Megalopolis

A term from urban geography that identifies a large, contiguous urban region. The word was first used by the French geographer Jean Gottman in describing the strip of urbanization running along the eastern seaboard of the United States from Boston, Massachusetts, toWashington, D.C. Another term for this concentrated zone of urban development is BosWash, an amalgamation of the names of the terminal cities. The label of “megalopolis” is now applied to any large urban conurbation anywhere in the world, and many such locations may be identified. Typically, a megalopolis is characterized by a large population, dense and sophisticated transportation systems, a concentration of industrial and service economic functions, and numerous urban problems, such as higher levels of pollution, greater congestion, and loss of green space. A 2005 study by Robert Lang and Dawn Dhavale identified 10 “megapolitan areas” in the United States. To qualify for this label, an urban corridor had to include a combined population of at least 10 million by the year 2040, occupy a similar physical geography, represent an identifiable cultural region with a common sense of identity, and be “linked by major transportation infrastructure,” among other criteria. Lang and Dhavale identified 10 such urban regions within the United States, and highlighted the economic, demographic, and political power such mega-cities represent. According to their study, approximately twothirds of the U.S. population lives within the boundaries of a megapolitan area, and 80 percent of the members of the U.S. House of Representatives have some portion of their congressional district lying within such a region.

The toponymy of the 10 areas delineated by the research of Lang and Dhavale reveals both the location and identity of the megalopolis. The “I-35 Corridor,” for example, is an emerging strip of urban development that extends from San Antonio, Texas to Kansas City, closely following the interstate highway that links these cities and a string of others lying in between. The “Valley of the Sun” is a megalopolis centered on Phoenix, Arizona, while “Piedmont” is the urbanized region emerging along the southeastern flank of the Appalachian Mountains. But the development of such “super cities” is not limited to NorthAmerica, of course. In Japan the Taiheyo Belt is an enormous urban concentration of more than 80 million people, running from Tokyo on the island of Honshu to the northern end of the island of Kyushu, connected by high-speed trains. The Taiheyo Belt represents one of the most dense concentrations of industrial and financial development in the world, all focused in a strip of territory the size of southern California between San Francisco and Los Angeles. Indeed, megalopoli appear to be emerging in many corners of the planet, and it seems likely that such enormous urban clusters will dominate the urban landscape of the future. This will present new challenges in the form of transportation infrastructure, integration and governance, environmental degradation and quality of life, and very likely others that have yet to appear. Changes in the cultural landscape, as well as in cultural identity, also seem inevitable as the megalopolis

evolves into the defining feature of urban life.