Urban sprawl, climate change, and impact on animal life
‘Sprawl’, according to Merriam-Webster, means, ‘to spread or develop irregularly, or without restraint.’
In the context of urban design, ‘urban sprawl’ refers to the – usually unplanned – growth of cities, and if we look at the facts – that today, 55% of the world’s population lives in cities. By 2050, that will increase to 68% – this means, as the world’s population increases, and more people migrate from rural areas to urban ones, cities must expand to accommodate that growth. So this growth applies to most cities – urban sprawl applies to most cities.
Now, these growths, these expanding ‘sprawls’ – they’re not happening in a vacuum. They’re happening in physical, geographical contexts. Urban sprawl encroaches on natural land around the city. Ocean sprawl spreads its structures with its synthetic chemicals and rust and paint – right into the ocean. These environments of land and water, and their shared realm of air, are all being invaded by expedited human activity. Human activity, that aggressively pollutes the climate.
Climate change is not something that just happens in a vacuum, either. We are the ones causing it to change. We, as a global civilization.
So, climate change is not a phenomenon that is endemic to any single region.
Vijayawada, in Andhra Pradesh, is one of India’s highest density cities. Its rapid growth pays a heavy cost – the native green canopy that is a cornerstone of local ecosystem balance. Taking down large areas of that canopy at an exorbitant rate, does not allow for the ecosystem to reconfigure that balance. High-speed urban activity actively deteriorates it instead, and takes away the earth’s chance at acclimating to its new circumstances of higher land temperatures and changes in the components of the land, from water and soil to asphalt and concrete. So yes, the climate is going to change.
In China, the increased urbanization and urban sprawl means larger cities with districts organized by functions. As the city grows larger, the distance between these districts grows, and so commutes between residential areas to official and commercial areas increase in CO2 emission. The number of districts increases as well, meaning industrial districts have gone up across the country, causing more concentrated levels of air, water and land pollution all over the nation. Between 1992 and 2012, almost 26% of the Pearl River Delta and approximately 42% of local wetlands were lost to urbanization. The climate does not have a chance but to change.
Metro Manila in the Philippines undergoes a similar issue – commute, caused by sprawl. Although elsewhere in the world, public transport is considered a way to reduce carbon emissions, in Manila the public transport is characterized by small vehicles that do not process fuel efficiently, and produce higher carbon emissions than expected. High levels of traffic result in high levels of emissions, and so the climate there is changing drastically as well.
These countries used as examples, India, China and the Philippines, are ones that have received the short end of the stick – following the same principle, of development at the cost of deterioration, these developing countries are in these dire straits, because the developed countries have caused them to be there. That, however, is a different topic altogether.
Back on track: By cutting off or obstructing nature’s balance in one way or another, we are creating hotter cities. These hotter cities have nowhere to productively channel that thermal energy, let that increased heat travel to the atmosphere, where it gets trapped, and creates more heat. Climate change is, more increasingly, in a feedback loop with the ever-growing cities of the world. It is a global phenomenon, and its changes fluctuate with our contributions to the environment.
Now, we know what climate change implies in the future for us – and maybe even what it means in the present, in terms of numbers – global temperature, for examples – or concepts, like, renewable versus non-renewable energies, recycling, upcycling, and so on. But do we really know what’s happening, when it comes to the tangible details of other lives?
Climate change is affecting the world, and the world is not made up of just humans. The environments we are traversing are habitats to other life forms, grounds and corridors of migration, places of feeding, areas of breeding, for other species. There are plants making up those canopies, of course, and they home millions of species of animals, fungi, bacteria. The intricate balance of the environment is based here, through the connections between these other life forms. We are affecting them, and they are changing.
But how they change might be unexpected. Let’s take a look at some examples.
Birds of prey, or raptors, found commonly in London, have assimilated so well into the city that there are ‘urban’ raptors, those found in the city, as well as wild raptors, found elsewhere in nature. Urban raptors can be said to have adapted well to the city, given that they flourish in greater numbers and densities in cities, than elsewhere. A London study on peregrines in particular states that, even during lockdown, termed as an ‘anthropause’, certain peregrines that did not rely directly on human activity were still indirectly affected by the lack of it. Regardless, there were enough prey for the peregrines to survive the lockdown – they were able to adapt, and shift dietary habits.
The yellow-legged gull is another type bird that has learnt to flourish in cities. The main cause for this increase in population, a study based in Barcelona concludes, is directly and indirectly a result of human activity. Human interaction and offerings of food, human meal leftovers, trash are ways in which gulls benefit from human interaction, while indirect ways are through how human activity increases the population of other prey that gulls feed on.
But… enough about birds. Birds can fly, and fly fast, after all. What about mammals, tethered to the land?
It turns out, East African elephants are not so lucky, but they are making good on what they have. Of the eight different migration corridors along Kenya and Tanzania’s borders, only one is formally protected. A study in the area shows that the other seven corridors – though they are being encroached upon by increased urbanization’s different land uses that fragment the elephants’ ranges and leave some areas uninhabitable for them, and confining them to certain areas – these corridors are still being used by elephants. Most elephant populations simply adapt to their circumstances and shift corridor useage, either after a period of no migration, or right away. Some groups, though, remain confined in their areas and unable to migrate for good.
The fact that the adaptation of species among the elephants still bears the brunt of a downside, directly related to humans, is something shared with the birds, as well. The increased proximity to birds that did not initially interact in human spaces in such great amounts previously means humans have to be more responsible about and sensitive to their direct environments – these same birds that humans feed can and have carried diseases between other birds and other humans. This is an increased and unchecked health risk.
While the animals around us seem to be living well, how is the nature of our technological progress intersecting with nature itself?
Cities, climate change. They’re affecting everything.
NOTE: There’s actually a good amount of work done on evolution of the types of shelter and routes that animal take with relative ease upon the advent of the concrete jungle that usurped their natural environments. I’d love to go further into this and discuss ocean sprawl, as well as look into how cities can actually be planned for animals as well as humans, and how viable that is, health-wise – I touched a little on that in my Regenerating Places project – but maybe I’ll keep that for another post.
Not sure which direction I’ll go in for the next post, but… I’ll see you when I see you.
