human geog chapter 12

© 2016 Pearson Education, Inc.

Chapter 12: City Spaces: Urban Structure

Chapter 12 Lecture

Katie PrattMacalester College



Key Concepts

Figure: Chapter 12 Opener - A street scene in the Spitalfields district of London.


Spatial Patterns and Processes (North America)

• Sprawl• Central cities• Central business district (CBD)

Table 12.1 Top 10 Influences on the American Metropolis 1950–2000.

Figure 12.1 The central city.


Spatial Patterns and Processes (cont’d)

• Utility• Accessibility• Isotropic surface• Trade-off model

Figure 12.2 Accessibility, bid-rent, and urban structure.

Apply your knowledge: Identify three trade-offs that you have made in your own living space. How have these affected your access to school, transportation, and job?


The Polycentric Metropolis

• Urban realms• Edge cities• Nodal centers• Metroburbia

Figure 12.3 The twentieth-century metropolis.


The Polycentric Metropolis (cont’d)

Figure 12.4 The new metropolis.

Apply your knowledge: Create a map for your metropolitan area and label urban realms, major highways, edge cities, secondary business centers, and neighborhoods.


The Polycentric Metropolis (cont’d)

• Gentrification

Figure 12.5 Gentrification in Philadelphia.

Apply your knowledge: Analyze which areas of your city have experienced gentrification by comparing neighborhood renovations, property value, income averages, age and ethnicity of inhabitants, and use media sources to observe how the culture of the community may have changed.


Spatial Segregation


Problems of North American Cities

• Sprawl• Fiscal squeeze• Infrastructure

Figure 12.6 Urban sprawl in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Figure 12.7 Broken water main in Seattle, 1013.


Problems of North American Cities (cont'd)

• Poverty• Neighborhood decay• Cycle of poverty• Ghettos• Congregation• Redlining

Figure 12.8 Poverty in the District of Columbia.

Apply your knowledge: Identify fiscal, industrial, or neighborhood problems in your city or town. List and explain any cycles of poverty or other patterns you can identify.


Detroit’s Open Geography: Problems and Potential

Figure 12.B Detroit urban farms.

Figure 12.A Detroit’s urban footprint.


Detroit’s Open Geography: Problems and Potential (cont'd)

Figure 12.C Open air markets.


Urban Design and Planning

• New urbanism• Smartcode


European Cities

• Features – Low skylines– Lively downtowns– Neighborhood stability– Municipal socialism

Figure 12.9 Vigevano, Italy.

Figure 12.10 View from Dresden’s town hall of the devastated Old Town after allied bombings in February 1945.


European Cities (cont’d)

• Design and Planning– Glacis militare– Order, safety, and efficiency– Haussman– Beaux Arts style– Modern movement– Le Corbusier– International style

Figure 12.11 Castello Sforza, Milan, Italy.


Figure 12.13 International style.Figure 12.12 Boulevard des Italiens, Paris.

Apply your knowledge: Find images that best capture the typical features of European cities.

European Cities (cont’d)


Islamic Cities

• Basic principles– Personal privacy and

virtue– Communal well-being– Inner essence of things

• Jami (principal mosque)

• Kasbah (citadel)

Figure 12.14 Mosque in Iraq.

Figure 12.15 Bazaar-I Vakil suq in Shiraz, Iran.


Islamic Cities (cont'd)

Figure 12.16 Housing in Tunisia.

Figure 12.17 Traditional wind towers in Iran.

Apply your knowledge: Research an Islamic city that is similar in size to the community in which you live and list two similarities and two differences between your own town or city and the Islamic city you have researched.


Cities of the Periphery

• Underemployment• Dualism

Figure 12.18 Mumbai, India. Figure 12.19 Dualism: Slums adjacent to modern apartment buildings in Metro, Manila, Philippines.


Cities of the Periphery (cont’d)

• The informal economy/sector• Children• Positive aspects

Figure 12.20 Street market in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.

Figure 12.21 Garbage picking in Bangkok, Thailand.

Apply your knowledge: Identify an informal economic function in your town or city. List positive and negative effects of the activities involved in this type of economy.


Cities of the Periphery (cont'd)

• Slums• Squatter settlements• Community organization

– Dharavi • Slum clearance programs

Figure 12.23 Self-help as a solution to housing problems in Zambia.

Figure 12.22 Hillside favela, Rio de Janeiro.


Doha, Qatar

Figure 12.G The Aspire zone.

Figure 12.D Doha waterfront skyline.

Figure 12.E Migrant worker’s accommodations.

Figure 12.F Pear-Qatar development.


Garment Workers in Dhaka

• Collapse of a factory building in April 2013 that killed 1,129

Figure 12.H Garment workers in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

Apply your knowledge: What responsibility do corporations like H&M, Gap, and Apple have to workers in developing countries? How connected are the consumers of these products to the laborers who create them?


Cities of the Periphery (cont'd)

• The challenges of growth– Transportation infrastructure– Air pollution

Figure 12.24 Delhi, Metro. Figure 12.25 Air pollution in Beijing, China.

Apply your knowledge: Research a megacity and examine it in terms of the presence of slum housing, environmental degradation, and infrastructure concerns. What are the causes of these problems?


Future Geographies

Table 12.2 The 10 most likely influences on the American Metropolis 2000–2050.

Apply your knowledge: Thinking about technological innovations, economic resources, demographics, and openness to progressive social policies, name one city in each region, Asia, South America, Eastern Europe and Africa, that you predict could experience positive growth in the next 20 years, and why.