URBAN SPRAWL: With cities around the world adding a million new residents per week, how such cities accommodate new residents may well determine how bad the environmental impacts of such urbanization get.
Image: Flickr/Trey Ratcliff
LONDON -- The world's cities are mushrooming at the rate of around 1 million people a week as the planet's population heads toward 9 billion people by 2050 from 7 billion now.
Urban areas are set to sprawl over an extra area equivalent to most of Europe within 20 years, yet little is being done to prepare for the major challenges that expansion will bring, scientists said Tuesday.
Already more than half the world's population is urbanized -- a fraction, they said, that would surge to some two-thirds by midcentury if current projections hold true. "Re-engineering cities is urgently needed for global sustainability," Shobhakar Dhakal, director of Tokyo's Global Carbon Project, said during the second day of the Planet Under Pressure conference.
Rehabilitation was a major theme of the meeting, held in the former industrial wasteland of east London's docklands area, adjacent to the site of the new stadium for this year's Olympic Games. Conferees learned that more than 70 percent of climate-changing carbon dioxide emissions are generated in cities, with emissions set to hit 36.5 billion metric tons in 2030 from 25 billion in 2010 and 15 billion in 1990.
But most cities around the world were neither planned for nor intended to hold the vast numbers of people they are projected to house, with, in many cases, aging water, sewage, power and transport systems already struggling to cope.
While a century ago there were fewer than 20 cities holding more than 1 million people, there are now around 450, of which at least 10 have a population of more than 10 million.
'The North American suburb has gone global'
"The way cities have grown since World War II is neither socially or environmentally sustainable, and the environmental cost of ongoing urban sprawl is too great to continue," Yale University's Karen Seto said at the conference, which runs through Thursday.
"The planet cannot afford not to urbanize. People everywhere, however, have increasingly embraced Western styles of architecture and urbanization which are resource-intense and often not adapted to local climates," she said. "The North American suburb has gone global, and car-dependent urban developments are more and more the norm."
The scientists called for a range of critical actions, including better urban planning, improved health monitoring, congestion charging to regulate road usage, smart power grids to balance power demand and supply, and more integrated green spaces to act as urban lungs. They also called for better water supply, drainage and waste treatment and the rehabilitation of urban rivers that could help improve sustainability and lifestyle.
Some among the 2,800 participants said such actions could also have hidden dividends of actually improving public health through cleaner air and the incentive to take more exercise in the new open spaces.
"We have the unique opportunity now to plan for a coming explosion of urbanization in order to decrease pressure on ecosystems, improve the livelihoods of billions of people, and avoid the occurrence of major global environmental problems and disasters," said Roberto Sanchez-Rodriguez, professor emeritus of environmental studies at the University of California, Riverside. "That process cannot wait."
A need to rethink resource movement
Sybil Seitzinger, director of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme, a science research program founded in 1987 and sponsored by the International Council for Science, said it is crucial that cities see themselves in a planetary context whose responsibilities do not end at the city limits.
"Everything being brought into the city from outside -- food, water, products and energy -- needs to be sourced sustainably. We need to rethink the resource flow to cities," she said.
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9 Comments
Add CommentAnd STILL, no one discusses the real answer to the question of what to do with mankind's continuing growth, and how to prevent that growth from destroying Mother Earth!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMankind appears to have been born on this planet, and has certainly grown up on it, making more than a few mistakes in the process of that growing up. But now it's time to move on and establish a new home. Then Mother Earth can be a great place to come back to from time to time, for a visit. However, if mankind doesn't move on soon, the damage done by not "leaving the nest" will be beyond repair.
Many will say, "We're looking for Earth-like planets!" But to find one mankind can move to right away is too much to ask right now. But mankind can BUILD new habitats to provide temporary (and possibly permanent) "new nests" that can handle whatever expansions occur, off-planet!
Okay, hand over the keys. You've had one too many.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm afraid the last 'New World' solution was the discovery of the Americas. That bought European culture another ~200 years of continued 'unlimited' resource usage. The party's winding down now, and there's no other new world available for more billions of people.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt's great that the issues are being discussed (again). I don't know how feasible "Re-engineering" the 'Mexico Cities' of the world is, but we should do what we can...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDr.Gerald K.O'Neill's 1977 book "The High Frontier: Human Colonies in Space" presented a solution(s) that was, and is, achievable and affordable compared to what is coming per this article. And it will happen. The problem is that the longer we wait, the more severe the damage will be to the earth, making for a much less desirable environment either in what it becomes (hotter, drier, less hospitable generally), or how much more limited our lives become in terms of comforts, travels, activities of all sorts, and so on because of limited energy, degree of pollution, and physical space limitations.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe need the choices now whether to seek the "freedoms" of the New Frontier(s), or settle for increasingly restrictive rules and regulations in order to survive in a place that has had in limits reached in many ways.
The Americas essentially were like adding a bedroom or two to the folk's place. The family was staying put, and yet, still growing. Now, the kids are growing up and as the become old enough they need to get out on their own. Some might want to stay, and maybe they will, but it's still mom and dad's house. "My house, my rules." For the most part, though, it's "Come back and visit when you can!" But now it's your time to find a place to live and start your own family.
Haven't read the book you're talking about but I do agree with your ideas for a long term solution. The problem I see is that space programs (especially those such as the ISS which had to be assembled in space), almost by nature due to the amount of testing necessary, take a long time to really get going.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have a temporary solution which would help to fight urban sprawl that no one seems to consider. It would be to construct suburban neighborhoods (which cover massive areas of land) vertically instead of horizontally. These "high rise neighborhoods" would have a central building similar to your average high rise apartment or condo building. Surrounding this central building would be small grass lawns for each residence. A building of this design would allow its residents a "best of both worlds" scenario, in which they would have the convenience of living in the city as well as a limited version of the pleasures of suburban living. Due to its centralized nature, it would be easier to manage pollution (such as fertilizers and pesticides), recycling programs, as well as energy and water consumption. Ultimately, if you take our suburbs and stack them on top of themselves about 10 times it gives the population quite a bit of room to grow, while in the mean time our scientists can be working diligently on making a space condo for everyone.
The sky is falling, the sky is falling. Can all the hand wringers please live until 2050 so we can all laugh at your bogus, fear-mongering, childish predictions of doom and gloom. I think we already ran out of oil 4 or 5 times if you read the early hippie projectors. Please, stay in the cities so I don't have to listen to your all-knowing crap.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe real elephant in the room is uncurbed population growth. This is the root of all the issues we're talking about here. Funding a global birth-control campaign (propaganda + dispensing of birth control methods) would be the cheapest and easiest way to lower birth rates and avoid a lot of these problems. A planet with limited recources can never sustain a human population with no limit.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"While a century ago there were fewer than 20 cities holding more than 1 million people, there are now around 450, of which at least 10 have a population of more than 10 million.'
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo these are 'unplanned'....and now someone wants millions of bureaucrats 'planning'? in theory it sounds fine but indicvidual humans nake better decisions.
Re comments...it's ALL about birth control. Everything else is useless tinkering.