urban geography

A dove sitting in a tree.

The Gray-Green Urban Divide: How Wealth and Poverty are Visible from Space

Caitlin Dempsey

Known as the "gray-green divide”, the amount of trees and green space can be an indicator of the income level of the neighborhood.

A view of dark clouds over some urban buildings with blue sky in the background.

Cities are Changing Cloud Formations

Mark Altaweel

Researchers looked at cloud patterns over urban areas for 447 cities in the United States using satellite imagery.

Crow siting on a chain link fence.

The Growth of Crows in Cities

Katarina Samurović

Since the 1960s, more and more crows have been abandoning their rural winter roosts in favor of cities and towns.

Cover of 'The Eternal City: A History of Rome in Maps"

Review | The Eternal City: A History of Rome in Maps

G.T. Dempsey

When you finish this delight of a book, you feel that the history of the mapping of Rome can stand as the very paradigm of the history of pre-digital cartography itself.

Grand Canyon aiport. Photo: NPS, public domain.

Which Countries Have No Airport?

Caitlin Dempsey

How many countries in the world have no airports? There are five countries, all located in Europe, out of the 196 countries in the world that have no airports located within their borders.

Examples of city climate adaptation action themes. The size of the circle is proportional to the number of actions listed in the 80 city plans analysed, for each of the ten categories, from largest to smallest: physical infrastructure (73 actions); management and planning (62); green infrastructure (57); practice and behaviour (55); technology (52); policy (49); information (45); capacity building (40); warning or observing (22); financing (20). Source: Butt et al., 2018.

Biodiversity and Climate Change Adaptation

Mark Altaweel

Many cities globally are forging ahead with climate change adaptation.

How New York City is Protecting Its Subway System Against Flooding

Caitlin Dempsey

A flex-gate is a highly flexible covering that can be quickly deployed to protect a subway's entrance and underground structures in the event of a flood.

Bosco Verticale building in Milan, Italy. Photo: Plflcn, MediaWiki Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Africa’s First Vertical Urban Forest

Elizabeth Borneman

Vertical forests are buildings that integrate natural resources like trees, shrubs, and food-producing plants into spaces that can also be used as housing or offices.

The Geography of Borrowing Size

Mark Altaweel

Towns can 'borrow size' from nearby urban areas, enhancing their economic prospects and resilience by leveraging networks with larger towns.

Urbanization Makes the Surrounding Atmosphere Drier

Caitlin Dempsey

Researchers in southern China have analyzed the impact of urbanization on local climates, known as the urban dry island (UDI) effects.

Cabins in this ski resort are only listed by numbers, causing confusion among tourists and emergency responders. Source: Knut Røsrud / NRK

With Only Numbers and No Street Names, This Norwegian Town is Confusing Tourists

Caitlin Dempsey

A Norwegian municipality decided to only give the chalets in a development numbers with no corresponding street names.  

What is Necrotecture?

Caitlin Dempsey

Necrotecture is an urban planning coined termed by Rowland Atkinson to describe the "dead residential space" created by a high density of mostly vacant residential dwellings.

Will Self-Driving Cars Make Traffic Worse?

Caitlin Dempsey

The World Economic Forum and Boston Consulting Group studied the possible effects of autonomous vehicles on Boston's future traffic.

Review | The Nocturnal City

Caitlin Dempsey

Robert Shaw's newly published book, The Nocturnal City, is an effort to delve into the city at night which is a “very different time-space from day.”

Review | A History of the Future

G.T. Dempsey

The History of Future presents a survey of the history of futuristic predictions from the nineteenth century on through the first two-thirds of the twentieth, in the English-speaking world

UK housing construction volume.

Visualizing the Impact of Gentrification

Liam Oakwood

Graphic designer Herwig Scherabon has developed a book visualizing the impacts of gentrification in a number of cities in the United States and United Kingdom. Combining public access data and research with crisp visuals, Scherabon illustrates the spatial distribution of gentrification and examines the different issues at play.

Urban sprawl in Milton, Ontario, Canada. Photo: Suburban developments in Milton, Ontario by SimonP, under license CC BY-SA 3.0, MediaWiki Commons, 2009.

Defining Urban Sprawl

Elizabeth Borneman

The urban sprawl concept caused researchers to dive into figuring out what city in the world is the biggest based on the size of its urban sprawl.

Using Green Space to Reduce Water Pollution

Elizabeth Borneman

Researchers have used satellite data to analyze images for areas that should be protected as green spaces which in turn help protect Atlanta’s water supply.

Tract-to-Tract Commutes of 80km/50 miles or less in the Bay Area. Nelson & Rae, 2016.

How the Commutes of 130 Million Commuters Reveals Megaregions in the United States

Elizabeth Borneman

A study using data from 130 million commuters has revealed commuter-driven megaregions in the United States.

(a) Configuration of sampling site in Flagstaff office 1. This configuration was similar to those set up in all offices. Signs on the wall adjacent to wall sampling plate describe the project, as request that the materials not be touched. (b) Diagram of single sampling plate illustrating nine sampling swatches (circles) of three different materials, one row for tracking equilibrium relative humidity of the materials (Row #1), one row for infrequent sampling (Row #2), and one row for frequent sampling (Row #3). (c) Samples were collected from rows 2 and 3 of all sampling plates from three offices in each of our three cities in four intensive sampling periods over the course of one year. Coloring of sampling swatches in this figure illustrates the change in bacterial Phylogenetic Diversity over the year.

Geography of Microbiomes

Elizabeth Borneman

Researchers have determined that geography seems to be the most influential factor in determining what kinds of microbial life would be found in a variety of local office settings.

Map and summary table of Urban stream deserts (UrbSDs) within the Great Lakes Megaregion. The inset table summarizes the ten largest UrbSD Urban Areas (UAs). From: Napieralski and Carvalhaes, 2016.

Mapping the Consequences of American Urbanization and Stream Burial

A.J. Rohn

A study has found that much of the area of urban America ­ particularly in the Great Lakes region (8.3% of urban area), the Arizona Sun Corridor (7.1%), and Northern California (10.9%) but elsewhere all over the United States (6.2% total) ­ are “urban stream deserts” in which a city is “riverless... due to the effects of human development and population growth”.

District activity density in Milan (left) and Rome (right). From: De Nadai et al., 2016.

What Makes a Vibrant City? Lessons from Data Mining

Elizabeth Borneman

Researchers in Italy used a collaborative mapping tool, census data, land use data, and mobile phone data to compile information about the movement, interactions and life of an urban area.

A 19th century colored map showing New York City's street grid pattern.

Where the US Streets Have No Names

Elizabeth Borneman

Numerical numbering systems, or numbering streets in specific orders, is one way some cities have taking the pain out of navigation. A comprehensive analysis of streets in the US found that half of the cities here prefer to have their streets numbered rather than named.

Istanbul straddles both sides of the 20-mile long Bosporus Strait connecting the Mediterranean and Sea of Marmara (south) to the Black Sea (north). Source: NASA

Transcontinental Cities

Elizabeth Borneman

A transcontinental city is a city that exists on land over more than one continent. There are more than a few transcontinental cities in the world. Learn about cities that straddle continental divides.

Atlas of Urban Geography from the 16th Century Reissued

Caitlin Dempsey

The earliest atlas of cities, Civitates Orbis Terrarium (or Cities of the World) captured a time of incredible urban development and cartographic innovation.

Earthquake Time Bombs

Caitlin Dempsey

In his new book, Earthquake Time Bombs, Yeats discusses the world’s most dangerous earthquake hotspots, the communities at risk, and how the public can mitigate the effects of future disasters.

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