Introduction
About 20,000 years ago, things like towns and cities never existed as the humans who existed during that era lived in small and nomadic groups. The first urban centers emerged about 10 millenniums ago in places such as Catal Hoyuk in modern day Turkey and Jericho in Palestine. The concept of urban centers then started to spread to other parts of the world including the Western nations .As a result of this, very many urban centers of varying nature have continued to emerge in all corners of the world. Today, more than half the population in the Western nations live in urban centers and this has consequently led to an unprecedented scale and amount of urbanization in the history of the human race. The exploration of this urban development process presents very interesting factors and aspects to people interested in this field.
Urban development is the cultural, economic, physical and social development of towns or cities and also the causes behind these processes. Throughout history, the Western world has definitely witnessed a revolutionary urban development process .This process has led to the emergence of enormous urban centers in all the Western nations particularly the United States. There are very many factors that have contributed to urban development and here am going to look at some of these factors together with their historical evolution.
The history of urban development can be observed from a human geography perspective. This is because the development of towns and cities is one of the central topics in the discipline of human geography. The experience, structure and nature of the urban landscape are very essential to human geography presently (Teaford 42). This is because there is a need to comprehend the reason why people assemble and congregate in urban centers and the consequences of such congregations.
The history of urban centers in the United States has seen dramatic developments throughout recent centuries. In the 17th and 18th centuries, there were a relatively small number of cities that were mainly concentrated on the eastern coastline and these cities were mainly dominated by moguls who were the facilitators of trade between America and Europe. During the turn of the 18th century, domestic market expansion and industrialization led to an increase in the size and the number of cities (Sampson 45). Another thing witnessed was the emergence of cities different from those that existed in the earlier period. These cities emerged in the mid-western and northern regions and were a consequence of industrial revolution. As a result, the urban development overall pattern was altered by the relative services importance that was constantly growing and expanding. The urban population and development importance continued rising but in a more dispersed way. The level of population in the urban centers rose. This period saw a geographical shift in the concentration of cities in the southern and western regions of the United States.
During the 20th century, the number and size of cities continued to rise and the urbanization level also rose significantly. There has been a tendency by Western population throughout history to concentrate in expanding and large cities. The presence and concentration of industries in distinct locations have attracted people to these locations .A specific migration flow pattern has thus been witnessed in these areas. This movement of people towards industrial areas was one of the major factors that contributed to urban development. A good example of a migration pattern that contributed heavily to the growth of urban centers in the United States is the one from southern areas like Mexico and other South American countries to cities in the United States.
However as time passed on, the focus on industries gradually started to shift and people started to focus on economical development that was hugely based on factors that included human and natural resources location, economies of scale and market distances. All these factors attracted people to large metropolitan and cosmopolitan urban centers and in the process led to their growth. The main destinations of most of these migrants have constantly been the huge metropolitan cities and towns. When these migrants settle in the cities and towns, they assimilate the cultural and social norms of the local people and also introduce new values ands aspects to the locals.
In the later part of the 20th century, a new population trend was observed where people started to migrate from central cities and moved towards suburban areas. This subsequently led to the development of what is now referred to as cosmopolitans.
Despite the dramatically changes in the size, number, economic structure and location of cities that has been witnessed throughout history, there is one characteristic that has remained constant. The population sizes of different cities varied hugely at any one given time. This distribution of size in cities is seen as following the rank size rule (Sampson 71). This rule works on the principle that a city’s population is equal to the largest city population divided by the city’s in question rank.
20th Century American City Models
The 20th century has witnessed a significant change in the design of American cities. There are various factors that have shaped the 20th century development of American cities. These factors include the following; the massive immigration that characterized this century, the emergence of skyscrapers and inventions like that of the electric trolley vehicle.
Other factors include the Second World War, the cold war, the development of commercial aircrafts, the enactment of the city of New York zoning code and the stock market crash. All these factors and issues have played a significant role in the way the 20th century cities are modeled and designed to perform various functions. These factors have brought forward a new school of thought to urban geographers and planners influencing the way they view urban centers and their functions.
Cities and other urban centers are no longer seen as collections of people and buildings.20th century cities are characterized by functional structures .These cities are therefore organized to perform various functions in fields such as education, commerce, production amongst others.
Cities have continued to evolve and in doing so, they have continued to exhibit increasing complexity. The 20th century saw various urban planners and geographers attempt to come up with models to show how cities function. Some of these models that were proposed by various geographers included the concentric zone model, the Hoyt model, the multiple-nuclei model and the urban-realms model. The most popular model of cities in the 20th century was the multi-nucleic model. This model was proposed by two geographers, Edward Ullman and Chauncy Harris. This model‘s basis was the assertion that the central business district of any particular city was losing its position as the core or nucleus of the urban centre.
The several urban regions of a given city would have subsidiary ‘nuclei’ that would perform the function of the central business district. The importance of this model increased during this period and saw greater movement of people towards the suburbs. According to this model, each city had nine sections with each having a different function.
These sections are; central business district, industrial suburbs, light manufacturing, residential suburb, outlying business district, heavy manufacturing, upper-class residential, middle-class residential and low-class residential (Teaford 41). These sections then developed into regions that were independent as a result of the activities that they performed.. For instance, the economic activities that are related or rely on each other (for example, schools and bookstores) would create a nucleus. On the other hand, some nuclei would form due to the fact that they needed to be far from each other, for example airports and residential areas. Other nuclei developed from specialization of economic activities, such as railway centers or shipping ports.
The city of Chicago in Illinois is an example of a Mid-Western city that can be used to explore the 20th century American city models. Chicago is the third largest city in the United States. This city extends westwards on the southwestern shoreline of Lake Michigan. It is huge metropolitan area that further extends into the states of Indiana and Wisconsin.
Chicago has a diversified economy that is based on finance and insurance, manufacturing, publishing, food processing amongst others. This industrial base together with its huge inland port contributes greatly to its position as a major distribution and transportation centre.
The model of the city exhibits very intriguing facts. It is one of the fastest growing cities in the world. It was initially founded in 1833 with a population of less than 200 people. It however increased in population at a very fast rate such that by the end of the 19th century it was ranked in the 5th position in a list of the world’s largest cities despite the fact that it had gone through one of the greatest urban calamities, The Great Fire of Chicago in 1871 (Teaford 32).The city was the destination of very many immigrants from different nationalities who came to seek employment opportunities.
Chicago is home to very many sky scrappers and other historical landmarks. The functional nature of the city can be explored using the multi-nucleic model. Using this model, the previously stated nine sections of a city are clearly visible. The fact that the metropolis of Chicago extends to other metropolitan areas further extends the need for decentralization of the primary functions of the central business district to other ‘nuclei’ as stipulated by the multi-nucleic model.
The city however deviates to a small extent from the 20th century model due to the fact that the dynamic nature of various elements in the city sometimes makes it difficult to classify it into a particular model. The relatively high population growth rate in the city together with unplanned infrastructure development exhibited sometimes by the city is some of the dynamic elements that characterize this city. The United States government is however trying to come up with measures to ensure Chicago and other cities in the country are well adapted and developed to perform various economic, social and cultural functions in an effective and efficient way. This way, it will become relatively easy to manage these cities together with the residents who occupy them.
Works cited
Teaford, Jon. The Twentieth-Century American City: Problem, Promise, and Reality (The American Moment). Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press.2002.
Sampson, Robert.Great American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. (2012).
