cities of gold
The rise of the megacity – those with populations exceeding 10 million
– will create both opportunities and challenges for their inhabitants
By Heather Farmbrough
T
echnology and globalisation
are creating an explosion in
the number and size of cities
worldwide. More than half
of the world’s population
now lives in a city; by 2050 the proportion
will have risen to 66%, according to the UN.
Four years ago there were 350 cities of
more than one million inhabitants; by 2030
there will be 435.The UK currently has two
cities – London and Birmingham – whose
populations exceed one million; by 2030
China alone is expected to have 128.
These cities, however, are small in
comparison with the handful of megacities
that have sprung up over the past few
decades, each with more than 10 million
inhabitants. In 1990 there were 10 of these,
but by 2030 there are expected to be 41.
Cities create both opportunities and
challenges for their inhabitants and those
who run them.At their best, they can be
dynamic centres of creativity, enterprise and
sustainable living.‘Cities are our greatest
invention,’ says professor Richard Florida
of the University of Toronto, an urban
theorist.‘They generate wealth and improve
living standards while providing the density,
interaction and networks that make us more
creative and productive.They are the key
social and economic organising units of our
time, bringing together people, jobs and all
the inputs required for economic growth.’
Cities characterised by innovation,
enterprise and culture attract like-minded
people, creating a multiplier effect. San
Francisco today is at the heart of a high-tech
start-up boom, with young technology
companies choosing to be there rather than
the suburbs of SiliconValley. IT companies
don’t require large physical premises, but
depend on creative designers who need to be
with other people that have ideas and energy.
Cities can also be more environmentally
friendly; political economist Edward Glaeser
has demonstrated how city living reduces
CO
2
emissions because people tend to drive
less and live closer together. Doubling a city’s
size also has the potential to increase income,
wealth, patents, start-ups and universities;
but need not involve doubling the number
of petrol or train stations, or water pipes
and electricity cables, because the existing
infrastructure is utilised more efficiently.
Without adequate investment and planning
for education, health, housing, environmental
and other services, however, cities can descend
into squalor. Glaeser has demonstrated that,
when a city doubles in size, serious crime also
goes up by 16%.The geographic shift in the
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