HORT 283 - Wk1 - Lecture 1 - What is Urban Ag

Now, before we talk about what urban agriculture is, I want to first take a step back and talk
about what we're referring to when we refer to urban areas. We're going to be using the US
Census Bureau definition for what an urban area is, as well as an urban cluster and a rural region.
And the two components that determine whether or not an area is urban or not is the density of
the population that lives in that area, as well as the overall major land use of that area.

So if we consider population, according to the US Census Bureau, an urban area is a region

where 50,000 or more people live. It is not necessarily tied to the geographic boundaries of a city
or town but instead is tied to the geographic boundaries of US census blocks which sometimes
go over the boundaries of cities and towns. But for the purposes of our discussion, we're going to
consider urban areas as a region where 50,000 or more people reside.

The US Census Bureau also has a definition for what they call an urban cluster, and these might
be considered smaller cities or smaller towns. An urban cluster is a region where at least 2,500
people reside but less than 50,000 people reside. And finally, the US Census Bureau considers
rural regions to be any region that is not an urban area or an urban cluster. So according to the
US Census Bureau, the definition of rural regions is largely by default of being not urban.

So we've considered the role of population density in determining whether or not an area is
urban. What about land use? Well, land use is important to consider because urban areas are
characterized by large expanses of impervious surface area. That impervious surface area can be
in the form of roads, parking lots, or buildings.

And it's important to consider land use and impervious surface area when we talk about the
definition of urban because there are several urban areas that are extensively paved, but people
just don't live there. We can think about a business park or a shopping mall or an airport. These
are obviously land-use types that are associated with urban areas even though they lack residents.

And when we consider the extent of urban areas in the United States, it makes up a relatively
small portion of the overall landscape. This particular map has urban areas, places with residents
of 50,000 or more people living in purple and urban clusters. Those areas with at least 2,500
people but fewer than 50,000 people are in those smaller dots.

And what you'll notice if you're looking at the urbanized areas in particular is that it only makes
up about 2% to 3% of total land area in the lower 48 continental US states. However, that's
where the majority of people in this country live. Even though urban areas make up only 2% to
3% of land area, more than 80% of the US population lives in an urban area.

Now, urban areas themselves can be subdivided into regions depending upon the characteristics
of those specific regions. And when folks think about urban areas, they oftentimes envision them
as a series of concentric rings surrounding one another. And this is what's known as the
monocentric model of urban settlement.
In the monocentric model of urban development, we go from a densely built-up urban core on
out the further away you get from that core, you have less extensive built-up regions as well as
less population density. So in this monocentric model of urban development, we have the urban
core, and the urban core itself is characterized by extensive areas of built-up landscape in the
form of roads and buildings and parking lots. The urban core is oftentimes the center of business
and the center of government for an urban area.

Next comes the inner urban area. And the inner urban area being adjacent to the urban core is
characterized by dense urban living. Accordingly, there is also an area where there is extensive
built-up hardscape in the form of buildings and roads. In addition to having dense urban living in
this inner urban circle, it oftentimes is also a shopping or a retail district in urban centers.

Next, we move into the suburban region, which is characterized by a lower density of residents,
but we still have extensive built-up areas in the landscape. The difference between the suburbs
and inner urban and the urban core, however, is that instead of being concentrated in a small
area, in the suburbs, we start to see that built-up landscape being more spread out, and this is
oftentimes referred to as sprawl. Now, together, the urban core, the inner urban area, and the
suburbs are what we consider to be the core urban area. And as we start to move away from this
core urban area, we get into what is known the periurban region.

You can think of periurban as just being the region which surrounds the urban area. Think of
periurban surrounding the urban area as being very similar to the perimeter which goes around a
region. Now, the periurban region itself is made up of two circles. First, we're going to talk about
the urban periphery, and then we're going to talk about the urban fringe.

Now, in the urban periphery region which lies just adjacent and outside of the suburban region,
we start to see a decrease in the number of residents, so it's less densely populated, but we also
start seeing the presence of what are known as transport hubs. These transport hubs are
commuter lots, commuter railways, which are there to help folks living on the urban periphery
easily get into the urban center because folks who live on the urban periphery are oftentimes
dependent upon the urban area for employment, for shopping, for business, or for civic purposes.
We also start seeing an increase in green space in the urban periphery. With less densely
populated areas, there's more space for larger parks and other recreation sites.

Adjacent to the urban periphery is what we call the urban fringe. Once we start getting into the
urban fringe, we see an even further decrease in population density, and the populations tend to
be scattered into small settlements along the urban fringe. The urban fringe is sometimes used for
urban industrial purposes or sometimes, urban agriculture. As we start seeing space opening up
due to a decrease in residents, there is more space to meet the needs of industrial efforts or urban
agricultural efforts.

Now, surrounding all of these, our core urban area made up of inner urban, the urban core, and
the suburbs, and then our two periurban regions, the urban periphery and the urban fringe, is
what we call our rural landscape. So in the monocentric model of urban settlement, all of these
urban areas and periurban areas kind of dissolve into what are sometimes referred to as the rural
hinterlands. But we know that in reality, even though this is a textbook definition of what urban
areas look like, most urban regions actually have a polycentric model of urban settlement.

Now, in this polycentric model of urban settlement, we can see inner urban areas missing from
some regions, or we can see smaller suburbs, or we can see larger periurban areas. But instead of
having this nice gradient going from the inner urban core on out to the urban fringe, in reality,
most urban settlements are polycentric where you have scattered settlements all surrounded by
periurban areas going into the rural landscape.