Should urban growth in MEDCs be allowed to encroach on the surrounding countryside? Justify your answer.

Authors Avatar

Should urban growth in MEDCs be allowed to encroach on the surrounding countryside? Justify your answer [60 marks]

Large urban areas in More Economically Developed Countries (MEDCs) generate political, social, economic and environmental problems. The purely physical growth of cities both upwards and outwards destroys valuable agricultural land and ultimately may become detrimental to the urban way of life. It may be difficult in particular to make provision for adequate food and water supplies, sewage and rubbish disposal. Urban decay and problems in the inner cities and shantytowns become difficult to overcome along with severe traffic congestion, air, water and land pollution. There is a need to control urban growth. To do this, sections of Green Land especially in the More Economically Developed World (MEDW), have been designated Green Belts, wedges, buffers or hearts.

Green Belts encircle towns. They are broad rings of countryside often up to ten kilometres wide in which urban development is restricted. The aims of Green Belts were to stop urban sprawl, prevent neighbouring towns from merging and to preserve special character of towns. Since then other functions have been added including provision for recreation, safeguarding agricultural land and assisting in urban regeneration. In the UK there are twenty-one Green Belts covering nearly two and a half million hectares of land (about fifteen percent of the land area).

        Closely associated with the implementation of Green Belts was the development of new and expanded towns in order to house the overspill population from the cities. In some locations a complete ring or belt of preserved land was not possible or desirable. In these areas wedges or buffers have been used; these are small zones of ‘green’ land protected from development. This was typical of areas beyond London’s Green Belt. However, the pressures for development have continued for new housing, industry, retailing developments and recreational facilities. As a result there have been calls for Green Belt land to be released for development. This has led to considerable opposition from interested pressure groups.

         

The causes of accelerated decline of business in city centres include the redistribution of the population through the process of suburbanisation and counterurbanisation. The decline was also encouraged by a combination of both push and pull factors. The push factors are the relative disadvantages of the city centre locations while the pull factors represent the relative advantages afforded by alternative locations most often in the periphery of the urban area. The typical features of the Central Business District (CBD) that once provided advantages for commercial and business enterprises now present some disadvantages and disincentives for those same functions.

Join now!

The push factors are the disadvantages of the CBD forcing businesses and urban growth out of city centre locations. Traditionally the CBD has high land values. These resulted from the competition between businesses to locate in the CBD. The lack of space led to high-density construction and the need to build upwards creating a skyline of multipurpose skyscrapers in many CBDs.  The modern trend towards shopping under one roof and the modern one storey factory and business units with landscaped grounds and large car parks require vast areas of land. The CBD location is prohibitive due to lack space ...

This is a preview of the whole essay