12.3. Degradation of Urban Environments

Question 1

Urban Degradation

Answer 1

a general reduction in the quality of the environment in urban areas. This can happen in HIC, MIC and LIC cities

Question 2

Urban Decay

Answer 2

the process by which a previously functioning city, or part of a city, falls into disrepair and decrepitude. This is more likely to occur in HIC cities
- It may feature deindustrialisation, depopulation or changing population, restructuring, abandoned buildings and infrastructure, high local unemployment, fragmented families, political disenfranchisement, crime and desolate cityscape

Question 3

Factors causing degradation of urban environments in MIC and NIC cities

Answer 3

1) Urbanisation
2) Industrial Development
3) Inadequate waste management

Question 4

Urbanisation causing degradation of urban environment in MIC and NIC cities

Answer 4

• The process of population shift from rural to urban areas
• Very rapid in both MICs and NICs
• Many of developments unplanned and quite haphazard → shanty towns → pollution → crime rate increase

Question 5

Industrial Development causing degradation of urban environments in MIC and NIC cities

Answer 5

• People move to the cities to get jobs
• Jobs are provided by the new factories that develop in the MIC cities, which contribute to economic growth
• Environmental laws being not very strict attract TNCs to build factories
• So air and water pollution are often a problem, degrading the urban environment around the factories

Question 6

Inadequate waste management causing degradation of urban environments in MIC and NIC cities

Answer 6

• As MIC cities experienced rapid growth, waste disposal systems have struggled to keep up with the growth in the built-up area
• No proper disposal system or rubbish collection in shanty towns - the area quickly becomes very polluted and unhygienic
• Rubbish and raw sewage gets into rivers causing water pollution, because shanty towns are often built on marshy floodplain areas

Question 7

Solutions to degradation of urban environments in MIC and NIC cities

Answer 7

Main issue is the lack of money. As economic development proceeds, more money becomes available and the urban environment will be improved. However, the worst conditions in the shantytowns need to be dealt with as a matter of urgency.

1) City administrations have set up ‘self-help’ schemes where they provided the local people with the materials to improve their built environment themselves
2) City administrations have also installed clean water supplies, electricity and sanitation infrastructure in some shanty town areas, or in new areas where shanty town dwellers are encouraged (or compelled) to move
3) By improving public transport, city administrations can reduce congestion and air pollution

Question 8

Factors causing degradation of urban environments in HIC cities

Answer 8

1) Ageing and derelict buildings
2) Inadequate infrastructure
3) Deindustrialisation
4) Social segregation
5) Waste management

Question 9

Ageing and derelict buildings causing degradation of urban environments in HIC cities

Answer 9

• HIC cities experienced rapid growth when the country industrialised
• Expanding of cities outwards and the buildings in the inner-city zone have degenerated
• Inner-city zone is the home to the poorest people so their landlords do not have much financial incentive to fix the properties
• As buildings get older, its structure starts to crumble. Walls crack and flake and roofs begin to leak

Question 10

Inadequate infrastructure causing degradation of urban environments in HIC cities

Answer 10

• Doughnut effect (movement of urban activities from the central areas of the city to the edge of the city where new ring roads provide excellent accessibility
• Shops, offices and other urban functions have migrated to the edge
• This movement was due to the fact that road transport infrastructure in the central area of the city was becoming inadequate
• Traffic congestion resulted in air pollution
• Also, property developers were not interested in spending money revitalising the derelict and congested inner city areas where the urban environment was in a downward spiral

Question 11

Deindustrialisation causing degradation of urban environments in HIC cities

Answer 11

• Globalisation caused manufacturing jobs to move from HICs to MICs/NICs
• Factories in HIC cities began to close down, which led to dereliction and unemployment, further adding to the degradation of these old urban environments

Question 12

Social Segregation causing degradation of urban environments in HIC cities

Answer 12

• Richer people moved out of the old inner-city zones into the modern suburbs on the urban fringe
• Only poorest members of society were left in the inner city who had no money to improve their homes and paid very little tax so the local authorities had no funding to make improvements

Question 13

Waste Management causing degradation of urban environments in HIC cities

Answer 13

• As people become richer they produce more rubbish
  Waste is buried in landfilll sites, often on the edge of the city
• These sites were smelly and unsightly and degraded the environment of the area around them
• The trucks carrying the waste contributed to air pollution and traffic congestion in the city
• Once full, the land fill sites leached chemicals into the groundwater, potentially polluting the city’s water supply

Question 14

Solutions to the degradation of urban environments in HIC cities

Answer 14

1) Cooperation between government and the private sector
2) Sustainable communities
3) Improved waste management

Question 15

Cooperation between government and the private sector as a solution to the degradation of urban environments in HIC cities

Answer 15

• Government may relax planning laws and acquire land, clean it and put in new infrastructure
• Maybe encourage private investors to build high profit buildings, such as office blocks and upmarket accommodation

Question 16

Sustainable communities as a solution to the degradation of urban environments in HIC cities

Answer 16

• Carbon-neutral, small-scale urban developments
• Sustainable communities aim to be economically sustainable by providing local job opportunities and ensure local people have adequate educational provision and decent healthcare
• They aim to tackle multiple deprivation and social exclusion

Question 17

Improved waste management as a solution to the degradation of urban environments in HIC cities

Answer 17

• Introduce recycling and composing schemes to cut down on the amount of domestic waste that has to be disposed of in a landfill
• Waste that cannot be recycled or composted is burnt in waste-to-energy incinerators, producing electricity

Question 18

Detroit, Michigan State, USA: Before the Urban Degradation and Urban Decay

Answer 18

• Was the “Motor City”
• The city that was once one of the wealthiest in America is a decrepit, often surreal landscape of urban decline.
• It was once one of the greatest cities in the world.
• The birthplace of the American car industry, it boasted factories that at one time produced cars shipped over the globe.
• Its downtown was studded with architectural gems, and by the 1950s it boasted the highest median income and highest rate of home ownership of any major American city.

Question 19

Detroit, Michigan State, USA: Causes of Urban Degradation and Urban Decay

Answer 19

• Collapse of its manufacturing base
• Factories shut down because globalisation occurs and it becomes cheaper for manufacturers to manufacture in MICs
• Globalisation allows for manufacturers to trade and transport parts
• White flight - half a century ago it was still dubbed the “arsenal of democracy” and boasted almost two million citizens, making it the fourth-largest in America. Now that number has shrunk to 900,000.

Question 20

Detroit, Michigan State, USA: Symptoms of Urban Degradation and Urban Decay

Answer 20

• Its once proud suburbs now contain row after row of burnt-out houses.
• Empty factories and apartment buildings haunt the landscape, stripped bare by scavengers.
• Now almost a third of Detroit – covering a swath of land the size of San Francisco – has been abandoned.
• Tall grasses, shrubs and urban farms have sprung up in what were once stalwart working-class suburbs.
• Even downtown, one ruined skyscraper sprouts a pair of trees growing from the rubble.
• There is a shocking jobless rate of 29%.

Question 21

Detroit, Michigan State, USA: Reversing Urban Degradation and Urban Decay

Answer 21

• Gleaners Community Food Bank has long sent out parcels of food, clothing and furniture all over the city.
• But now it is doing so to the suburbs as well, sometimes to people who only a year or so ago had been donors to the charity but now face food shortage themselves.
• Gleaners has delivered a staggering 14,000 tonnes of food in the past 12 months alone. Standing in a huge warehouse full of pallets of potatoes, cereals, tinned fruit and other vitals
• In Detroit many people see the only signs of recovery as coming from themselves.