Sustainable Development Policies Can Reduce Urbanization Problems

Rapid urbanisation has caused a variety of problems, including transport congestion, lack of sufficient homes and living conditions, sanitary and health care issues, and crime. For all these problems, city planners have attempted potential solutions, each with varying degrees of success. Cities including London, Manila and Mumbai have several of the aforementioned problems, and have each tried their own potential solutions. This essay will discuss how successful these schemes have been in resolving these issues.

Recent data has shown that the world’s total population is doubling; however, the world's urban population is tripling. In the early 1800s, only 2 percent of the world’s population lived in urban areas (Urbanization; an environmental force to reckon with). This is a sharp contrast to what we have today. The promise of ample job opportunities, higher wages, and a better standard of living have been the main luring factors for attracting people into cities. Today about 50 percent of the world’s population lives in urban areas. It is estimated that by 2050 about 60-70 percent of the world’s population will be living in urban areas (Urbanization; an environmental force to reckon with). This growth trend of the urban populace is troubling since it has tremendous bad effects on our environment which in turn has bad effects on our health and well-being.

Traffic congestion is a major disadvantage in largely populated cities which can be diminished by limiting car usage. “...pitted sidewalks have been replaced by broad, smooth sidewalks; rush-hour restrictions have dramatically cut traffic...” (Source 3). The reduction of car usage has lowered the number of traffic jams and atmospheric pollution. High percentages of smog can cause harmful effects to the human body and the reduction of cars can aid in improving the health of the inhabitants of these cities and lessening the dangerous living conditions.

The level of urbanization in the world as a whole was about 46.6 percent in 2000, 50.6 percent in 2010 and it is supposed to reach 57.2 percent in 2025. The corresponding figures for African countries are 36.0 percent, 40.0 percent, and 47.2 percent respectively. Ethiopia was 14.9 percent urban in 2000 and 16.7 percent in 2010 and it is projected to be 21.3 percent urban by 2025. However, urbanization is occurring rapidly in Ethiopia, and it is expected that urban growth rate will remain the fastest with some decline in Ethiopia than in other African countries on average (UN World Urbanization Prospects, 2011).

Although research on urban sustainable development has made significant advances in the last years, key knowledge gaps remain for improving governance for urban sustainability and resilience. Government policy often supports non-sustainable behavior or addresses problems of sustainability in inconsistent ways. . Visions of sustainability are rarely used as a compass for policy by governments, and “sustainability-oriented policy remains an ideal to which policy makers are committed only in words” .

From the start of urbanization the belief in many nations all throughout history has been that cities are where the prosperity of the nation is held. But is this really a valid argument or does that simply referring to a select few? The urban population has grown rapidly since 1950 form 746 million to 3.9 billion people as of 2014. Many of these number exist in North America with 82% of the population living in cities, Europe with 73%, and Latin America with 80%. Asia and Africa on the other hand are far behind having only 40 – 48% of population living in urban areas. It is said by the World Bank that “Africa is witnessing an unprecedented projected population growth of more than 40,000 new urban inhabitants per day between now and 2040” (Voice of America). Although for some countries population growth as large as this can be a good thing but in regards to many developing countries that have cities with a lack of a strong infrastructure, a weak economic hold, lack of a sustainable government, and a poor quality of life, the population influx could cause a major issue in the progress of development and therefore make urbanization a highly negative thing if these issues are not properly addressed.

A sustainable city is when harmony is reached between the environment, economy and society. Environmentally, sustainable cities are ecologically friendly by using alternative sources of energy such as solar or wind power. Economically, governments should share a similar decision-making process with institutions and with the public by having a common belief in what should be done by improving sustainability. Sorensen, Marcotullio, and Grant (2004), find that a good decision making process consists of planning and control at the municipal and national political levels which would allow local level functions to become reinforced. Socially, sustainable cities are classless, meaning that there are no social divisions which serve as limits; leading to a more equal society. One of the many ideas would be using mixed housing to remove the class divisions between people. Also, city streets would be walkable, with businesses and services located at close proximity to promote a healthier lifestyle and serve as an alternative to using cars for transportation. The writers differ in their analysis when examining the approaches to improving sustainability in cities. This section will analyze four important ideas on how cities can become more sustainable.

Sustainable development and sustainability have been the focus of many researchers in various disciplines for quite some time now. The current distribution of natural resources and their allocation is modeled on an infinite growth assumption. The mainstream economic perspective assumes that the market will allocate resources in the most efficient way possible. Yet there are many externalities that often left out of this model such as clean air, clean water, and the carrying capacity of the Earth's natural systems. For example, when someone used oil as a source of fuel, the pollution from its use is not counted in the standard economic perspective. Furthermore, the fact that oil is a nonrenewable resource is also not effectively included in these models.

Traffic congestion in the United States is becoming increasingly salient to citizens, private companies, and government actors. Traffic congestion, particularly on major highways and interstates, increases with economic development and production. First, as the economy develops, workers’ income rises. Public transportation is an inferior good in that a person’s demand for it decreases as their income rises. Thus, as workers in a growing economy gain income, they begin to purchase vehicles, which leads to more drivers on the roads (Road Congestion). A second way in which economic growth affects traffic congestion is through business and other urban development. As a city’s borders expand with new businesses and residential areas, the amount of people increases quickly, while new infrastructure to sustain them follows slowly behind in a dragging effect. To worsen the problem, these new businesses have new employees who travel on the same roads at the same time of day, which further leads to congestion during peak hours (Winaisathaporn).

There are many challenges in urbanization when people live in cities and the population increases in hope of a better life for an individual’s family.

Urbanization causes financial problems to the overwhelming majority of the people. This is because problems with money are widespread in urban areas. First of all, urbanization leads to the extreme growth of unemployment. For instance, as reported by the International Labour Organization, International unemployment rose to 210 million people in 2010 (David & Vicente 2012, p.154). According to David & Vicente (2012, p.156) vast amounts of unemployment results in human resources not being used efficiently across cities which cause social inequality. This evidence shows that urbanization causes unemployment. Urbanization leads to significant overpopulation in the central cities, which causes high competition and as a result lower job opportunities for most people in the labor market. As businesses and governments cannot produce enough jobs to meet the demand of a fast-growing population, a lot of individuals are faced with a shortage of employment and deprived of a vital source of income. As a result, lack of revenue leads to inequality in society. Secondly, urbanization leads to a lack of affordable housing for the overwhelming majority of urban people. According to Gan (et al., 2017, p.427) in the forthcoming future, the global urban population will reach around 6.3 billion people in 2050, and about 94% of them will be in developing countries. Furthermore, approximately 828 million people from developing countries currently live in inadequate housing and this number will rise

Sustainable development, throughout time, has evolved various forms of definitions. However, this term is used in reference to environmental, ecological, social, and economical development and in terms of the dictionary reference, the term could be used in terms of trying to uphold, or the long term effect of actions for a desired result (Naz, 2009, p.187). The dictionary definition is somewhat parallel to the definition provided in the Brundtland Report “Our Common Future” (Naz, 2009, p. 187). In this report, the definition of sustainable development was thoroughly investigated. The definition was as follows: sustainable development is fulfilling the needs in the present without compromising future

Urbanization, which is becoming a buzzword during the last few decades, is enlarging at a booming speed. It is predicted that 93 percents urban growth will occur to the year 2020, in the developing world (Elliot J.A, 1999). Generally speaking, more than half of the people around the world have been moved to cities, which led to a series of “matters” connected with people’s life that changed in a dramatical way. In this period, sustainable development, another buzzword during the past few years, came into people’s view and gradually became the mainstream of society development. Its definition is to make the development continue in a long term, which means allowing appropriate economic growth and industrialization without

The first step to achieving sustainability is the incorporation and financing of green programs by the government (Fuchs, 2010). The link between urban development and sustainability for the betterment of all citizens of a region, city, or state has to be made clear to the population, so they can become invested in the process as well. The

Urbanization is the defining phenomenon of the 21st century. For the first time in history, more than half the world’s population lives in cities, with 90 percent of urban growth taking place in the developing world. Increasing population growth in the existing urban areas and rapid urbanisation is leading to need for increased land area to accommodate the growing population. Rapid urbanization is turning villages are into towns, towns into big cities and cities in to metropolitan cities. This is leading to various emerging challenges that urban areas today have to address like inadequate housing, inefficient physical infrastructure like water, sanitation, transport, inadequate social infrastructure like education and health, spiralling construction costs and land prices.