Metropolitan area

About: Metropolitan area is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 26029 publications have been published within this topic receiving 385648 citations. The topic is also known as: metro & metro area.

Beyond Metropolis: The Planning and Governance of Asia's Mega-Urban Regions

Abstract: Beyond Metropolis studies planning and governance in the regions surrounding the twelve cities in Asia with populations over ten million: Tokyo, Mumbai, Kolkata, Dhaka, Delhi, Shanghai, Jakarta, Osaka, Beijing, Karachi, Metro Manila, and Seoul. These regions are greater than cities plus suburbs: for almost all, development has sprawled into the surrounding countryside, enveloping villages, towns, and small and medium-sized cities, creating "extended metropolitan regions." These areas, argues Aprodicio A. Laquian, are the centers of development for their countries: they represent huge markets; large and varied labor pools; and centers of politics, education, and culture. Beyond Metropolis examines these mega-urban regions in terms of governance and sustainability; water, transportation, and housing; and the twin questions of inner-city redevelopment and satellite area development. The author embraces, on one hand, unified regional planning and, on the other, cooperative efforts by urban residents for addressing their own problems. Beyond Metropolis builds on studies conducted during the 1990s under the Centre for Human Settlements at the University of British Columbia.

The Post Pandemic City: Challenges and Opportunities for a Non-Motorized Urban Environment. An Overview of Italian Cases

Abstract: COVID-19 has forced city governments to reconsider the relationship between mobility, urban space and health in order to ensure physical distancing while meeting the travel needs of inhabitants. Therefore, cities around the world are already involved in the transformation of mobility through new models of sustainable transport. The World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines on mobility during the COVID outbreak are mostly directed at creating more spaces for cyclists and pedestrians, especially in densely populated urban areas, thus avoiding the overloading of public transport and the use of private cars. Through the analysis of the programs set up by the 10 main Italian metropolitan cities, chosen as a case study, this research evaluates the response implemented by local governments in order to transform urban environments in one of the world’s most pandemic-affected countries in detail. Starting from the current mobility model, this paper focuses on local government policies concerning post-COVID sustainable mobility to understand policies, approaches and measures in depth, as well as the effectiveness of the ongoing actions in shaping future urban mobility. From the research, an almost homogeneous awareness among policy makers and planners emerges concerning the need to rethink urban spaces and mobility, to make up for lost time and to start a green revolution that is aimed at quickly decarbonizing urban transport and enhancing cycling and walking through the city.

Changing urban education

Abstract: With critical issues like desegregation and funding facing our schools, dissatisfaction with public education has reached a new high. Teachers decry inadequate resources while critics claim educators are more concerned with job security than effective teaching. Though urban education has reached crisis proportions, contending players have difficulty agreeing on a common program of action. This book tells why. "Changing Urban Education" confronts the prevailing naivete in school reform by examining the factors that shape, reinforce, or undermine reform efforts. Edited by one of the nation's leading urban scholars, it examines forces for change and resistance in urban education and proposes that the barrier to reform can only be overcome by understanding how schools fit into the broader political contexts of their cities. Much of the problem with our schools lies with the reluctance of educators to recognize the profoundly political character of public education. The contributors show how urban political contexts vary widely with factors like racial composition, the role of the teachers' union, and relations between cities and surrounding metropolitan areas. Presenting case studies of original field research in Baltimore, Chicago, Houston, and six other urban areas, they consider how resistance to desegregation and the concentration of the poor in central urban areas affect education, and they suggest how cities can build support for reform through the involvement of business and other community players. By demonstrating the complex interrelationship between urban education and politics, this book shows schools to be not just places for educating children, but also major employers and large spenders of tax dollars. It also introduces the concept of civic capacity the ability of educators and non-educators to work together on common goals and suggests that this key issue must be addressed before education can be improved. "Changing Urban Education" makes it clear to educators that the outcome of reform efforts depends heavily on their political context as it reminds political scientists that education is a major part of the urban mix. While its prognosis is not entirely optimistic, it sets forth important guidelines that cannot be ignored if our schools are to successfully prepare children for the future."

Environmental Inequality in Metropolitan America.

Abstract: This study compares the environmental hazard burden experienced by Blacks, Hispanics, Pacific Islanders, Native Americans, Asian Americans, and Whites in each of the 329 metropolitan areas in the continental United States, using toxicity-weighted air pollutant concentration data drawn from the Environmental Protection Agency's Risk-Screening Environmental Indicators project to determine whether and to what degree environmental inequality exists in each of these metropolitan areas. After demonstrating that environmental inequality outcomes vary widely across metropolitan areas and that each group in the analysis experiences a high pollution disadvantage in multiple metropolitan areas and a medium pollution disadvantage in many metropolitan areas, the authors test three hypotheses that make predictions about the role that residential segregation and racial income inequality play in producing environmental inequality. Using logistic regression models to test these hypotheses, the authors find that residential segregation and racial income inequality are relatively poor predictors of environmental inequality outcomes, that residential segregation can increase and decrease racial/ethnic group proximity to environmental hazards, and that the roles income inequality and residential segregation play in producing environmental inequality vary from one racial/ethnic group to another.