The Urbanization of the World

The Urbanization of the World
________________________________________
Origin of Cities: Some Introductory Points

The City is a relatively recent form of social organization.
• Homo sapiens, the present human form has existed on earth for about 40,000 years, but cities have existed for less than 10,000 years.
• Jericho in about 7000 B.C. grew from village to a "city" of about 3,000
• 3,500-4,000 B.C. first large cities (population of about 25,000) were established in Mesopotamia.

A "city" refers to a place of relatively dense settlement -- dense enough so that city residents can not grow their own food. A city population, therefore, is always dependent upon its "hinterlands" to provide it with food. Not until agriculture developed could hinterlands provide food for their own populations and enough of a surplus to feed a city population. And in agricultural societies the surplus was so small that only a tiny proportion of an entire population could live in cities. Up until very recently -- about 200 years ago -- that proportion was limited to about 5% of an entire population. So cities existed, but there was no urbanization.
Urbanization refers to a process in which an increasing proportion of an entire population lives in cities and the suburbs of cities. Historically, it has been closely connected with industrialization. When more and more inanimate sources of energy were used to enhance human productivity (industrialization), surpluses increased in both agriculture and industry. Larger and larger proportions of a population could live in cities. Economic forces were such that cities became the ideal places to locate factories and their workers.
________________________________________
Urbanization of First World Societies

In the United States, about 5% of the population lived in cities in 1800, but about 50% of the population lived in cities by 1920. Throughout the 19th century, the US was urbanizing. The same was true for most European societies during the 19th century.


The 19th Century Growth of Chicago
1820
Population:
15
1854
Population:
55,000
1898
Population:
1,698,575
Today about 80% of the US population lives in cities and suburbs. Since no more than 100% of a population can possibly be urban, urbanization as a process is coming to an end.
How many major US cities can you locate in this satellite photo?




________________________________________
Urbanization of Third World Societies




Compare Urbanization in the World's More Developed and Less Developed Societies



Notice that at mid-century only 17.8% of the population of Third World societies lived in cities, but in the fifty years since 1950 that percent has increased to over 40%. By the year 2030, almost 60% of Third World populations will live in cities. In just a few years the World will become predominately urban -- about 80-85 years after that happened in the United States.

The World's Population Will be Predominately Urban
by the Year 2005



There is a very big question related to Third World urbanization: Will it prove beneficial for people's lives? Much of Third World urbanization is the result of overpopulation in the countryside. In villages babies have been living and not dying. A husband and wife who farm 15 acres might have three sons and three daughters. All now live and grow up. But there is not land enough for them to have the farms they need to marry and raise a family. This lack of land for burgeoning rural populations forced them to leave the village and migrate to cities. They find a place to live in the favela's and shantytowns -- such as the one pictured below -- but often times they don't find productive employment.



Third World urbanization will be a beneficial social trend only if enough good jobs can be found for the rapidly growing population of Third World cities.



948,237,169 visitors served. T E X T

TheFreeDictionary Google
?
Word / Article Starts with Ends with Text





Dictionary/
thesaurus


Medical
dictionary


Legal
dictionary


Financial
dictionary


Acronyms



Idioms


Encyclopedia

Wikipedia
encyclopedia ?

Urbanization
Also found in: Dictionary/thesaurus, Hutchinson
0.04 sec.
Ads by GoogleUrbanization Summary
A Complete Academic Resource 49 Pages of Related Content
BookRags.com
Environmental Problems
All Kinds Of Environmental Problems Here In One Spot.
Educations.PerfectFacts.net
Study Special Effects
Study Special Effects and Earn Your Degree. Get a Free Info Packet.
www.AcademyArt.edu

The city of Los Angeles is an example of urbanisation


Urbanization or Urbanisation (see difference in spelling) means the removal of the rural characteristics of a town or area, a process associated with the development of civilisation. Demographically , the term denotes redistribution of populations from rural to urban settlements.
Urbanization Today
The 2005 Revision of the UN World Urbanization Prospects report described the 20th century as witnessing "the rapid urbanization of the world’s population", as the global proportion of urban population rose dramatically from 13% (220 million) in 1900, to 29% (732 million) in 1950, to 49% (3.2 billion) in 2005. The same report projected that the figure is likely to rise to 60% (4.9 billion) by 2030.[1]

Urbanization rates vary across the world. The United States and United Kingdom have a far higher urbanization level than China, India, Swaziland or Niger, but a far slower annual urbanization rate, since much less of the population is living in a rural area.
• Urbanization in the United States has affected the Rocky Mountains in locations such as Jackson Hole, Wyoming, Telluride, Colorado, Taos, New Mexico, Douglas County, Colorado and Aspen, Colorado. The lake district of northern Minnesota has also been affected as has Vermont, the coast of Florida, the Birmingham-Jefferson County, AL area, the Pacific Northwest and the barrier islands of North Carolina.
• In the United Kingdom, two major examples of new urbanization can be seen in Swindon, Wiltshire and Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire. These two towns show some of the quickest growth rates in Europe.
Urbanization Projections
According to the UN-HABITAT 2006 Annual Report, sometime in the middle of 2007, the majority of people worldwide will be living in towns or cities, for the first time in history; this is referred to as the arrival of the "Urban Millennium". In regard to future trends, it is estimated 93% of urban growth will occur in Asia and Africa, and to a lesser extent in Latin America and the Caribbean. By 2050 over 6 billion people, two thirds of humanity, will be living in towns and cities.
Economic effects

One of the last houses of the old Russian village of Lukeryino, most of which has been mostly demolished over the last 30 years to make way for 9-story apartment buildings of the growing city of Kstovo, such as the one in the background
Over the last few years urbanization of rural areas has increased. As agriculture, more traditional local services, and small-scale industry give way to modern industry the urban and related commerce with the city drawing on the resources of an ever-widening area for its own sustenance and goods to be traded or processed into manufactures.

Research in urban ecology finds that larger cities provide more specialized goods and services to the local market and surrounding areas, function as a transportation and wholesale hub for smaller places, and accumulate more capital, financial service provision, and an educated labor force, as well as often concentrating administrative functions for the area in which they lie. This relation among places of different sizes is called the urban hierarchy.

As cities develop, effects can include a dramatic increase in rents, often pricing the local working class out of the market, including such functionaries as employees of the local municipalities. For example, Eric Hobsbawm's book The age of the revolution: 1789–1848 (published 1962 and 2005) chapter 11, stated "Urban development in our period [1789–1848] was a gigantic process of class segregation, which pushed the new labouring poor into great morasses of misery outside the centres of government and business and the newly specialised residential areas of the bourgeoisie. The almost universal European division into a 'good' west end and a 'poor' east end of large cities developed in this period." This is likely due the prevailing south-west wind which carries coal smoke and other airborne pollutants downwind, making the western edges of towns preferable to the eastern ones.
Changing form of urbanization
Traditional urbanization exhibits a concentration of human activities and settlements around the downtown area. When the residential area shifts outward, this is called suburbanization. A number of researchers and writers suggest that suburbanization has gone so far to form new points of concentration outside the downtown. This networked, poly-centric form of concentration is considered by some an emerging pattern of urbanization. It is called variously exurbia, edge city (Garreau, 1991), network city (Batten, 1995), or postmodern city (Dear, 2000). Los Angeles is the best-known example of this type of urbanization.
Planning for urbanization

The construction of new towns by the Housing Development Board of Singapore, is an example of planned urbanization
Urbanization can be planned or organic. Planned urbanization, ie: new town or the garden city movement, is based on an advance plan, which can be prepared for military, aesthetic, economic or urban design reasons. Unplanned (organic) cities are the oldest form of urbanization. Examples can be seen in many ancient cities; although with exploration came the collision of nations, which meant that many invaded cites took on the desired planned characteristics of their occupiers. Many ancient organic cities experienced redevelopment for military and economic purposes, new roads carved through the cities, and new parcels of land were cordoned off serving various planned purposes giving cities distinctive geometric UN agencies prefer to see urban infrastructure installed before urbanization occurs. landscape planners are responsible for landscape infrastructure (public parks, sustainable urban drainage systems, greenways etc) which can be planned before urbanization takes place, or afterward to revitalized an area and create greater livability within a region.
New Urbanism
New Urbanism was a movement which started in the 1980s. New Urbanism believes in shifting design focus from the car-centric development of suburbia and the business park, to concentrated pedestrian and transit-centric, walkable, mixed-use communities. New Urbanism is an amalgamation of old-world design patterns, merged with present day demands. It is a backlash to the age of suburban sprawl, which splintered communities, and isolated people from each other, as well as had severe environmental impacts. Concepts for New Urbanism include people and destinations into dense, vibrant communities, and decreasing dependency on vehicular transportation as the primary mode of transit.
See also
• Counter urbanisation
• Suburban sprawl
• Urbanization in Africa
References
1. ^ World Urbanization Prospects: The 2005 Revision, Population Division, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, UN
Guy Ankerl: Urbanization Overspeed in Tropical Africa, INUPRESS, Geneva,1986 ISBN 2-88155-000-2
External links
• Tomorrow's Crises Today - the humanitarian dimension of urbanisation multimedia IRIN report September 2007
• Urban conglomerates
• Urbanisation worldwide - World Bank 2005 WDIs (PDF file)
• City Program — courses and free public lectures on urban development from Simon Fraser University
• The Natural History of Urbanization, by Lewis Mumford
• A Dynamic Map of the World Cities' Growth
• FT-article on urbanization ("Urban Outfitters")
Motto
"In God We Trust" (since 1956)
"E Pluribus Unum" ("From Many, One"; Latin, traditional)
Anthem
..... Click the link for more information.
Motto
"Dieu et mon droit" [2] (French)
"God and my right"
Anthem
"God Save the Queen" [3]
..... Click the link for more information.
This page contains Chinese text.
Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Chinese characters.
China (Traditional Chinese:
..... Click the link for more information.
This page is currently protected from editing until disputes have been resolved.
Protection is not an endorsement of the current [ version] ([ protection log]).
..... Click the link for more information.
Motto
"Siyinqaba" (Swati)
"We are the fortress"
Anthem
Nkulunkulu Mnikati wetibusiso temaSwati
..... Click the link for more information.
Motto
"Fraternité, Travail, Progrès" (French)
"Fraternity, Work, Progress"
Anthem
La Nigérienne
..... Click the link for more information.
Jackson, Wyoming

Seal
Motto:
Location of Jackson, Wyoming
Coordinates:
Country United States
State Wyoming
County Teton
Area
..... Click the link for more information.
Telluride, Colorado
Colorado Avenue: Main Street
Location in San Miguel County and the state of Colorado
Coordinates:
Country San Miguel County
State Colorado
..... Click the link for more information.
Taos, New Mexico

Seal
Motto:
Location of Taos, New Mexico
Coordinates:
Country United States
State New Mexico
County Taos
Area
..... Click the link for more information.
Douglas County is the eighth most populous of the 64 counties of the State of Colorado of the United States. The county, sometimes nicknamed Dougco, is located midway between Colorado's two largest cities: Denver and Colorado Springs.
..... Click the link for more information.
Aspen, Colorado
Location in Pitkin County and the state of Colorado
Coordinates:
Country
..... Click the link for more information.
State of Minnesota

Flag of Minnesota Seal
Nickname(s): North Star State,
The Land of 10,000 Lakes, The Gopher State
Motto(s): L'Étoile du Nord (French: The Star of the North)

Capital Saint Paul

..... Click the link for more information.
State of Vermont

Flag of Vermont Great Seal of Vermont
Nickname(s): The Green Mountain State
Motto(s): Freedom and Unity
Before Statehood Known as
The Vermont Republic

Official language(s)
..... Click the link for more information.
Editing of this page by unregistered or newly registered users is currently disabled due to vandalism.
If you are prevented from editing this page, and you wish to make a change, please discuss changes on the talk page, request unprotection, log in, or .
..... Click the link for more information.
Birmingham, Alabama

Flag
Seal
Nickname: "The Magic City" or "Pittsburgh of the South"
Location in Jefferson County in the state of Alabama
Coordinates:
Country
..... Click the link for more information.
Jefferson County is the most densely populated county in the U.S. state of Alabama, the county seat being Birmingham.[0] As of 2000 U.S. Census, the population of Jefferson County was 662,047.
..... Click the link for more information.
Pacific Northwest, abbreviated PNW, or PacNW is a region in the northwest of North America. There are several partially overlapping definitions but the term Pacific Northwest should not be confused with the Northwest Territory (aka the Great Northwest) or the
..... Click the link for more information.
The State of North Carolina

Flag of North Carolina Seal
Nickname(s): Tar Heel State; Old North State;
The Rip Van Winkle State
''Motto(s): Esse quam videri (Latin: To be, rather than to seem)''

Official language(s)
..... Click the link for more information.
Swindon
Swindon (United Kingdom)

Swindon shown within the United Kingdom
Population 155,432
OS grid reference SU152842
..... Click the link for more information.

Not to be confused with Wilshire.


Wiltshire (abbreviated Wilts) is a large English county in the South West England region of the UK.
..... Click the link for more information.
Milton Keynes
Milton Keynes ()
|240px|Milton Keynes (

..... Click the link for more information.
prevew not available
..... Click the link for more information.
20th century - 21st century - 22nd century
1970s 1980s 1990s - 2000s - 2010s 2020s 2030s
2003 2004 2005 - 2006 - 2007 2008 2009

2006 by topic:
News by month
Jan - Feb - Mar - Apr - May - Jun
..... Click the link for more information.
20th century - 21st century - 22nd century
1970s 1980s 1990s - 2000s - 2010s 2020s 2030s
2004 2005 2006 - 2007 - 2008 2009 2010

2007 by topic:
News by month
Jan - Feb - Mar - Apr - May - Jun
..... Click the link for more information.
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent. It covers 8.6% of the Earth's total surface area (or 29.4% of its land area) and, with almost 4 billion people, it contains more than 60% of the world's current human population.
..... Click the link for more information.
Africa is the world's second-largest and second most-populous continent, after Asia. At about 30,221,532 km² (11,668,545 sq mi) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area, and 20.4% of the total land area.
..... Click the link for more information.


Latin America (Portuguese and Spanish: América Latina; French: Amérique Latine) is the region of the Americas where Romance languages, those derived from Latin (particularly Spanish and Portuguese), are primarily spoken.
..... Click the link for more information.
Caribbean (Dutch: Cariben or Caraïben, or more commonly Antillen; French: Caraïbe or more commonly Antilles; Spanish: Caribe
..... Click the link for more information.
Manufacturing (from Latin manu factura, "making by hand") is the use of tools and labor to make things for use or sale. The term may refer to a vast range of human activity, from handicraft to high tech, but is most commonly applied to industrial production, in which raw
..... Click the link for more information.
Urban ecology is the subfield of ecology which deals with the interaction of plants, animals and humans with each other and with their environment in urban or urbanizing settings.
..... Click the link for more information.


This article is copied from an article on Wikipedia® - the free encyclopedia created and edited by online user community. The text was not checked or edited by anyone on our staff. Although the vast majority of the Wikipedia® encyclopedia articles provide accurate and timely information please do not assume the accuracy of any particular article. This article is distributed under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License.


Link to this page:
Please bookmark with social media, your votes are noticed and appreciated:



Ads by GoogleAir Testing Services
Trace analysis of air pollutants ISO17025 Accredited
www.LeederConsulting.com
5 Tips for a Flat Stomach
Stop making these 5 mistakes & you will finally lose your ugly belly.
www.BellyFatIsUgly.net
TransCAD and TransModeler
The finest transportation software in the world.
www.caliper.com
?Page tools

Printer friendly
Cite / link
Email
Feedback



Advertisement (your ad here)
Related Ads

▪ Urbanization Info
▪ Live Earth
▪ The Environment
▪ Ecology
▪ Conservation
▪ Earth Day
▪ Water Floods
▪ Ecosystem
▪ Environmental Law
▪ Ecological Books


?My Word List

Add current page to the list


Advertisement (your ad here)
?Charity

Feed a hungry child - donate to school feeding program


Advertisement (your ad here)

? Mentioned in
? References in periodicals archive

Agricultural revolution
Dhaka
Mike Douglass
Modern Chinese social structure
New urban planning
Porto Alegre City Council
Pseudo-urbanization
Urbanization in Africa
Urbanization in China
World Planners Congress

In 1976, urbanization and its impacts were barely on the radar screen of the United Nations, which was created just three decades earlier when two thirds of humanity was still rural.
The Third World Urban Forum: 'Spaceship Earth' spiralling ... by Rollnick, Roman / UN Chronicle
May 16, 2006) Urbanization has led to the demise of county Extension programs across the country.
Urbanization claims county agent position by Dairy Today
This, in turn, is due to demographic tendencies and the growing rates of urbanization both in Russia and the rest of the world.
Military urbanistics and military geography by Olesik, N.S. / Military Thought
More results

Wikipedia browser
?
? Full browser


Urbania (film)
Urbanice
Urbanice (Pardubice District)
Urbanism
Urbanism (album)
Urbanite
Urbanity
Urbanization
Urbanization in Africa
Urbanization in China
Urbanizm Music
Urbank, Minnesota
UrbanLab
Urbanna, Virginia
Urbano


urbanising
urbanism
urbanism
urbanism
Urbanism (album)
urbanist
urbanist
urbanist
urbanist
Urbaniste
urbanistic
urbanistically
Urbanists
Urbanists
Urbanists
Urbanitas
urbanite
urbanite
Urbanites
Urbanites
urbanities
urbanities
urbanity
urbanity
Urbanization
Urbanization in Africa
Urbanization in China
Urbanization rate
Urbanization rate
urbanize
urbanize
urbanize
urbanized
urbanized
urbanized
Urbanized area
UrbaniZed Area (Federal Highway Administration)
Urbanized areas
urbanizes
urbanizing
Urbanizm
Urbanizm Music
Urbank
Urbank, Minnesota
Urbank, MN
UrbanLab
Urbanlegends.com
Urbanna
Urbanna Swim Team (Manassas, Virginia)





TheFreeDictionary Google
?
Word / Article Starts with Ends with Text



Free Tools: For surfers: Browser extension | Word of the Day | Add the dictionary to favorites | Help
For webmasters: Free content NEW! | Linking | Lookup box | Double-click lookup | Partner with us


Disclaimer | Privacy policy | Feedback | Copyright © 2008 Farlex, Inc.
All content on this website, including dictionary, thesaurus, literature, geography, and other reference data is for informational purposes only. This information should not be considered complete, up to date, and is not intended to be used in place of a visit, consultation, or advice of a legal, medical, or any other professional. Terms of Use.

Urban Population
The majority of the human population moved into urban area, separate from nature, soon after the Industrial Revolution. Currently, less than 3 percent of the U.S. population lives or works on a farm while over 80 percent live or work in urban areas (Miller, 1997).