The Urban World, 9 th Ed.

The Urban World, 9th Ed. J. John Palen

Chapter 5: Metro and Edge City Growth • Introduction • Metropolitan Growth • Commuting and Communication • Canadian Urban Regions • Postindustrial Central Cities • Edge Cities • Nonmetropolitan Growth • The Rise of the Sunbelt • Movement to the Coasts • Summary

Introduction • Three major transformations • The metropolitan area (and beyond) replacing the city as the major urban unit • The increasing dominance of edge cities as a major locus of metropolitan growth • The three-decades-long population and industry shift toward the sunbelt and the nation’s east and west coastlines

Figure 5.1 Rate of Net Migration by Metropolitan and Micropolitan Statistical Areas, 2000 to 2010

Figure 5.2 Percent Change in Population, 2000 to 2010

Metropolitan Growth • In-Movement: 1900-1950 • The central city found its physical expansion contained by surrounding suburbs, but the social and economic influence of the central city exploded • Out-Movement: 1950 into the 21st Century • Decentralization of people, shopping, offices, and manufacturing has been the pattern since the last half of the 20th century

Commuting and Communication • The 19th century city was based on steam power. • The cities of the 20th and 21st centuries are based on electricity and petroleum • The motor vehicle enabled transportation growth, while the telephone allowed for greater communications abilities

Canadian Urban Regions • Canada is now 80 percent urban, and four major Census Metropolitan Areas (CMAs) now hold half of Canada’s population • The four CMAs are growing faster than the country as a whole • These areas are magnets for people, jobs, and services, and they are more ethnically diverse than the rest of the country

Postindustrial Central Cities • Cities no longer dominate in population, services, or employment • There are now over three suburbanites for every two central-city residents • Generally, production and distribution have decentralized as markets have decentralized • Downtowns still offer businesses centralized locations, and they also have become major entertainment, tourist, and convention sites

Edge Cities • Edgeless and Private Edge Cities • Edge Cities describe the pattern of evolving new multiple urban cores increasingly found in the outer rings of metropolitan areas • Edge cities do not have clearly defined legal edges • Edge cities have no civic order or elected government • They are private property; in effect, private cities unto themselves • Edge cities are private domains because they are managed by private corporate policy • Boomburgs • The name given to extremely fast-growing suburban incorporated places that have populations over 100,000 but are not the largest city in the metro area • As of 2003 the U.S. had fifty-three boomburg suburbs

Suburban Business growth • The industrial park has supplanted the city factory, with twice as many manufacturing jobs now located in suburbs as in central cities • Over 90 percent of new office space is built in suburbs • The old Burgess hypothesis of economic growth moving out from the CBD through a series of zones has become history

Malling of the Land • The dominant symbol for the beginning of the 21st century is the shopping mall • The first shopping center was Country Club Plaza, developed in 1923 in Kansas City • Food courts were introduced by the Rouse Company in the early 1970s • Malls have become the contemporary public space version of the ancient Greek agoras

Malls and “Street Safety” • Malls emphasize total predictability • Rigorously private, so they can ban people from their property • Security staff hold a public relations function • To maintain their image of safety, malls use their advertising clout to see that crimes committed on mall property are not reported on local TV or in local newspapers

Nonmetropolitan Growth • Diffuse Growth • The pattern of rural rebound is the out-movement of population into a new form of community that is more diffuse • The fastest growth is in the sprawling exurbs • Some growth related to providing recreational and retirement opportunities for metropolitan residents

National Society • The pattern of discrete metropolitan concentrations is being challenged by an emerging pattern of increased dispersion and metropolitan de-concentration • Increased mobility of goods, persons, and ideas suggests that a new urban phase—a national urban system—is being created • Physical distance is losing importance • Whether we live in a metropolitan area or not, we are all part of a metropolitan society

The Rise of the Sunbelt • Population and Economic Shifts • A shift of population to the metropolises of the West and the South • An impossible transformation without the technology of air conditioning • Rustbelt refers to the decline of the heavy manufacturing cities that during much of the 19th and 20th centuries defined America’s industrial might. • Quality-of-life factors played a large role in the shift

Regional Consequences • The South now is the fastest-growing region in the nation • Population is flowing south and west, attracted by new jobs, a mild climate, a lower cost of living, and a lifestyle stressing outdoor living • The shift of the population is also shifting political power • Sunbelt populations are more likely to vote conservative and are less likely to support liberal political candidates or policies

Figure 5.3 Congressional Seat Gain/Loss Based on 2010 Census

Sunbelt Problems • Breakneck growth has brought not only jobs but also massive urban sprawl, huge traffic congestion, overtaxed water and sewer systems, rising air pollution, and widespread environmental degradation • Hit very hard by the recession • Some parts of the South and Southwest still have academic systems that need upgrading

Movement to the Coasts • Wealth generated by a strong economy, and more flexible work arrangements such as telecommuting, are resulting in more and more people living permanently near the shore • The “moral hazard” problem occurs when existing federal programs, by protecting against loss, inadvertently create the very problem they were designed to prevent

The Urban World, 9 th Ed.