Urban areas are cultural and technological epicenters ranging from quaint municipalities to sprawling megacities. They have existed for millennia. But over the last half century, their size and influence has been expanding rapidly, particularly in emerging nations like China and India. This rapid urban growth has caused environmental issues like pollution, waste management problems, and loss of habitat. Many cities have tried to address these issues by covering rivers that flowed through them, although this causes new ecological problems by removing vital freshwater ecosystems.

1. II Semester
M.ARCH. (URBAN REGENERATION)
JMI
Ecological Transformations

2. Populations on the Rise!
• Cities have existed for thousands of years and can be traced back to
the river valley civilizations of Mesopotamia (present-day
Iraq), Egypt, India, and China. At first, these settlements depended
largely on agriculture and domestic cattle, but as they grew in size
they became centers for merchants and traders.
• Urban growth, also known as urbanization, accelerated dramatically
with the advent of industrialization some 200 years ago. At that
time, large numbers of people moved to cities in search of
jobs, mostly in factories. But the most rapid growth has taken place
over the past 50 years. While less than one-third of the world's
population lived in cities in 1950, about two thirds of humanity is
expected to live in urban areas by 2030. Most of that urbanization is
taking place in Asia, Africa, and Latin America.

3. Populations on the Rise!
• Urban is defined as "that which is characteristic of a city." But what
exactly is a city? In the past, walls may have defined a city. But
today's city boundaries are often blurred. Are suburbs, which are
often called metropolitan areas, part of cities? Depending on the
boundaries used, Tokyo can have a population of anywhere between
8 and 40 million people.
• Cities make a lot of sense for humans. People are concentrated in a
small space rather than being spread out over a large territory. This
allows the government and others to provide more service such as
water, electricity, and transportation to a larger number of people.
Schools and shops are more easily accessible than in rural areas.

4. Populations on the Rise!
• Cities have always been at the center of economic growth and
technological advances. The promise of jobs and prosperity pulls
people to cities. But their rapid growth has also brought with it
many negative things: violence, poverty, overcrowding, health
problems, and pollution. Many cities in developing countries in
particular are growing too rapidly for their own good, with many
residents unable to find jobs and forced to live in slums.
• Urban expansion is also encroaching on wildlife habitats
everywhere. Increasingly people live and work in close proximity to
wild animals whose native habitats have been lost or broken up.
Many animals—from mice and cockroaches to pigeons and
squirrels—have adapted to city life, taking advantage of abundant
food and warmer temperatures.

5. Environment and Society
Ecology is the study of the interaction of living organisms
and the natural environment.
Humans have transformed half of the world’s land surface
and use more than half of all the accessible surface
fresh water in the world.

6. Ecological Issues
The world is now facing an environmental deficit, profound and
negative harm to the natural environment caused by humanity's
focus on short-term material affluence. This concept implies three
important ideas:
• The state of the environment is a social issue.
• Environmental damage is often unintended.
• Much environmental harm is reversible.
By: Alan S. Berger, 2010

7. Ecological Issues
• Culture: Growth and limits
– The logic of growth thesis is a widely accepted cultural
value which suggests that growth is inherently good and
that we can solve any problems that might arise as a result
of unrestrained expansion.
– The limits to growth thesis holds that humanity must
implement policies to control the growth of
population, material production, and the use of resources
in order to avoid environmental collapse.

8. Population on Rise! Cities and Suburbs
Urban areas are cultural and technological epicenters ranging from quaint municipalities to
sprawling megacities. They have existed for millennia. But over the last half century, their size
and influence has been expanding rapidly, particularly in emerging nations like China and India.

9. A Northern Virginia housing development encroaches
on farmland. Population growth and relocation is
threatening rural environments across the world.

10. Ecological Issues

11. Ecological Issues
• Solid waste: The disposable society.
– Why Grandmother Had No Trash.
– Landfills pose several threats to the natural environment.
– Recycling,
reusing
resources
discard, is one solution.
we
would
otherwise

12. Ecological Issues

13. Ecological Issues
• Air
– A deterioration of air quality was one of the unanticipated
consequences of the development of industrial technology.

14. Ecological Issues
• Air
– A deterioration of air quality was one of the unanticipated
consequences of the development of industrial technology.
Pollution contributors: example of Delhi

15. Ecological Issues
•
Rain forests are regions of dense forestation, most of which
circle the globe close to the equator.
•
Global warming is apparently occurring as a result of the
greenhouse effect, a rise in the earth’s average temperature
due to increasing concentration of carbon dioxide in the
atmosphere resulting in part from the decline of the rain
forests.
–
The shrinking of the rain forests reduces the earth’s biodiversity.

19. Ecological Issues
•
Water supply is problematic in many parts of the world.
•
A special problem is acid rain, rain that is made acidic by air
pollution and destroys plant and animal life.
•
Water Consumption in Global Perspective. Some countries
do not have an adequate supply of water.
•
Polluted water is an increasingly serious concern as well.

20. Ecological Issues
Sources of Water;
•
Ground water
•
Pond
•
Lake
•
River
•
Sea
•
Air
(moist air flowing from sea to desserts is used to extract water from air. A usual
practice in UAE)

21. River for Drinking Water

22. River for Domestic use

23. River for Food

24. River for Food

25. River for Agriculture

26. River for Shelter

27. River for Shelter

28. River for Transportation

29. River for Retreat/Tourism

30. River for Energy

31. River for Energy

32. River as Faith

33. RIVERS
• Lifeblood of many plant, animal, and human
communities.
• Yet many of the world's rivers have been
– dammed,
– degraded,
– polluted, and
– overdrawn at alarming rates.

34. Rivers don't always reach their ends…
• Many rivers dry out or else die out before
reaching sea because people have divert
water so much for agriculture, industry, and
municipal uses.
• Other rivers have been completely covered
over by development, as people attempted to
"tame" nature by ending flooding and
maximizing usable land area.

35. Fresh water ecosystems?
Ques.) But what happens to once-thriving freshwater
ecosystems when the rivers they depend on are
entombed in sewer pipes beneath layers of concrete
and soil?
Ans.) Few species can make the transition to
subterranean living. Ironically, it was often rivers and
streams that attracted people in the first place, but
those very sources of life can fall victim to the
expanding concrete jungle.

36. River: Sunswick Creek
Location: Queens, New York
City
maps of 1870s

37. Sunswick Creek
ran through
Queens until the
late 19th
century, originat
ing in the south
of the
Ravenswood
area. These
maps below are
from 1873.

38. Photograph by Steve Duncan
The waterway was above ground at least through the 1870s. Eventually, however, it was
completely covered over, though it's apparent inside the thing that different parts of the tunnel
were covered over at different times.

39. Photograph by Steve Duncan
Now, it exists only as a meager flow through buried sewer-like pipes.

40. Photograph by Steve Duncan
Duncan notes that the burial process appears to have occurred in multiple phases, based on his
explorations of the dank channels.

41. Tibbetts Brook, New York City
•
•
•
•
•
Tibbetts Brook starts just north of the Bronx and then flows into the borough's
leafy Van Cortlandt Park, where it fills a small lake. Thanks to historic
development, the brook is then forced underground at Tibbett Avenue.
It then flows under the Bronx through a large, double-channeled brick sewer until it
reaches the Harlem River Ship Canal, which was dug in the 1890s, shaping the
border with Manhattan.
Before development, the Lenape Native Americans who lived in the area took
advantage of the brook's freshwater and plentiful fish and game, which included
muskrats, raccoons, rabbits, skunks, and many species of birds. The Lenape called
the stream Mosholu, meaning "smooth or small stones."
In the 1690s, property owner Jacobus Van Cortlandt built the small dam that
created the lake, in order to power a sawmill and gristmill. He also cut ice from the
lake in winter to sell to locals. The city of New York acquired the land that became
Van Cortlandt Park in 1888.
Today only a small part of Tibbetts Brook remains above ground. Runoff of toxins
from the surrounding city remains a problem for water quality. In 1961, pollution
seeped into the stream, leading to the death of thousands of fish in the lake.

42. Photograph by Steve Duncan

43. Sawmill River, Yonkers, New York
• The longest tributary of the mighty Hudson River, the Sawmill River flows
about 23 miles (37 kilometers) from Chappaqua, New York, to Yonkers, just
north of New York City. Since the early 1900s, the last 2,000 feet (600
meters) of the river have been entombed in a flume underneath downtown
Yonkers.
• The river was covered gradually. First, bridges were built across it. Over
time, the bridges got bigger and closer together, as Yonkers experienced
rapid industrialization. Eventually, the river was completely covered
over, and it has historically suffered from pollution and intense
development.
• In 2007, a $34 million plan was approved to expose, or "daylight" much of
the buried section of the Sawmill River, as part of a $3 billion redevelopment
project for Yonkers. This will include a new city park.
• Scientists hope that exposing the river to daylight will help restore it to a
better state of health. A BioBlitz was conducted in 2009 to assess the health
of the watershed. Participants counted eight species of fish, though more
than 20 were counted by scientists in the past. Native Americans called the

44. Photograph by Steve Duncan

45. Park River, Hartford, Connecticut
• In the 1940s, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers diverted the Park
River beneath Hartford, Connecticut, in what was one of the
largest and most expensive projects the Corps had tackled up to
that point. The Park had connected the city's west side to the
larger Connecticut River, though it had long been abused as a
dumping ground for sewage and industrial waste.
• Long called Hog River because of its stench, the Park was buried
30 to 50 feet below the surface, where it still runs under the state
capitol and main public library.
• Today, a few intrepid urban explorers paddle canoes down the
buried river. John Kulick of Huck Finn Adventures, who has guided
float trips through the subterranean section, told the New York
Times he has seen eels, carp, and stripers in the dark water. Kulick
joked, perhaps at least half seriously, that a burst of water gurgled
into the river because "someone flushed a toilet."

46. Photograph by Steve Duncan

47. Neglinnaya River, Moscow
• The Neglinnaya River (also called the Neglinka River) used to flow
across Moscow from north to south, until it was buried
underground in 4.7 miles (7.5 kilometers) of tunnels. Today it
drains into the Moskva River via two openings.
• The Kremlin was built on a hill west of the Neglinnaya River, with
a moat filled from its channel. Over time residents grew weary of
the river's flooding, so in 1792, the city diverted its course into a
new canal, and filled in the original bed. After a devastating fire in
1812, the river became heavily polluted, so engineers covered it
over with a vault.
• In subsequent decades, additional tunnels were built or expanded

48. Photograph by Steve Duncan

49. Wein River, Vienna
• The Wein River was driven below Vienna long ago, where it was
integrated into the city's sewer system. Fans of classic movies may
recognize this tunnel from the 1949 Orson Welles film The Third
Man, set in postwar Vienna.
Photograph by Steve Duncan

50. Bradford Beck River, Bradford, England
• Beautiful arched foundations can be seen along the underground
Bradford Beck River in Bradford, England. Urban explorer and
photographer Steve Duncan believes this section underlies
Bradford City Hall, a Victorian-era structure built in the 1880s.
(Duncan has traveled the world in search of subterranean rivers.)
• According to Duncan, the Bradford Beck flows about four miles
through a wide variety of tunnel architecture and building
foundations.
Photograph by Steve Duncan

51. River Sheaf, Sheffield, England
• This large area is the end of the tunnel that contains the River Sheaf
as it travels through the city of Sheffield. The river emerges from time
to time as it passes beneath the city, before it merges with the River
Don near Blonk Street Bridge.
• The River Sheaf historically suffered severe pollution from industrial
activities in the area, especially metalworks, although recent efforts
have been made to improve water quality.
Photograph by Steve Duncan

52. River
Westbourne, Lo
ndon
• A number of watercourses
through London were buried
over the centuries, including
the
River
Westbourne, which flowed
from Hampstead through
Hyde Park to Sloane Square
and into the River Thames at
Chelsea.
Photograph by Steve Duncan

53. River
Westbourne,
London
• The River Westbourne had
been an important source of
drinking water for the
growing city, and conduits
were built for that purpose
in
1437
and
1439.
However, by the 19th
century, the water had
become too filthy to use for
anything except a sewer.
Photograph by Steve Duncan

54. River
Westbourne, Lo
ndon
• In the early part of the 19th
century,
the
River
Westbourne was channeled
into underground pipes to
make more room for the
growing
areas
of
Chelsea, Paddington, and
Belgravia. That work was
completed in the 1850s, and
the river has remained "lost"
ever since.
Photograph by Steve Duncan

55. River
Westbourne, Lo
ndon
• Part of the original iron pipe
can still be seen running
above the Sloane Square
tube station, where it
survived intense bombing by
Germany in World War II.
Photograph by Steve Duncan

56. River Fleet, London
• The largest of London's lost rivers, the River Fleet flows four miles (6.4
kilometers) underground through downtown before it enters into the
Thames. Here, it splits into two 12-foot-high (3.7-meter-high) brick
tunnels not far from St. Paul's Cathedral.
• The Fleet was forced underground and combined with the sewer
system in the 19th century. In Roman times, it had been a major and
important river. By the 13th century, the Fleet had already become
polluted, since it was long used as a sewer. Much of its water was also
gradually diverted for industry.
• After the Great Fire of London in 1666, the river was reshaped into a
canal. Over time this was increasingly covered over by
development, until the process completed around 1870.
• Today the River Fleet can still be heard gurgling below a grating at Ray
Street. The river's name lives on as the inspiration for Fleet Street.

57. Photograph by Steve Duncan

58. River Walbrook, London
• The Roman settlement of Londinium, the precursor to today's
city, was bisected by a river called the Walbrook, perhaps
named because it flowed under the fortified walls. The stream
started in what is now Finsbury and flowed into the River
Thames near today's Cannon Street Railway Bridge.
• The river was long used as a sewer, as well as for drinking
water, and its quality began to decline as early as the Roman
period. By 1598, historian John Stow wrote that the Walbrook
was being paved over with bricks to make way for housing.
• By the 1830s, what remained of the Walbrook's flow was
coursing through city sewer lines, where it remains today.
According to Steve Duncan, groundwater in the area works its
way through the brick of the tunnel, spraying from every
direction.

59. Photograph by Steve Duncan

60. Colorado River
• The Colorado River is one of the most used and
contested waterways on Earth. It provides water for 30
million people, and has many dams and diversions
along its 1,450 miles (2,333 kilometers).
• Because
it
is
so
heavily
tapped
for
agriculture, industry, and municipal uses along its
course, the Colorado River rarely reaches its delta and
the Gulf of California. About one-tenth of the river's
former flow now makes it to Mexico, but most of that
is used for farming and cities south of the border.
Photograph by Peter McBride
For National Geographic

61. • Balancing Limited Supply With Increasing Demand
• The Colorado River Basin is a critical component of North American
water supply, providing H2O to 30 million people and thousands of
acres of farmland. When Colorado River withdrawals were first
allocated among the river basin’s seven states, in 1922, the river held
17.5 million acre-feet (5.7 trillion gallons) of water. However, new
science has shown that 1922 was part of an especially wet period.
The river now averages about 14.7 million acre-feet per year and is
allocated among seven states and Mexico. Water managers are trying
to address growing challenges associated with over-allocation, rapidly
increasing urban populations, development of unused water
rights, and expected climate change. The water levels of the river’s
two largest reservoirs—Lake Mead and Lake Powell, stored by Hoover
and Glen Canyon Dams—have dropped significantly in recent
years, threatening supplies for major cities. In addition, the trapping
of silt behind dams also limits the quality and extent of river habitats.
http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/freshwater/colorado-river-map/

62. Colorado River
• A growing coalition of advocates is working to restore some
of the water in the Colorado, with hopes of regenerating the
now-arid delta (previous image) and important ecosystems
along the way.
• More people have come to appreciate the vital role the river
plays on both sides of the border. There is growing interest
in removing some of the dams along its path, including the
controversial Glen Canyon Dam near the Grand Canyon.
Photograph by Peter McBride
For National Geographic

63. Amu Darya River
•
•
•
•
•
Aral Sea, once the world's fourth largest inland water body with a surface of 26,000 square miles
(67,300 square kilometers). The sea was once ringed with prosperous towns and supported a lucrative
muskrat pelt industry and thriving fishery, providing 40,000 jobs and supplying the Soviet Union with a
sixth of its fish catch.
The Aral Sea was originally fed by two of Central Asia's greatest rivers, the Amu Darya in the south and
the Syr Darya in the north. The former is the longest river in the region, snaking through 1,500 miles
(2,414 kilometers) of steppe.
But in the 1960s, the Soviets decided to make the steppes bloom. So they built an enormous irrigation
network, including 20,000 miles of canals, 45 dams, and more than 80 reservoirs, all to irrigate sprawling
fields of cotton and wheat in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. The system was leaky and
inefficient, however, and after several decades, the Amu Darya had lost so much of its flow that it no
longer reached the Aral Sea. Today, it ends about 70 miles (110 kilometers) away.
Pictured is the Amu Darya a little ways upstream from where it dries out.
Deprived of a major source of its water, the inland sea shrank rapidly. In just a few decades, the Aral Sea
was reduced to a handful of small lakes, with a combined volume one-tenth the original and much
higher salinity due to all the evaporation. Millions of fish died, coastlines receded miles from towns, and
those few people who remained were plagued with toxic dust storms, the residue of industrial
agriculture and weapons testing in the area.
Photograph by Matthieu Paley, Corb
For National Geographic

64. Syr Darya River
• Although the Syr Darya fared somewhat better than its sister river, the Amu
Darya, it was also heavily tapped and polluted. The Syr Darya starts in the Tian Shan
Mountains of Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan and flows 1,374 miles (2,212 kilometers)
toward what's left of the Aral Sea. (Pictured is a reach near Tashkent)
• In the 18th century, a system of canals was built on the river. These structures were
greatly expanded by Soviet engineers during the 20th century, largely to grow vast
quantities of cotton. Virtually the entire flow was diverted, leaving only a trickle
into the inland sea.
• The deputy director of Kazakhstan's agency for applied ecology, Malik
Burlibaev, recently warned that "the Syr Darya is so polluted that water from it
should not be used for drinking or for irrigation.“
• In the past few years, the World Bank has funded a dam and restoration project
with the goal of improving the health of the Syr Darya and increasing the flow into
what's left of the North Aral Sea.
Photograph by Carolyn Drake
•
For Panos Pictures

65. Rio Grande River
• One of the largest rivers in North America, the 1,885-mile (3,033-kilometer) Rio
Grande runs from southwestern Colorado to the Gulf of Mexico. It defines much of
the border between Texas and Mexico. But the once grande river is looking
more poco these days, thanks to heavy use on both sides of the border.
• Less than a fifth of the Rio Grande's historical flow now reaches the Gulf. For a few
years in the early 2000s, the river failed to reach the coast entirely. All that
separated the United States from Mexico was a beach of dirty sand and an orange
nylon fence.
• Here, the river defines the international border across the Adams Ranch near Big
Bend National Park.
Photograph by Ian Shive
For Aurora Photos/Alamy

66. Rio Grande River
• Algae colors the confluence of
the Rio Grande and Arroyo San
Carlos.
• The population in the Lower Rio
Grande Valley is exploding in
both the United States and
Mexico, driven by NAFTA-era
factories
and
agricultural
productivity. But by the time it
reaches Matamoros, the river's
level is so low that it often falls
below the Mexican city's intake
pipes. Farmers in Texas say they
lose $400 million annually due to
lack of irrigation water.
• The region's wetlands, once
critical stopover points for
migrating birds, are getting
choked off. All these problems
are made worse by the decadeslong drought gripping the region.
Photograph by Jack W. Dykinga
For National Geographic

67. Yellow River
• The Yellow River is the second longest in China, after the Yangtze, and the sixth
longest in the world, with a course of 3,395 miles (5,464 kilometers). The Yellow
River was the cradle of the earliest known Chinese civilization, and it has a long and
complex history in the region. Numerous floods over the centuries resulted in
catastrophic loss of life, including a flood in 1931 that killed one to four million
people.
• Since 1972, the Yellow River has frequently run dry before reaching the sea, thanks
to extensive diversion, largely for agriculture. In 1997, the lower Yellow River did
not flow for a whopping 230 days. Such a dramatic decrease in water has choked
off the ecologically rich delta, which is also eroding due to loss of silt.
• In recent years, the Chinese government has taken steps to restore some of the
water's flow, denying some farmers use along the way.
Photograph by Christian Kober
For Robert Harding World Images

68. Teesta River
•
The Teesta River flows 196 miles (315 kilometers) through the Indian state of Sikkim and into
the Brahmaputra River in Bangladesh. It starts in the Himalaya, where it is fed by
snowmelt, and then carves its way through temperate and tropical valleys.
•
The Teesta is often called the lifeline of Sikkim, but in recent years it has been so tapped for
irrigation and other uses that it has largely dried up. Fishermen are no longer able to make a
living along its banks, and thousands of farmers have lost their water supply.
•
Even so, India is going ahead with plans to build a new series of dams along the Teesta, in a
bid to generate electricity. Geologists warn that the weight of sediments that pile up as a
result could trigger earthquakes in the seismically active area.
•
"Reasonable sharing of Teesta water is the only way to improve the ecological situation in
the area," Indian environmental activist Golam Mostafa of CAMP told The Daily Star. "But it
is still to be achieved despite a few meetings between Bangladesh and Indian governments,"
he said.
Photograph by John Stanmeyer, VII/Corbis
For National Geographic

69. Murray River
•
Some experts have warned that the troubles in Australia's Murray River Basin may be a
harbinger of what other water-stressed regions can expect in a warming world, with rising
human population. The Murray is Australia's longest and arguably most important
river, stretching for 1,476 miles (2,375 kilometers) from the Australian Alps, across the inland
plains to the Indian Ocean near Adelaide.
•
As a result of irrigation, the Murray Valley is Australia's most productive agricultural
zone, and is widely known as the nation's food bowl. However, withdrawals have resulted in
rising salinity, which threatens that agricultural productivity. The river is also the source of 40
percent of Adelaide's drinking water and most of the water for many smaller towns along its
length.
•
Disruptions and diversions have reduced the flow so much that the mouth of the river
closed due to silt formation at the beginning of the 21st century. Only dredging is able to
keep the final channel open, both to the sea and the lagoon of nearby Coorong National
Park.
•
Pictured is Lake Hume, a reservoir that was only at 19.6 percent capacity when this photo
was made. By the end of the summer of 2009 it dropped to 2.1 percent capacity.

70. Murray River
• The mouth of the Murray River, where a dredge keeps the pathway
open.
• The Murray faces other serious environmental threats, including
polluted runoff, especially from farms in four Australian states, and
introduction of invasive species, especially the European carp.
• Similar problems affect the Darling River, which flows into the Murray
at Wentworth. The Darling is known as a main waterway of the
outback, but some years it is so tapped and affected by drought that
it hardly flows at all.
Photograph by Amy Toensing
For National Geographic

71. Solution?!

72. Solution?!
•
Environmental racism is the pattern by which environmental hazards are
greatest in proximity to poor people, particularly poor minorities. In part, it
is a deliberate strategy by factory owners and powerful officials.
•
Looking Ahead: Toward a Sustainable World.
–
–
–
–
–
–
We need to develop an ecologically sustainable culture, a way of life that meets the
needs of the present generation without threatening the environmental legacy of
future generations.
Combat poverty by promoting economic development and job creation.
Involve local community in local government.
Reduce air pollution by upgrading energy use and alternative transport systems.
Create private-public partnerships to provide services such as waste disposal and
housing.
This calls for three basic strategies:
»
»
»
»
We must bring world population growth under control.
We must conserve finite resources.
We must reduce waste.
Will People Overwhelm the Earth?

73. http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/habitats/urban-threats2/
Summary
•
•
•
The promise of jobs and prosperity, among other factors, pulls people to cities. Half of the
global population already lives in cities, and by 2050 two-thirds of the world's people are
expected to live in urban areas. But in cities two of the most pressing problems facing the
world today also come together: poverty and environmental degradation.
Poor air and water quality, insufficient water availability, waste-disposal problems, and high
energy consumption are exacerbated by the increasing population density and demands of
urban environments. Strong city planning will be essential in managing these and other
difficulties as the world's urban areas swell.
Threats
– Intensive urban growth can lead to greater poverty, with local governments unable to provide
services for all people.
– Concentrated energy use leads to greater air pollution with significant impact on human health.
– Automobile exhaust produces elevated lead levels in urban air.
– Large volumes of uncollected waste create multiple health hazards.
– Urban development can magnify the risk of environmental hazards such as flash flooding.
– Pollution and physical barriers to root growth promote loss of urban tree cover.
– Animal populations are inhibited by toxic substances, vehicles, and the loss of habitat and food
sources.
– Plant trees and incorporate the care of city green spaces as a key element in urban planning.

74. Summary
•
Environmental racism is the pattern by which environmental hazards are
greatest in proximity to poor people, particularly poor minorities. In part, it
is a deliberate strategy by factory owners and powerful officials.
•
Looking Ahead: Toward a Sustainable World.
–
–
–
–
–
–
We need to develop an ecologically sustainable culture, a way of life that meets the
needs of the present generation without threatening the environmental legacy of
future generations.
Combat poverty by promoting economic development and job creation.
Involve local community in local government.
Reduce air pollution by upgrading energy use and alternative transport systems.
Create private-public partnerships to provide services such as waste disposal and
housing.
This calls for three basic strategies:
»
»
»
»
We must bring world population growth under control.
We must conserve finite resources.
We must reduce waste.
Will People Overwhelm the Earth?

75. Summary

76. Return to
Basics…