GCSE SETTLEMENT QUESTION:

Using [one or more] [examples], [describe] how the outward growth of a settlement can affect the surrounding
countryside.

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What key case studies have you studied that you could How does urban growth affect the countryside?
use in this answer? •It is called URBAN SPRAWL.
MEDC’s •It engulfs farmland, farms, small villages and
•Cambridge woodland.
•Manchester •It means loss of open countryside.
•Glasgow •It means loss of productive agricultural land.
•Panorama video on Bradford and Silsdon •It means the growth of Hobby Farms as farms
•London are sold for building land and are then too small to
LEDC’s be productive.
•Cairo •It means loss of wildlife habitats.
•Bangkok •It means loss of identity for the villages, as they
Any Brazilian city become a suburb of a large city.
•It means an increasing number of roads and the
accompanying environmental pressures of traffic.
It means an increasing demand for leisure facilities
along the urban-rural fringe e.g.: golf courses, country
parks, riding stables.
Now you have to link these Case Studies with these affects to create you answer. You need to make at least
FOUR points because 4 marks are available.
ANSWER: (This is longer than you would need to write for 4 marks, but it shows how you can link Case Studies
and answers.)
>In Manchester, the clearance of the inner city slums in Miles Platting and redevelopment of past efforts at urban renewal
like Hulme have required the building of new edge of city housing estates in places like Coldshaw Farm. >This urban sprawl
has resulted in the loss of productive farmland, and the loss of countryside and woodland. >This means also a loss of wildlife
habitats. >The village that was on the outskirts of Manchester has now been expanded and is now just a suburb of
Manchester. Its identity is now that of a housing estate instead of a village.
>On the outskirts of Edinburgh, the M8 motorway was built to try to help solve the city transport problems. It has however,
encouraged new developments along side it, resulting in the loss of countryside,
>On the outskirts of Glasgow the new motorway link has encouraged the growth of new housing and out of town retail parks
and light industry. >New leisure facilities for the increasing population such as a golf course and leisure centre have been
created, >which means a change in the land use, increased traffic and an increase in the associated environmental problems.
>In the London area farmland has been sold for housing and industry, making the farms too small to be economic so the
remaining land has been sold to Hobby Farmers. The result is a loss of the Greenbelt.
>In LEDC’s the story is the same, but less well controlled. For example, in Cairo, uncontrolled urban growth has driven
peasant farmers off their land. As land values have increased at the edge of the city, farmers have been tempted to sell
their land. This has meant the loss of the limited productive fertile land on the Nile delta. >Because it is uncontrolled it has
also meant that patches of farmland are quickly being surrounded by urban growth.