Human Geography (Changing Urban Environments)

Urbanisation

Urbanisation is the proportion of people living in built environments such as towns and cities.

More people are now living in urban environments such as cities rather than rural environments such as the countryside.

Rural migration (movement of people from the countryside to urban areas) happened in richer countries from the 18th century onwards on a large scale but has gradually slowed down and some people are moving from urban areas into rural areas

Patterns of urbanisation:

1. Richer countries were the first to urbanise and have the largest proportion of their population living in urban areas.

2. Poorer countries currently have lower rates of urbanisation, but the urbanisation that does take place happens very rapidly.

Megacities are cities that have over 10 million people in them and they are mainly in poorer parts of the world

Causes of urbanisation

Push factor - Encourages or forces people to move away from an area. This could be: famine, drought, flooding, lack of employment, over populated and civil war.

Pull factor - This encourages people to move to an area. This…