Land Use

Summary

This environmental sciences video discusses land use, focusing on urban sprawl and its environmental impacts. It highlights the transition from rural to urban areas, known as urbanization, and the associated ecosystem challenges. The video advocates for smart growth to mitigate negative consequences and emphasizes the importance of land conservation efforts through national parks, wildlife refuges, and protected wetlands. It concludes by stressing the need for sustainable development to preserve the planet.

Takeaways

• 🏙️ Urban sprawl, like in Las Vegas, leads to significant ecosystem impacts due to the expansion of cities into peripheral areas.
• 🌳 The shift from rural to urban areas, known as urbanization, can be beneficial as it conserves more land for ecosystem services.
• 🚗 The increase in transportation infrastructure and personal vehicles contributes to urban sprawl and the associated loss of land and pollution.
• 🌆 Urban blight can occur as people move out of cities, taking their tax base with them and leaving behind underdeveloped areas.
• 🌡️ Urban sprawl results in various forms of pollution, including air, light, noise, and heat, exemplified by urban heat islands.
• 🌱 The concept of smart growth is introduced as a solution to mitigate the negative impacts of urban development.
• 🏞️ Efforts to conserve land are highlighted through the establishment of national parks, wilderness areas, wildlife refuges, and wetland protection.
• 🌍 A global trend towards urbanization is observed, with a significant increase in the urban population, especially in developing countries.
• 🏘️ High-density housing in cities can help preserve more land outside urban areas by reducing the need for extensive infrastructure like roads.
• 🌿 Strategies to combat urban sprawl include creating walkable neighborhoods, establishing growth boundaries, and enhancing city centers to attract residents.

Q & A

What is the term used to describe the expansion of urban areas into the periphery?

The term used to describe the expansion of urban areas into the periphery is 'urban sprawl'.

What are the ecosystem impacts associated with urban sprawl?

The ecosystem impacts associated with urban sprawl include loss of land, air pollution, light and noise pollution, and heat pollution, which can lead to the formation of urban heat islands.

Why is urbanization considered a good thing in terms of land conservation?

Urbanization is considered a good thing because it can lead to more land being conserved for ecosystem services as people move from rural areas into cities.

What is the term for the process of people moving from rural areas to urban areas?

The process of people moving from rural areas to urban areas is called 'urbanization'.

How does the development of highways and the increase in car usage contribute to urban sprawl?

The development of highways and the increase in car usage contribute to urban sprawl by making it easier for people to live in lower-density housing outside of city centers, leading to the spread of urban areas.

What is meant by 'smart growth' in the context of urban development?

Smart growth refers to the idea of managing urban development in a way that avoids the negative consequences of urban sprawl, such as excessive land use, pollution, and loss of ecosystem services.

What is the significance of the shift from rural to urban living in terms of global population trends?

The shift from rural to urban living is significant because it represents a major demographic change, with predictions that the majority of the global population will live in urban areas in the coming decades.

How does the movement of people into cities affect the tax base and urban blight?

The movement of people into cities can lead to urban blight as they take their tax base with them, which can result in underfunded services and neglect in the inner city areas.

What are some strategies mentioned in the script to mitigate the negative impacts of urban sprawl?

Strategies to mitigate the negative impacts of urban sprawl include promoting high-density housing, creating walkable neighborhoods, establishing growth boundaries, and planting trees.

What role do national parks, wilderness areas, and wildlife refuges play in land conservation efforts?

National parks, wilderness areas, and wildlife refuges play a critical role in land conservation efforts by protecting valuable ecosystems and habitats from development and preserving them for future generations.

How does the concept of 'low-density housing' contribute to urban sprawl and what are its environmental implications?

Low-density housing contributes to urban sprawl by encouraging the spread of urban areas into previously undeveloped land, leading to environmental implications such as habitat loss and increased pollution.

Outlines

00:00

🌆 Urban Sprawl and Its Impacts

This paragraph discusses the concept of urban sprawl, using the transformation of Las Vegas as an example. It highlights the shift from rural to urban areas, known as urbanization, which is generally beneficial as it can conserve land for ecosystems. However, it also points out the negative consequences of urban sprawl, such as the loss of land, pollution, and the dilution of city benefits. The paragraph emphasizes the need for 'smart growth' to mitigate these issues and mentions the importance of land conservation efforts like national parks and wildlife refuges. It also notes the global trend of increasing urban populations, with a significant shift from rural to urban living, especially in developing countries.

05:04

🌳 Addressing Urban Sprawl and Environmental Conservation

The second paragraph delves into the environmental issues caused by urban sprawl, such as smog, noise, light, and heat pollution, with a specific focus on urban heat islands. It suggests solutions like planting trees and promoting smart growth to encourage people to live in city centers. The concept of smart growth includes creating walkable neighborhoods, compact building designs, and growth boundaries. The paragraph also discusses land preservation efforts outside of cities, including the establishment of national parks, wildlife refuges, and wilderness areas, emphasizing the importance of limiting development in these areas to protect them for future generations. It concludes by stressing the necessity of smart development to balance growth with environmental conservation.

Keywords

💡Land Use

Land use refers to the management and modification of Earth's surface, including the natural and built environments. In the video, land use is discussed in the context of urbanization and urban sprawl, highlighting how human activities shape the landscape and the potential ecological impacts. The video emphasizes the importance of sustainable land use practices to balance development with environmental conservation.

💡Urban Sprawl

Urban sprawl is the expansion of human populations away from central urban areas into suburban and rural areas. The video discusses how urban sprawl, exemplified by the growth of Las Vegas, leads to ecosystem impacts such as land loss and pollution. It is presented as a consequence of urbanization and transportation development, which has both positive and negative implications for the environment and city planning.

💡Urbanization

Urbanization is the process by which an increasing number of people live in urban areas, typically resulting in the growth of cities. The video explains that urbanization can be beneficial as it can leave more land for ecosystem services, but it also brings challenges such as urban sprawl and increased transportation needs. The video suggests that smart growth strategies can mitigate some of the negative impacts of urbanization.

💡Ecosystem Services

Ecosystem services are the benefits people obtain from ecosystems, such as clean water, air, and food. The video suggests that urbanization can potentially leave more land conserved for these services, but urban sprawl can disrupt them by consuming land and causing pollution. The concept is used to argue for the importance of sustainable development that preserves the environment's ability to provide these essential services.

💡Smart Growth

Smart growth is an urban planning and transportation strategy that encourages efficient land use to create walkable, compact, and desirable urban areas. The video discusses smart growth as a solution to the negative impacts of urban sprawl, such as pollution and land loss. It is presented as a way to create more sustainable cities that balance development with environmental conservation.

💡Pollution

Pollution in the context of the video refers to the contamination of the environment, including air, light, noise, and heat pollution, caused by urban development and sprawl. The video uses examples like the urban heat island effect in Manhattan to illustrate how pollution can have significant environmental and health impacts, and it suggests strategies like planting trees to mitigate these effects.

💡National Parks

National parks are protected areas established by governments to preserve natural environments for public use and enjoyment. The video mentions national parks in the United States, such as Yosemite and Yellowstone, as examples of land conservation efforts. These parks are meant to protect ecosystems and wildlife, providing a contrast to the development and sprawl discussed elsewhere in the video.

💡Wildlife Refuges

Wildlife refuges are areas of land and water set aside specifically for the protection and management of wildlife populations. The video refers to the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) in Alaska as an example of a wildlife refuge designed to protect species like the caribou. These refuges are part of broader land conservation efforts to preserve biodiversity and natural habitats.

💡Wetlands

Wetlands are areas where water covers the soil or is present near the surface of the soil for at least part of the year. The video discusses the importance of protecting wetlands around cities as part of land conservation efforts. Wetlands provide various ecosystem services, such as water filtration and habitat for wildlife, and their preservation is crucial for maintaining ecological balance.

💡Heat Islands

Heat islands are urban areas that are significantly warmer than their surrounding rural areas due to human activities and the built environment. The video uses the example of Manhattan to explain how cities can absorb and retain heat, leading to higher temperatures in urban areas compared to rural ones. This phenomenon can exacerbate pollution and has implications for urban planning and the need for strategies to mitigate its effects.

Highlights

Las Vegas has experienced massive urban sprawl since 1984.

Urban sprawl is characterized by development at the periphery of cities.

Urbanization, the movement from rural to urban areas, can be beneficial for ecosystem conservation.

The growth of transportation infrastructure, particularly highways and cars, contributes to urban sprawl.

Urban sprawl leads to loss of land and various forms of pollution, including air, light, noise, and heat.

The concept of smart growth is introduced as a way to mitigate negative impacts of urban development.

Conservation efforts include the establishment of national parks, wilderness areas, and wildlife refuges.

Globally, there is a shift from rural to urban living, with 70% of people predicted to live in cities by 2050.

The US has already seen over 75% of its population living in urban areas.

Economic opportunities are a driving force behind the movement of people to urban areas.

Higher density housing in cities can help preserve more land outside urban areas.

The historical development of cities and the impact of the automobile on urban sprawl.

Urban sprawl creates a positive feedback loop, encouraging further movement away from city centers.

Urban blight results from the tax base moving to suburban areas, leaving inner cities under-resourced.

Pollution in cities, including smog, noise, and heat islands, is a significant concern.

Strategies for smart growth include creating walkable neighborhoods and establishing growth boundaries.

Preserving land outside cities through the protection of wetlands and forests is crucial for conservation.

The importance of smart development to balance growth with environmental preservation.

Transcripts

Hi. It’s Mr. Andersen and this is environmental sciences video 18. It is on land use. You

are probably familiar with this skyline. It is the Las Vegas strip. But it is actually

a small portion of the Las Vegas area. This picture was taken in 1984 and I am going to

show you a picture taken in the same location in 2011and watch what has happened to Las

Vegas. So we have had huge development into the periphery. We call that urban sprawl.

And it brings with it some ecosystem impacts. And so land development will always occur

with humans. But we are seeing a movement from the rural to the urban, into the cities.

We call that urbanization. That is actually a good thing. It can leave more land conserved

for ecosystem services. The problem is not only are we seeing growing cities but we are

seeing growing transportation. We are getting highways, the arrival of the car. And that

leads to urban sprawl. The cities are spreading out and we lose all of the benefits of the

city. Also as people move out they take their tax base with them and that can lead to urban

blight on the inside of the city. And so we are getting these ecosystem impacts. With

urban sprawl we are eating up the land around the city. So there is a loss of land and also

we have pollution. So we can have air pollution. We can have light and noise pollution and

heat pollution. We see that in the urban heat islands. But we are always going to have development.

So people are putting forward this idea of we need growth that is smart or smart growth,

to avoid some of these negative consequences. But in parallel to that we are also trying

to conserve land. And we have been doing this in all countries around the world. In the

US this is highlighted in the national parks. We have wilderness areas, wildlife refuges.

And then around cities we are trying to protect the wetlands and the forests. And so this

is the movement towards the cities. In 1950, this is where people were living. 70 percent

of the people on the planet lived in rural areas. And less than 30 percent in the cities.

Watch what happened over the last 50 years and what they predict into the next 50 years.

Those are going to flip-flop. And so we are getting this movement to the cities. This

has already occurred in a lot of the developed countries. And so the US, it is already over

75 percent of the people are living in the cities. But we are going to see this in developing

countries. As they come online we are going to have more people moving into the urban

areas. You can see this in an age structure diagram. This is females in a rural county

in Iowa. And you can see that once they go to college the numbers drop off in that area.

Now why is that? In a rural setting, with industrial agriculture there are not jobs

anymore. And so you can see that they are moving into the cities. This is the growth

in a urban area of Iowa. And so we are seeing this movement into the cities due to opportunity.

You can get jobs there. And once you move into the city you are not going to move back.

And so this transition is going to occur into the future. It is actually a good thing. If

we think about low density housing, I want you to concentrate on the green area here,

let’s say we have nine houses and they are all spread out. Let’s say this is in a subdivision.

Each of them have their own yard. And we have to put roads to each of those, and what is

happening is we are losing that valuable land. But if we get the movement into the city,

so we take those same nine houses, stack them on top of each other, let’s call them apartments,

now we have higher density housing. We can have a park that they share and fewer roads,

and now we leave more of that land outside the city. And so cities are actually good.

The problem is urban sprawl. And so if we put a city right here and then put a couple

of roads to it, so back around the turn of the last century, cities started to grow.

And that is because there were opportunities there. And so if we say this is the housing

density, so we are going to have the greatest density inside the center of the city, there

are opportunities there. It is really hard to get into the city. We do not have a lot

of roads. We do not have a lot of transportation. It is hard to get out of the city. And so

we are going to see these flourishing inner cities. Now what happens though, around the

last half of the last century, is that we have the arrival of roads, infrastructure

and the automobile. Now it is easier to get in and out of the city. And people started

doing that. They started buying up lower density housing. And so what you get is this urban

sprawl. This movement away from the city. And this is a positive feedback loop. The

more people move out, the more roads there are the more tax base there is and we are

going to get more movement out. And we are going to encroach into the area around it.

They are also brining their tax base with them. And so that leaves, a lot of the time

urban blight, areas on the inside of the city where people are not actually living. Now

this is kind of a United States problem or it is more of a problem in the US. And so

if we look at this graph, this is the area per person. And so these are all US cities.

And so in US cities like Houston and Phoenix we have low density housing. If we look on

this side, on gasoline use in the US we are going to be using more gasoline. And so since

cities in the US formed later than those in Europe, and also since we were using the automobile

and we had increase in highway structure, we have had this sprawl be a larger problem

in the US. It brings with it problems. In all cities pollution would an example. This

is smog in Mexico City. We also get noise and light pollution and heat pollution. If

we look specifically at heat pollution we are seeing these heat islands where cities

are. And so this is a picture of Manhattan. This is Central Park right here. And then

we are looking at a map down on Manhattan. You can see Central Park right here. And areas

that are really green are areas that are rich in vegetation. But watch what happens if I

now show you heat coming off of the land. You can see that we are going to have higher

temperature, hotter temperatures where we do not have that vegetation. So as we build

up those cities, it is actually absorbing that heat and creating a heat island. And

so how do we solve this problem? Well one thing would be to plant a lot of trees. But

how do we return people to the city center? A lot of people are going around this idea

of smart growth. And so we need to create desirable locations in the downtown, walkable

neighborhoods, compact building design, sense of place in the city, growth boundaries perhaps

around the city so we force people to stay within those settings. Now there are pros

and cons of all of these, but sprawl is definitely having some negative impacts. Now outside

the cities we have also have been trying to preserve land. So the National Park Service

was instituted and we have National Parks like Yosemite and Yellowstone National Park.

We try to protect this area for people into the future. Now if you have ever been into

a park we still have roads there. We still have infrastructure run by the National Park

Service. We also have wildlife refuges. So those are administered by the US Fish and

Wildlife. So this is ANWR. This is in Alaska. It is a national wildlife refuge. These are

set up to protect specific species. In this case it is the caribou. And then the strictest

of constraints are in the wilderness areas, which are administered by all four of these

entities. Inside a wilderness area we try to limit roads. The only way you can really

get in is walking, riding a horse or by canoe. And so we do not have mining inside those

wilderness areas. And so we are trying to protect these areas so they are not developed

into the future. And we are also, on a micro scale, trying to protect wetlands around cities.

This is a forest that has been protected in Poland since the 1300s. So if we put boundaries

around that we can number one mitigate it. So we do not have development into these valuable

areas. We can restore them when they are damaged or remediate them. All of these are very big

things that we can do around cities. And so did you learn the following? Could you pause

the video at this point and fill in the blanks? Remember development and urbanization can

cause urban sprawl. That pollution could be air pollution, light pollution and heat pollution.

We are trying to conserve our planet, preserving it in national parks, wilderness areas, wildlife

refuges and wetland areas. But the biggest thing is we have to be smart in the growth.

We are always going to have development, but we have to make that smart development.

And I hope that was helpful.