Urban Sprawl: An Emerging Issue

 Humans are becoming an increasingly urban species. They want to move to metropolitan cities and urban centres for better jobs opportunities or for the excitement of the city life. And this possess a really challenging developmental question of where are all these people going to go and if you live in a city, you might have noticed the expansion and the development of cities to suburbs and this is what we call urban sprawl. In 1937, Earle Draper- one of the first city planners in the south-eastern United States coined the term ‘sprawl.’ The urban sprawl is essentially the geographical expansion of a city or town and is often characterised as low density development, meaning housing is being built on really large land areas or scattered land locks, single use zoning and is also characterised by the increased reliance on private automobiles for each person transportation. The sprawl generally takes place in radial course around the city centre or in linear direction along the highways. Los Angeles is a great example of the Urban sprawl. Over the years the residential housing areas expanded at larger rates and traffic has also increased incredibly. This phenomenon is not limited to a particular country but has become a global problem. According to United Nations Population Division, 29 percent of world’s population lived in urban areas in 1950 which had increased up to 49 percent in late 2000s. Currently, 25.73% population of India is residing in the urban centres and is expected to increase up to 33% in the next fifteen years. It shows the alarming rate of urbanisation and the extent of sprawl that could take place. Urban Agglomeration is a similar concept which means a city along with its surrounding suburban areas and satellite settlements.

 

Causes of Urban Sprawl

The reason of urban sprawl can be population growth and large scale migration in urban areas so the need to accommodate a rising urban population has led to urban sprawling. It could also be lifestyle changing where people’s desire for more living space and more privacy or more amenities like pools but it can also be restrictive zoning laws that are defining residential areas, commercial areas and not integrating them together so that it is easier to  get from you are living to the place of your work. Compared to land in the cities, suburbs lands are cheaper and provides more space for living than inner city dwellings. Some people move to suburban areas just to enjoy the lifestyle that avoids congestion, noise of the city and crime. Thus, we can say that urban sprawl is the combined effect of increasing affluence or economic growth, globalization, changing lifestyles, growing advancement in personal mobility made possible by private automobiles and most importantly lack of proper laws that can regulate urban planning.

Problems of Urban Sprawl

Urban Sprawl has been associated with many problems that vary among different cities but some common examples are: increasing air and water pollution, increase in water consumption, degradation of human health, loss of land and wildlife, increasing fragmentation of natural areas, increase in traffic and fatalities, increase risk of floods, loss of agricultural capacity, increased car dependency, higher taxes, increased runoff in river and lakes, and loss of acres of forests, farmland, wetlands and woodlands.

Urban sprawling has led to the conversion of forest land into farmland that has threatened the food security and shelter of animals and rising man – animal conflicts. And at the same time conversion of farmland into buildings has threatened the food security of humans.

Carrying capacity in an ecosystem / environment is the maximum population size of the species that the environment can sustain indefinitely given the food, habitat, water and other necessities available in the environment

Not considering the carrying capacity of any region and unplanned urban expansion results in ecological disasters for example Uttarakhand flash floods of 2013

Steady encroachment of urban water bodies as a result of construction in wetland areas/ flood plains of a river causes urban flooding. E.g. Delhi’s Akshardham Temple complex and commonwealth games village were built right on the Yamuna flood plains similarly the secondary runway of Chennai international airport was built on Adyar river flood plain.

Horizontal expansion of cities in an unregulated manner without a commensurate expansion of drainage facilities. E.g. Hyderabad century old drainage system developed in the 1920s, covered only a small part of the core city. In the last 20 years the city has grown at least four times its original build-up area.

You are also interested in Urban Heat Islands

Solutions

1.    Strictly regulate land use and encroachment to ensure protection of land

2.    Building smart cities: sponge city, climate resilient cities, ensure green cover, china has launched the sponge city initiative in the year 2015 and presently it has sixteen such cities

3.    Empower urban local bodies to deal with the problem of haphazard development of urban centres

4.    Community involvement through NGOs/civil society to promote sustainable development

Conclusion

It is very much important to make sustainable decision of where to build, how to build and how much to build. Steady rise in the population possesses a challenge for the government to provide basic amenities. Proper planning and city development can solve the problem of urban sprawling.

 

 

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