EV20001: ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE
Lecture #2
Human Population &
Urbanization
Dr. Shamik Chowdhury
School of Environmental Science and Engineering
E-mail:
[email protected]09 February 2022
Are There Too Many of Us?
Currently, there are about 7.8 billion of us. Each year, we add about 83 million more
people to the world’s population. If such growth continues, the number of people on
Earth is projected to increase to 8.5 billion by 2030.
Population Growth Affect Ecosystem Services
Urbanization
As the world is undergoing the largest wave of population growth in history,
urbanization ‒ the process of transition from a rural to a more urban society ‒ is
inevitable.
More than half of the world’s population now lives in cities.
Urban living is often associated with higher levels of literacy and education, better
health, greater access to social services, and enhanced opportunities for cultural and
political participation.
Trends in Urbanization
Globally, more people live in urban areas than in rural areas, with 55% of the world’s
population residing in urban areas in 2018.
In 2007, for the first time in history, the global urban population exceeded the global rural
population, and the world population has remained predominantly urban thereafter.
Growth in the urban population is driven by overall population increase and by the
upward shift in the percentage living in urban areas.
Just a few countries are home to half of the world’s urban population. China
has the largest urban population (758 million), followed by India (410 million).
Future increases in the world’s urban population are also expected to be highly
concentrated in just a few countries. India, China and Nigeria – together are
expected to account for 35% of the growth in the world’s urban population
between 2018 and 2050. India is projected to add 416 million urban dwellers,
China 255 million and Nigeria 189 million.
Tokyo is the world’s largest city with an agglomeration of 37 million inhabitants,
followed by Delhi with 29 million, Shanghai with 26 million, and Mexico City
and São Paulo, each with around 22 million inhabitants.
Today, Cairo, Mumbai, Beijing and Dhaka all have close to 20 million
inhabitants.
Benefits of Urbanization
Urban areas are global economic platforms for production, innovation and trade, and
offer significant opportunities for both formal and informal employment.
Urbanization has helped millions escape poverty through increased productivity and
employment opportunities; improved quality of life via better education and health; large-
scale public investment and access to improved infrastructure and services.
Challenges of Urbanization
Urbanization does not necessarily result in a more equitable distribution of wealth and
wellbeing. Today, urban areas are more unequal than rural areas: 75% of the world’s cities
have higher levels of income inequalities than two decades ago.
Inadequately managed urban expansion leads to rapid sprawl, pollution, and environmental
degradation, together with unsustainable production and consumption patterns.
Cities Can Grow Outward or Upward
Compact cities
• Limited land area with high population density, thus growing vertically
• Most people get around by walking, biking, or using mass transit
• Example: Hong Kong, Singapore, Tokyo
Dispersed cities
• Ample land area available for outward expansion
• Residents mostly depend on motor vehicles for transportation
• Example: Cities in Australia, Canada, China, India and the United States
Transport and Urban Environment
Road transport contributes significantly to urban air pollution in many countries.
A common feature across road networks in many urban regions in the developing world is
the presence of critical congestion areas. Traffic congestion worsens the emissions of both
local and global pollutants.
Besides, each year, automobile accidents kill approximately 1.2 million people and injure
another 15 million people, globally. They also kill about 50 million wild animals and family
pets every year. Car accidents have killed more Americans than have all the wars in the
country’s history!
Transport and Urban Environment
Some cities promote alternatives to motor vehicles, each with its own advantages and
disadvantages.
Spatial Patterns of Urbanization
A concentric circle city, such as Kolkata, develops outward from its central business district
(CBD) in a series of rings as the area grows in population and size.
Typically, industries and businesses in the CBD and poverty-stricken inner-city housing
areas are ringed by housing zones that usually become more affluent toward the suburbs.
1. Central business district (CBD) 4. Middle-class suburbs
2. Deteriorating transition zone 5. Commuter’s zone
3. Worker’s home
A sector city grows in pie-shaped wedges or strips when commercial,
industrial, and housing districts push outward from the CBD along major
transportation routes. An example is the large urban area extending from
Mumbai to Navi Mumbai.
1. High-rent residential 5. Transportation
2. Intermediate-rent residential 6. Industrial
3. Low-rent residential 7. CBD
4. Education and recreation
A multiple-nuclei city develops around a number of independent centres, or
satellite cities, rather than a single centre. Singapore comes fairly close to this
pattern.
1. CBD 6. Heavy manufacturing
2. Wholesale, light manufacturing 7. Outlying business district
3. Low-rent residential 8. Residential suburb
4. Intermediate-rent residential 9. Industrial suburb
5. High-rent residential
Urban Sprawl
Rapid expansion of the geographic extent of cities, often characterized by low-density
residential housing, single-use zoning, and increased reliance on private automobile for
transportation.
The end result is the spreading of a city and its suburbs over more and more rural land.
Urban sprawl is a complex phenomenon, which goes beyond average population density.
Causes of Urban Sprawl
Urban sprawl is driven by demographic, economic, geographic, social and technological
factors.
As number of people in a city grows beyond capacity, the local communities continues to
spread farther and farther from the core of the cities.
Increased affluence, attractive land and housing prices, and the desire for larger homes
with more amenities (such as yards, swimming pools, storage space, lower noise levels,
better air quality, and privacy) play significant roles at the level of the individual.
Most importantly, sprawl is also policy-driven. Maximum density restrictions, specific zoning
regulations, tax systems that are misaligned with the social cost of low-density
development, the underpricing of car use externalities and the massive investment in road
infrastructure contribute to this phenomenon.
Consequences of urban sprawl
As they grow and sprawl outward, separate urban areas may merge to form
a megapolis. For example, the remaining open space between Boston,
Massachusetts, and Washington D.C., is rapidly urbanizing and coalescing.
Two megapolises: Bowash,
consisting of urban sprawl
and coalescence between
Boston and Washington,
D.C., and Chipitts, extending
from Chicago to Pittsburgh.
Regulating Urban Sprawl
Some cities provide open space and control urban sprawl by surrounding a large city with a
greenbelt: an open area used for recreation, sustainable forestry, and or other
nondestructive uses.
Satellite towns (smaller metropolitan areas which are located somewhat near to, but are
mostly independent of larger metropolitan areas) can be built outside the belt.
Highways or rail systems can be used to transport people around the periphery and into the
central city.
Regulating urban sprawl
Another increasingly popular approach to preserving open space outside a city is to set up
an urban growth boundary: a line surrounding a city beyond which new development is not
allowed.
The sharp demarcation
between the metropolitan
area of Portland, Oregon (on
the left), and the rural
acreage that falls outside the
city’s urban growth boundary
determines where, precisely,
land can be developed —
and where it cannot.
Regulating Urban Sprawl
In recent years, builders have increasingly used a new pattern, known as cluster
development, in which high-density housing units are concentrated on portion of a parcel,
with the rest of the land (often 40‒50%) used for commonly shared open space.
Urban Poverty
With uncontrolled migration and rapid urban growth, the redistribution of wealth and opportunities
across diverse individual abilities and cultural backgrounds that historically characterizes urban
dynamics seems to have stalled in many regions of the world.
At least 1 billion people live under crowded and unsanitary conditions.
Some live in slums – areas dominated by tenements and rooming houses where several people might
live in a single room.
Others live in improvised shanty towns or squatter camps ‒ housing developments often made up of
corrugated metal, plywood, cardboard boxes and sheets of plastics.
People in slums live under the most deplorable conditions, with little access to effective social and
health care services, potable water, sanitation facilities and are therefore more vulnerable to epidemics
and developmental challenges.
The numbers of urban poor are, to a large extent, outside the control of city
governments, and are swelled by a combination of economic stagnation,
increasing inequality, population growth (especially growth through in-
migration), and inadequate and expensive accommodation.
Sustainable urbanization: Eco-cities
An eco-city is
‒ an ecologically healthy human settlement modelled on the self-sustaining resilient
structure and function of natural ecosystems and living organisms.
‒ an entity that includes its inhabitants and their ecological impacts.
‒ a subsystem of the ecosystems of which it is part — of its watershed, bioregion, and
ultimately of the planet.
‒ a subsystem of the regional, national and world economic system.
The ultimate goal of eco-cities is to eliminate all carbon waste, to produce energy entirely
through renewable sources, to incorporate the environment into the city, reduce poverty,
organize cities to have higher population densities, and therefore higher efficiency, and
improving health.
Sustainable urbanization: Eco-cities
Eco-cities
‒ centralize the population within a given area.
‒ use renewable energy as much as possible.
‒ use energy and matter efficiently.
‒ prevent pollution and reduce waste.
‒ recycle, reuse, and compost.
‒ protect and encourage biodiversity.
‒ promote urban gardens and farmers markets.
Case study: Vauban, Freiburg
The Vauban district of Freiburg in southern Germany is the world’s best example of
sustainable urban living.
Pedestrian and bicycle paths form a highly-connected, efficient, green transportation
network with every home within walking distance of a tram stop. Trains appear every 7.5
minutes during rush hours with ticket costs subsidized to encourage use.
Public energy and heat are generated by a highly efficient woodchip-powered combined
heat and power generator connected to a district heating grid.
Organic household waste is treated with an anaerobic digester. The city has an unique
ecological sewage system in one pilot project: sucked by vacuum pipes, faeces are
transported into this digester; generating biogas, which is used for cooking.
Grey-water is cleaned in biofilm plants and returned to the water cycle.
Case study: Vauban, Freiburg
The city contains over 600 hectares of parks and 160 playgrounds providing greenery,
recreation, and biodiversity.
3,800 small privately owned garden allotments for the inhabitants to grow their own food lie
on the outskirts of the city.
Local food is also supplied by farm shops, a farmers’ market, a local winery and distillery,
beekeeping, butchers, bakers and plant nursery.
Shops and offices are located on the ground floor of the apartment buildings, allowing
residents easy access, on foot or bicycle, to their daily needs.
Renewable energy production is encouraged with tax credits from the federal government
and subsidies from the regional utility.
Sustainable urbanization: Smart cities
A smart city is a municipality that uses information and communication technologies to
increase operational efficiency, share information with the public and improve both the
quality of government services and citizen welfare.
Sustainable urbanization: Smart cities
Sustainable urbanization: Smart cities
