Urbanisation - Case Study Example

Challenges of Transport due to Urbanization While many people are moving to the edge of towns and cities, traffic congestion is worsening because people now drive their cars inside the city centers to get to work. It is undeniable that most people are brought into city on large roads or motorways then the roads link up with smaller and narrow roads in the city center thus causing bottleneck and congestion (Shaw, 2011). Several cities have tried to manage the challenge by introducing park and ride schemes, cycle lanes, congestion charging schemes, car-pooling and Low Emission zones as well as vehicle exclusion zones to tackle the issue. It is apparent that transportation system is among the many problems facing urbanized city especially if the city is not well planned and laid out properly as explained in this article. Presently, many growing economies face serious challenges brought about by traffic congestion because of the increasing influence of citizens and the movement of people from rural to urban centers (Crane & Weber, 2012). The act of urbanization has seen an explosive increase in urban households owning cars yet the road infrastructures cannot keep up with the rapid growth. Moreover, the rise of the number of vehicles in the urban centers is characterized by vehicle breakdowns and traffic accidents that cause serious traffic congestion thus causing regular headache for city officials (Rodrigue, 2014). People’s reliance on cars for transportation is a huge problem in urbanization especially those owning private cars that are the major cause of traffic jam on the highways. Current transport planning is very challenging because of the higher population found in the urban centers. Urbanization is associated with rise of many cities whose transportation structures combine multifaceted systems of infrastructure that includes aerial tramway, subway systems, City buses, and Island railways. Most of the transportation systems were facilitated by the second industrial revolution, which led to the development elevated trains, and subterranean transportation and since then, private transportation came into existence, which notably changed the cities’ transportation (Black, 2010). Urban cities are known for significant use of public transportation with almost 54.2% of the employees using public transport while some households own their private cars. In some cities such as New York, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority which is the agency managing transport system in New York City, serves 12 counties and carries over 11 million passengers on an average weekday and further 800,000 vehicles on toll bridges and tunnels every weekday. This shows how challenging it is to transport millions of people within the urban cities such as New York, Beijing, and London. It is apparent that transport sectors in the cities make millions of dollars on daily basis but this comes with several disadvantages including pollution, jam, and congestion in those cities. Increasing and implementing an integrated crowd transportation policy in urban centers is never an easy task (Baddour & Percebois, 2012). Residential and job density in most cities are very high across the world because of the larger population that seek greener pastures in the cities (Grillo & Laperrouze, 2013). There is actually less street area per person in larger cities such as London and the street area covered by cars in those cities are also large. For instance, a parked car occupies almost 14 square meters of street and the congestion brought about by urbanization and posed by an additional car either parked or moving are very high (Crane & Weber, 2012). Land use and transportation are closely related considering the area covered by cars. Transport is a real issue because vehicles consume very valuable land yet in most cases, the car owners do not cater for the costs of the land that their vehicles use. It is therefore important to note that reducing the land consumption by cars may be of great help because it will further ease transport challenges that many vehicles bring in various cities across the world. Adapting to densities and demand that is triggered by increased transportation in the cities has posed great challenge to city planners. Congestion is therefore one of the most prevalent transport problems in large cities whose threshold is above 1 million in population because of motorization and the diffusion of the automobile that have stretched the demand for transport infrastructure. The supply of infrastructure cannot serve the demand of vehicles and population present, for instance, considering that most vehicles spend their time parked thus increasing demand for parking space (Crane & Weber, 2012). Central areas of the cities are parked with cars and the impact of parking and congestion are interrelated because they create additional delays thus impairing local circulation. Cruising may take a very long time in the central region of various densely populated cities because of the time spent by car owners looking for parking spaces. Moreover, urbanization is characterized with longer commuting hours between residential areas to workplaces. Issues regarding residential affordability where more affordable residents are located further away from the central business districts cause longer commuting hours (Shaw, 2011). Long commuting is associated with many social problems such as isolation and poor health issues of the individuals who are, in most cases, not economically well-off. There are also issues of public transport inadequacy where the transport system either is over or under used. There is always crowdedness associated with discomfort that city residents undergo during peak hours because of the huge demand and low ridership makes many services financially unsustainable, mostly in suburban regions. In addition, there are great challenges dealing with non-motorized transport contributed by the outcome of intense traffic and blatant lack of consideration for pedestrians and bicycles thus resulting into accidents. Transport issues in the cities has also been characterized by loss of public space because increased traffic has adverse effect on public activities such as markets and community interaction places (Peng, Sun & Lu, 2012). Automobiles have replaced all these once important places and the activities have been transferred to shopping malls. It is therefore undeniable that traffic flows influence life and interactions of residents as well as their usage of streets because more traffic impedes social interactions and street activities (Shaw, 2011). Environmental impacts and energy consumption of many vehicles found in the cities has become serious impediment to the quality of life and health of urban population. Solution Transportation should not always impose great threat to the urbanized city planners because there are other serious issues to deal with such as medical care, housing, poverty levels and high unemployment rates. Transportation system is not the least important thing because a good transportation system such as buses and subways may greatly minimize environmental degradation (Rodrigue, 2014). Urbanized city planners should plan the transportation system in a manner that a city can have more space that may provide a good room for growth and reduce a negative impact on the environment. Cities can have an arrangement that allows only less vehicles in their centers such as encouraging of walking, cycling and introduction of local busing routes that transport people at specific times (Næss, Næss & Nicolaisen, 2011). Moreover, car-pooling may also be introduced where people working in the same areas of town rotate driving duties thus saving on both fuel consumption and air pollution. Urban traffic congestion may also be reduced by establishing underground rail systems because train can carry far more people with much greater efficiency (Rodrigue, 2014). Underground rail system currently operates in many cities around the world including Shanghai and London. City planners should also encourage building of more capacity that may include the number and size of highways that can accommodate the higher number of vehicles and operate the existing capacity more efficiently. Urbanization is indeed a phenomenon that is actually very hard to deal with. Governments, city planners, and everyone concerned should take great precaution while dealing with challenges such as transportation that is influenced by urbanization (Black, 2010). Transportation problem has become one of the greatest challenges urban planners deal with in most cities because it imposes a great threat to the operations of cities thus derailing the economies of the respective cities. Cities should have less congestion and a well-planned transportation infrastructure that allow more space especially at the center of the cities. Bibliographies Baddour, J. & Percebois, J. 2012, "Insularity and sustainable transport", International Journal of Energy Sector Management, vol. 6, no. 4, pp. 558-568. Black, W., R 2010. Sustainable transportation: problems and solutions. New York, Guilford Press. Crane, R., & Weber, R 2012. The Oxford handbook of urban planning. New York, Oxford University Press. Grillo, F. & Laperrouze, J 2013, "Measuring the Cost of Congestion on Urban Area and the Flexible Congestion Rights,” Journal of Management and Sustainability, vol. 3, no. 2, pp. 40-55. Næss, P., Strand, A., Næss, T. & Nicolaisen, M 2011, "On their road to sustainability? The challenge of sustainable mobility in urban planning and development in two Scandinavian capital regions,” The Town Planning Review, vol. 82, no. 3, pp. 285-315. Peng, Z., Sun & Lu, Q. 2012, "Chinas Public Transportation: Problems, Policies, and Prospective of Sustainability", Institute of Transportation Engineers.ITE Journal, vol. 82, no. 5, pp. 36-40. Rodrigue, J 2014. Transportation and the Urban Form. The Geography of Transport Systems, Hofstra University. Retrieved from https://people.hofstra.edu/geotrans/eng/ch6en/conc6en/ch6c1en.html Shaw, P 2011. Helvetica and the New York City subway system: the true (maybe) story. Cambridge, Mass, MIT Press. Read More