Urban Sprawl: Causes and Effects

Urbanization refers to migration of population from rural regions to towns and cities. Man has always moved to new places in search of better pastures. Hence, migration is not a new phenomenon. However, recent studies have shown a steep rise in urbanization in the late 19th and early 20th century. This sudden increase in urbanization can be attributed to Industrial Revolution, which provided better economic opportunities in the cities, due to setting up of factories and industries. As the cities and towns reap most of the benefits of innovations in the fields of science and technology, urbanization still continues to take place in them. As a result of this, the cities and its suburbs spill over to the rural areas along their boundaries, and this spread is termed as urban sprawl.

Causes

• Cheaper land and housing costs in the suburbs as compared to urban centers has lured many to settle in these areas.
• There has been an increase in public spending for the development of infrastructure like roads, water and electricity in the suburbs than in existing urban centers, thus adding benefits to life in sprawls.
• There has been an increase in commercial lending practices that favor suburban development.
• Increase in family income of an average American has raised his living standard. Owning a car and paying for gas to transit from suburb to the city is affordable for many Americans.
• Sprawls are characterized by low density populations and less traffic congestion. Therefore, even in the absence of any federal policies that would encourage growth of sprawls, these centers have proliferated due to the willingness of a growing number of people to live in sprawls, where they find life more calm and peaceful than in the cities.
• Higher property and business taxes in the cities have pushed businesses to the suburbs where taxes are generally low.

Effects

• Sprawls have been criticized for increasing public costs. Some view sprawls as a venue where public money is being spent on redundant infrastructure outside the urban areas at the cost of neglecting the infrastructure in the cities that is either not utilized or underutilized.
• Populations living in urban sprawls commute to cities in their automobiles. This has resulted in heavier traffic on the roads leading to traffic congestion, increase in air pollution and automobile related accidents.
• Increasing dependence on automobiles has led the sprawl population to use their vehicles even for short distances. Such behavior is believed to have led to increase in obesity and hypertension, in the population living in sprawls than those in the cities.
• Sprawls have triggered concerns over environmental issues. Houses in sprawls are larger than those in urban centers. This is viewed by some, as waste of cultivable land and displacement of wildlife. As large area of land is covered with impervious material, such as concrete, there is lesser percolation of rainwater to reach the groundwater.
• These are believed to cause disintegration of the social capital of America. Houses in the sprawls are big with large backyards that tend to separate neighbors. Hence social interactions among neighbors is much less in these regions than the cities.
• Due to heavy dependence of people residing in sprawls on automobiles, city planners are compelled to spend more money on larger highways and parking spaces. This is considered as an additional burden on the state treasury as this reduces the area of taxable land.

Despite widespread anti-sprawl sentiments, urban sprawls have their own benefits. With a considerable portion of the population preferring to live in sprawls, houses have become more affordable in cities. Reduced housing costs in sprawls is believed to have provided minorities and recent immigrants better housing opportunities.

Urban sprawl is the later stage of urbanization and is an inevitable phenomenon. Just like every other process urban sprawl has its own pros and cons. However, the negative aspects of urban sprawls can be neutralized by monitoring their growth in a planned way, so that they are not a liability either to the society, economy or the environment.