level

Answer 50

• Governments have a ‘cost’ consideration.
• There is also a political ‘game’ (what will gain the most votes)?
• There are numerous policy decisions to be made and prioritised.
• Many countries have home-grown charities set up.
• Small charities set up by foreigners but aimed at improvement of squatter settlements in emerging cities, or aimed at improving deprived areas of developed cities.

Question 51

Stakeholders - International level

Answer 51

• International charities, e.g. OXFAM, Water Aid, CAFOD, MSF, Christian Aid, etc. help to improve basic amenities, infrastructure, food, education, health and employment issues.
  IGOs, e.g. The World Bank, International Monetary Fund and the WHO fund projects aimed at helping the poor.

Question 52

Management of slums

Answer 52

1. Bulldoze & clear away: Governments force the clearing of slum areas across the country. People lose their homes but it reduces the risk of infectious disease.
2. **Clear away but relocate **
3. **Redevelop: **This involves simply evicting the squatters and rebuilding the site in a more formal and organised way.
4. **Self-help or site and service schemes: **
   * Self-help schemes give people in squatter settlements the tools and training to improve their homes. Low-interest loans are available to help pay for the upgrading.
   * Site-and-service schemes give people the chance to buy or rent a piece of land with basic services on a new or cleared site. Low-interest loans allow people to buy the materials for building their new homes.
5. Ignore: local authorities either turn a blind eye to the squatter settlements and hope they go away. Or they do not have the resources to commit to redevelopment of the squatter settlements.