The Effects of Overcrowding on Tokyo City - Essay Example

Overcrowding The Effects of Overcrowding on Tokyo Tokyo has experienced a tremendous population growth rate in the past years. This has mainly been as a result of industrial, sociological, and scientific changes. In addition, high health and sanitary standards generate a life expectancy that exceeds that of America making it one of the most populated cities in the world (Cybriwsky 79-80). Consequently, overcrowding has caused many problems for the city, both on a global and localized level. This work addresses the effects of overcrowding in Tokyo and the ways on which the city plans to accommodate or combat it. Overcrowding has had many negative effects on Japanese over the years. It has caused severe indirect and direct health risks to all sections of the population, especially the young children, elderly, and the disabled (Cybriwsky 80). It has led to insufficient aeration in homes leading to or exacerbating respiratory illness like Asthma. In addition, overcrowding has aggravated health hazard s linked to deprived and inadequate water supply and poor systems for hygiene. This is mainly because there has been inadequate fresh water for sewage treatment as well as for consumption in Tokyo due to an increase in human population. Consequently, the demand for fresh water is high than the supply due to overcrowding. Overcrowding has also led to lack of space directly affecting the psychological well being and physical development of the disabled in the society (Cybriwsky 80- 2). Disabled people require enough space to move about from one place to another as wheel chairs and other objects aid them. Lack of adequate space due to overcrowding makes it difficult for people to move from a point to the other. In addition, disabled people require enough space for their exercises in order for them to be more flexible. In addition, overcrowding has contributed to extensive social problems. It has made it hard for women to access economic and social resources by augmenting their responsibilities at home. A significant number of women in Tokyo are left at home taking care of their children and household chores making it difficult for them to have time for these resources (Cybriwsky 83). Overcrowding has also led to increased levels of air pollution, noise pollution, and soil contamination. There has also been a reduction of natural resources, particularly fossils fuels (Cybriwsky 84). Overcrowding has also caused destruction of ecosystems and forest clearing that maintains balance between atmospheric carbon dioxide and oxygen. This has resulted to changes in atmospheric consequent and composition leading to global warming (Cybriwsky 85). Increase in human population in Tokyo has made many people live in slums. This is mainly because there has been poor planning on how to accommodate growth making many people slum dwellers (World Bank 70). As a result, slum dwellers in Tokyo city face inadequate drainage and sanitation, unsafe drinking water, poor hygiene, and housing that are terribly crowded and structurally unstable (World Bank 71-2). All these problems have awful consequences on health, especially the children’s health. This is because awful living situations coupled with overcrowding in slums cause a direct danger to public health and increases the vulnerability of those migrating from the urban areas to the effects of environment change (World Bank 73). In addition, hazardous environment in slums leads to susceptibility and spread of fatal illness and diseases. Illnesses like malaria, diarrhea, and cholera are prevalent in the slums. In addition, the young children living in these slums suffer from malaria, measles, diarrhea, pneumonia and have a greater risk of succumbing to disease and illness. Recent statistics indicate that diarrhea is the leading killer disease of children in the slums (World Bank 74-5). Therefore, overcrowding in slums has led to deteriorating health and climate conditions for slum dwellers, with adverse implications for nationwide government stability and global security. Overcrowding has also led to negative effects on transportation in the city. Tokyo city has many business centers proper with many residential areas resulting in a huge number of commuters travelling between these two areas (Little Tokyo Historical society 90). Tokyo overcrowding has led to more than twenty-percent rise in commuter population. This has already exceeded nine million commuters; thus, there has been intense overcrowding of commuters during rush hours (Cavendish 1122- 124). Precisely, overcrowding is more intense in Tokyo that other regions, and while there is an increase in transportation capacity, especially in railway transportation sections, that have levels of overcrowding beyond 200% body contact with extensive pressure, are common. In addition, there are sectors with levels beyond 250 % that makes the trains body incline when it jolts making it unable to move (Cavendish 1126). The high prices on land have also made people live far from the suburbs increasing the distance to be traveled, hence longer traveling hours. In order to combat or accommodate the issue of overcrowding in Tokyo, the city plans to increase transportation capacity. This will be achieved by increasing capacity regarding pre-existing railway networks, creating a fresh railway network, and by shortening the travelling hours. Increasing the speed of the buses connecting the commuters to the trains and increasing the speed of the trains as well will lead to shortening the travelling hours. In addition, there is a need to improve public transportation by improving the environment for bus transportation. This will be achieved by improving the traffic flow, by enhancing intersections and roads, establishing bus exclusive and preferential lanes, and clearing the streets of cars that are illegally parked (Vogel 29-30). The government will also have proper planning on how to accommodate growth and put into place new public housing works, in order to reduce the negative effects of overcrowding (Vogel 31). These will also be achieved by improving water supplies, sanitation and toilets and by ensuring that Homeless International’s Workers assist in reducing the spread of illness and disease in slums (Vogel 32). In sum, overcrowding is one of the main problems faced by Tokyo in the new century. This problem has caused many negative effects on the health of the young children, elderly, disabled, and the climate conditions. In addition, overcrowding has interfered with the transportation system due to an increase in the number of commuters. Therefore, as a world-class city, the government needs to address this problem, as it is extremely hard for the people and international businesses to adjust to such a prevalent problem. Works Cited Cavendish, Marshall. World and its peoples: Eastern and southern Asia. New York: Marshall Cavendish, 2008. Cybriwsky, Roman. Historical Dictionary of Tokyo. Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2011. Little Tokyo Historical society. Los Angeless Little Tokyo. Charleston, S.C. : Arcadia Pub., 2010. Vogel, Steven. Japan Remodeled: How Government and Industry are Reforming Japanese Capitalism. New York: Cornell University Press, 2006. World Bank. World Development Report 2009: Reshaping Economic Geography. Washington, DC: World Bank, 2008. Read More