🏡 HUMAN SETTLEMENTS

A human settlement is defined as a place inhabited more or less permanently.

Rural And Urban Dichotomy

The human settlements can be differentiated in terms of rural and urban, population size, nature of activities, structure, functions, etc.
There is no uniformity in the hierarchy of the functions provided by rural and urban settlements. Petrol pumps are considered as a lower order function in the United States while it is an urban function in India. Even within a country, rating of functions may vary according to the regional economy.
But, the basic difference between towns and villages is that in towns the main occupation of the people is related to secondary and tertiary sectors, on the other side, in villages people are engaged in primary activities.
Sub-Urbanisation : It is a new trend of people moving away from congested urban areas to cleaner areas outside the city in search of better quality of life.
Census of India, 1991 It defines urban settlements as - All places which have Municipal Corporation, Cantonment Board, Notified Town Area Committee and have a population of 5000 persons and above and where 75% of male workers are engaged in non-agricultural activities and density of population is at least 400 persons per sq km are urban.

Types And Patterns of Settlements

Settlements may also be classified by their shape, patterns types. The major types classified by shape are:

Compact or Nucleated settlements: These settlements are those in which large number of houses are built very close to each other. Such settlements develop along river valleys and in fertile plains. Communities are closely knit and share common occupations.
Dispersed Settlements: In these settlements, houses are spaced far apart and often interspersed with fields. A cultural feature such as a place of worship or a market, binds the settlement together.

Rural Settlements

These settlements are closely and directly related to land. They are dominated by primary activities like agriculture, fishing, animal husbandry, etc. The factors affecting the location of settlements are as follows:
Water Supply: Rural settlements are located near water bodies such as rivers, lakes and springs as water is easily obtained. Most water based ‘wet point’ settlements - water is available for drinking, cooking and washing.
Land: people choose to settle near fertile lands suitable for agriculture. Human settlements like villages in rolling countryside in Europe avoiding swampy areas, low lying river valleys and coastal plains suited for wet rice cultivation in South-East Asia.
Upland: Not prone to flooding therefore, in low lying river basins people chose to settle on terraces and levees which are “dry points”. In tropical countries people build their houses on stilts near marshy lands to protect themselves from flood, insects and animal pests.
Building Material: Settlements are made in those places where building materials are available like cave dwellings in China, mud bricks houses in African Savanna and igloos with ice blocks in polar regions.
Defence: During the times of political instability, war, hostility of neighbouring groups villages were built on defensive hills and islands. In India most of the forts are located on higher grounds or hills.
Planned Settlements: Planned settlements are constructed by the government by providing shelter, water and other infrastructure on acquired lands. E.g. Canal colonies in Indira Gandhi Canal Command Area in India.

Rural Settlement Patterns

Refers to the way the houses are sited in relation to each other. The surrounding topography terrain influences the shape. They are:

On the basis of setting: The main types are plain and size of village, plain villages, plateau villages, coastal villages, forest villages, desert villages, etc.
On the basis of functions: There may be farming villages, fishermen villages, lumberjack villages, pastoral villages, etc.
On the basis of forms/shapes of the Settlement: The villages are developed in geometrical forms and shapes such as:
Linear pattern: In such settlements houses are located along a road, railway line, river, canal edge of a valley or along a levee.
Rectangular pattern: Such patterns of rural settlements are found in plain areas or wide intermontane valleys. The roads are rectangular and cut each other at right angles.
Circular pattern: Circular villages develop around lakes, tanks and sometimes the village is planned in such a way that the central part remains open and is used for keeping the animals to protect them from wild animals.
Star like pattern: Where several roads converge, star shaped settlements develop by the houses built along the roads.
T-shaped, Y-shaped, Cross-shaped or Cruciform settlements: T -shaped settlements develop at tri-junctions of the roads (T) while Y-shaped settlements emerge as the places where two roads converge on the third one and houses are built along these roads. Cruciform settlements develop on the cross-roads and houses extend in all the four directions.
Double village: These settlements extend on both sides of a river where there is a bridge or a ferry.

Problems of Rural Settlement

Rural settlements in developing countries are large in number and have poor infrastructure. There is inadequate supply of water in these settlements.
Water borne diseases like cholera, jaundice, etc are a common problem.
There is a lack of irrigation facilities, drought and flood in rural settlements.
Inadequate sanitation facilities, toilet and garbage disposal facilities cause health related problems.
Proper housing and separate sheds for animals are not there.
Rural settlements mostly lack metalled roads and modern communication networks.
Health centres and educational institutions are less in number

Urban Settlements

The first urban settlement to reach a population of one million was the city of London by around 1810 A.D.
By 1982 approximately 175 cities in the world had crossed the one million population mark.
Expected that 68 percent of the world’s population lives in urban settlements by 2050 compared to only 3 percent in the year 1800.

Classification of Urban Settlement

Urban areas varies from one country to another. Some of the common basis of classification are size of population, occupational structure and administrative setup.
Population Size: It is an important criteria used by most countries to define urban areas. The lower limit of the population size for a settlement to be designated as urban 5,000 in India and 30,000 in Japan.
Density of 400 persons per sq km and share of non-agricultural workers are taken into consideration in India.
Occupational Structure: In some countries, such as India, the major economic activities in addition to the size of the population in designating a settlement as urban are also taken as a criterion. In India a settlement is called urban, if more than 75 percent of its economically productive population is engaged in non-agricultural pursuits.
Administration: The administrative setup is a criterion for classifying a settlement as urban in some countries. For example, in India, a settlement of any size is classified as urban, if it has a municipality, Cantonment Board or Notified Area Council.
Location: Location of urban centres is examined with reference to their function. E.g. strategic towns offering natural defence, mining towns, industrial towns, tourist centres, places with historical relics and other places that can provide proper living conditions have the potential to develop into urban centres.

Functions of Urban Centres

On the basis of the functions, the urban settlements are classified as:

(i). Administrative towns : National capitals having administrative offices like New Delhi, Canberra, London, Beijing, etc are called administrative towns. Provincial (sub-national) towns can also have administrative functions. E.g. Victoria (British Columbia), Albany (New York), chennai(Tamil Nadu) etc.
(ii). Trading and Commercial Towns : Agricultural market towns such as Winnipeg, banking and financial centres like Frankfurt, large inland centres like Manchester, transport nodes like Lahore, Baghdad, and Agra are important trading centres.
(iii). Cultural Towns : Pilgrimage places like Jerusalem, Varanasi, Jagannath Puri, etc are considered cultural towns. Other centres like health and recreation (Miami), industrial (Pittsburgh and Jamshedpur), mining, quarrying (Dhanbad) and transport (Singapore and Mughal Sarai) are also urban settlements.

Classification of Towns on The Basis of Forms

An urban settlement may be linear, square, star or crescent shaped.
Towns and cities of developed and developing countries reflect marked differences in planning and development. For example, Chandigarh and Canberra are planned cities, while smaller towns in India have evolved historically from walled cities to large urban sprawls.
Ethiopia-Addis Ababa (The New Flower) : New City in 1878–hill valley. The roads radiate from the government headquarters Piazza, Arat and Amist Kilo round abouts. Mercato has markets which grew with time and is supposed to be the largest market between Cairo and Johannesburg. Bole airport is a relatively new airport.
Australia- Canberra : Established in 1912, it is the capital of Australia. It is a garden city with wide open spaces, parks and gardens. Initially, it was built to accommodate 25,000 people but now it has expanded to accommodate many satellite towns.

Types of Urban Settlements

Depending on the size and the services available and functions rendered, urban centres are designated as town, city, million city, conurbation, megalopolis.

Town : The concept of town can best be understood with reference to village. Population size is not the only criterion. Functional contrasts between towns and villages may not always be clear - cut, but specific functions such as, manufacturing, retail and wholesale trade, and professional services exist in towns.
City : In the words of Lewis Mumford, ”The city is in fact the physical form of the highest and most complex type of associative life”. They are larger than towns, have a greater number of economic functions, tend to have transport terminals, major financial institutions and administrative offices.
Conurbation : The term conurbation was coined by Patrick Geddes in 1915. This is applied to a large area of urban development that resulted from the merging of originally separate towns or cities like Greater London, Manchester, Chicago and Tokyo.
Megalopolis : Greek city was popularised by Jean Gottman (1957), this signifies super metropolitan region extending as union of conurbations, e.g. urban landscape stretching from Boston to Washington in USA.
Million City: It refers to a city whose population reaches more than one million, e.g. London reached the million mark in 1800 followed by Paris in 1850 and by 1950 there were around 80 such cities.
Distribution of Mega Cities : The number of mega cities or megalopolis has been rising rapidly. The number of mega cities is 25 currently.

Problems of Urban Settlements

In Developing Countries- Suffers from various problems, such as unsustainable concentration of population, congested housing and streets, lack of drinking water facilities.
Since most cities in developing countries are unplanned, it creates severe congestion. Shortage of housing, vertical expansion and growth of slums are characteristic features of modern cities of developing countries.
In many cities an increasing proportion of the population lives in substandard housing, e.g. slums and squatter settlements. In most million plus cities in India, one in four inhabitants lives in illegal settlements, which are growing twice as fast as the rest of the cities.
Economic Problems : The decreasing employment opportunities in rural areas push the unskilled and semi-skilled labour force to migrate to urban areas which is already saturated.
Socio-Cultural Problems : Cities in developing countries suffer from several social ills. Lack of financial resources fail to create adequate social infrastructure. Lack of employment and education tends to aggravate the crime rates. Male selective migration to the urban areas disorts the sex ratio in these cities.
Environmental Problems : Urban settlements in developing countries suffer from improper sewage systems, massive use of fuel that causes air pollution, lack of clean drinking water, dumping of untreated wastes and huge concrete structures that aggravate the environmental problems.

Health City

World Health Organisation (WHO) suggests that, among other things, a ‘healthy city’ must have:

A ’Clean’ and ‘Safe’ environment.
Meets the ‘Basic Needs’ of ‘All’ its inhabitants.
Involves the ‘Community’ in local government.
Provides easily accessible ‘Health’ service.

Urban Strategy- UNDP

The UNDP has outlined these priorities as part of its urban Strategy:

Increasing ‘Shelter’ for the urban poor.
Provision of basic urban services such as ‘Education’, ‘Primary Health care’, ‘Clean Water and Sanitation’.
Improving women’s access to ‘Basic Services’ and government facilities.
Upgrading ‘Energy’ use and alternative ‘Transport’ systems. Reducing ‘Air Pollution’.

& Comment

Writiy

Friday, 24 December 2021

Human Settlements