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AP file
Building denser cities like Manhattan -- as shown in this aerial view Wednesday, Aug. 29, 2007, in New York - could be part of the answer.
Cities worldwide are on track to expand by nearly 580,000 square miles – more than twice the size of Texas – in less than 20 years, according to experts at a major international science conference.
Yale University professor Karen Seto said the North American suburb had “gone global, and car-dependent urban developments are more and more the norm.”
The world’s population is expected to grow from the current 7 billion to about 9 billion by 2050, according to the United Nations.
Experts meeting at the Planet Under Pressure 2012 conference in London said in a statement released by the organizers Tuesday that unless changes were made, “humanity’s urban footprint” would increase in size by 1.5 million square kilometers (nearly 580,000 square miles) by 2030.
This is significantly more than twice the size of Texas or, according to a "back-of-the-envelope calculation" by Seto, more than 43,000 football fields every day for the next 18 years.
”The way cities have grown since World War II is neither socially or environmentally sustainable and the environmental cost of ongoing urban sprawl is too great to continue,” Seto said in the statement.
“People everywhere, however, have increasingly embraced Western styles of architecture and urbanization, which are resource-intense and often not adapted to local climates,” she added. “The North American suburb has gone global, and car-dependent urban developments are more and more the norm.”
Eco-friendly skyscrapers?
Seto was one of the authors of a report in the journal PLoS One about global urban sprawl, along with Michail Fragkias of Arizona State University, who is one of some 2,800 participants at the London conference.
The Planet Under Pressure conference is designed to give an idea of the health of the globe ahead of the Rio+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development in June.
Fragkias told msnbc.com that "the answer [to urban sprawl] is denser cities."
"The main message is we are not going to get away with cities like Phoenix or cities like Los Angeles," he said. "These are the typical cities of the single-family house, with a huge lot and huge highways that connect various areas of the cities because there is no way you can have an efficient or cheap enough mass transit system to support them."
Instead, densely populated areas such as Singapore or Manhattan -- but not New York City's surrounding urban sprawl -- provided possible models for the future. "If cities can develop in height rather than in width that would be much more preferable and environmentally not as harmful," Fragkias said.
Census: 8 out of 10 Americans are now urbanites
But Seto told msnbc.com that density was only part of the answer, saying someone who lives close to where they work in Phoenix could have a low environmental impact, compared to someone living in a densely packed city who commutes through congested streets in a car.
Cities are not 'bad'
And she said that increasing the urban population was "absolutely" the way to deal with the rising number of people in the world.
"For a long time, environmental activists said 'cities are bad.' The rationale was cities take up space and that could be better used for gorillas and butterflies," and other wildlife, Seto told msnbc.com.
But she said the global population was increasing and "we certainly don't want them strolling about the entire countryside. We want them to save land for nature by living closely [together]."
The conference statement said that creating more environmentally friendly cities included better infrastructure planning; “reversing the trend to ever larger homes;" and ending subsidies that favor cars over public transport.
Beijing's 'hubs' haven't curbed population pressures
Inner city schools should also be improved and other urban issues such as income inequality and crime rates addressed, the statement said.
"Cities are being built so quickly, we have to rethink how we do things ... Rome wasn't built in a day, but Chinese cities are," Seto quipped, saying most urban growth was taking place in Asia.
UNICEF: Millions of kids live in urban squalor
On Tuesday, organizers of the conference also highlighted a website called Welcome to the Anthropocene, referring to a term adopted by scientists and environmentalists to describe what they say is a new epoch, one uniquely influenced by human actions.
The idea the world had entered the Anthropocene was first put forward in 2000 by Dutch Nobel laureate Professor Paul Crutzen and U.S. academic Professor Eugene F. Stoermer.
"This century is special in the Earth's history. It is the first when one species -- ours -- has the planet's future in its hands," Martin Rees of the Royal Society, Britain's academy of sciences, said at the conference Monday according to the AFP news agency. "We've invented a new geological era: the Anthropocene.”
More from msnbc.com and NBC News:
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- Afghan abuse victims jailed over 'moral crimes'
- Man cuts off foot, throws it in furnace to avoid job assignment
- Turmoil builds in China's Tibetan regions
- French rail company to pay out after delays cost commuter job
- World's cities to expand by twice the size of Texas by 2030
Follow us on Twitter: @msnbc_world
Leave a Comment:
Forced contraception, sterilization please .... Absolute priority is to curb population growth.
You first. Please.
Who appointed you God to say there is too many people in the world fruitcake. Like the UN has one clue what the population is going to be in 2050 other studies said we could be down to 3.5 billion people. Who cares what some Marxist anti American scumbag scientist think we don't want people strolling around the countryside? Marxist dreams of total control force to live in a big city. Hey fruitcake scientist here is a clue Americans are buying guns for a reason. Because we ARE NOT going to be treated like peasants.
Lets just nuke the world up to bring down the populations.
Start with Chicago please. Look at what they gave us in 2008
Why don't we just Give Barrack Hussein Obama a blank check to devise a way and he can bill the American Tax Payers for it.
One more term is more than we can handle
And I guess Hell is packed on the other side that's we were born.
With the current worldwide poverty and mass starvation, the fact that poor humans continue to breed and reproduce is beyond stupid... and governments that support this bad behavior via welfare will end up broke themselves. The human population needs to be reduced by 2 billion in the next 18 years, not increased. Overpopulation is destroying this planet. Birth control should be the number one priority everywhere. If everyone lives, everyone will die. A plague that kills 75% of all humans would be a great blessing. Hopefully this happens sooner rather than later.
Missed the current "mass starvation" everywhere. Care to actually state how many masses are currently starving?
We need to expand our cities to make them enormous and awesome for when Jesus comes. He will be very proud of all the work we have done.
Agenda21. Marxism cumming to America, Brought to you by progressive liberals. Welcome to the new USSR. United states socialist republic.
My solution would be no pregnancy during certain years.For instance.no baby` til you are 25 or older.That would slow down the birth rate,while allowing the elders to pass.Just imagine how the teen pregnancy would stop!We are living longer,so we MUST slow down the birth rate.Safe sex and birth control would be a good start.The whole world would have to be on board.I know this sounds impossible,but we have got to do something.Sustainability is the key word,and if we do not do something now.There won`t be enough water or food to supply the overpopulated earth.
Are you are an idiot. How in the hell do you propose to do this? Force abortions? Sterilization? You do know who else thought those were some good ideas right? You do realize giving the govt THAT much power is bad right? What if suddenly right wing xtian extremists came into power? You and your boyfriend would be forced apart. Gay relationships could be banned outright. They could compel people to have babies whether they liked it or not. You and your shortsighted brethren fail to see what these totalitarian policies will do when wielded by the other side.
Your solution is just more stealth fascism. Sterilize yourself.
Er,Politics will not help matters.This is a life or death issue.Not just with humans,but wildlife too!With expanding city` comes less land for farming and less land for animals.We as humans have to come together or we as a species are screwed.
Thoery of people,not so fast on darkness illusion in hollywood, some 8,000 year's from now the world will be much more strive in every aspect of human physical and soul developement.Paradise earth will be peaceful and high tech living,and home to some alien visitors.Human will coutinues their exloration to the universe.Human are more than the universe and it's existence.
Genophage anyone :)
I just love how myopic science can be. Just because they can calculate something does not mean it relates to reality or common sense. We can't support the population as it is.
Instead of daydreaming and planning super-mega cities, maybe some of you grand thinkers should look into ways of solving the real problems we face right now. Or if the bible is right, Jesus will return, wipe out a good portion of the population and we'll have 1000 years of peace since there will be plenty of room and food for all. It's simple, when there are more people than resources, conflicts arise. Just like we have now.
"There are wars, and always will be wars"
Sad to quote that, but it's been proven to work, time and again.
Yes.... and all funded by the same people since the time of Napolean. Because nothing creates wealth, culls the population, & consolidates banker power (Rothschild), like war. Luckily for Rothschild, he has his minions in the US too (Rockefeller). Same Rockefeller who owns GE, biggest military contractor in human history, and MSNBC is its subsidiary. Those left after great wars are far more easily "educated" to the new desired reality, because theres less of them, & theyre still in shock.
You could fit the world population in an area slightly larger than Australia (do the math)..... its not about human population, its about control...... over you, your life, & how productive a head of cattle you are on the tax farm.
Wise up
Not to worry ... WWIII will fix everything.
So much talk about saving the Earth by using compact fluorescents and running cars on ethanol. The fundamental problem is that there are too darn many humans! But anything that threatens the increase in human population (Like the classic Four Horsemen) becomes a cause for hand wringing among the same people that complain about the loss of species and, more importantly, habitat. Humans need to spend less effort on ensuring that the population continues to increase.
Birth control is theoretically a kinder, gentler method of population control, but only the smart people realize it. The dumb people just keep breeding. The net effect of that is a continuous average genetic loss of IQ.
Wow man… how stupid can people be!!! Its called “U.N. Agenda 21”.. & it is a continuation of Nazi agenda…. Except, instead of blitzkrieg, they do things incrementally or “progressively” since blitzkrieg didn’t work out. So lean forward, as Maddow would say, right into the fan! As far as the elites are concerned, theres far too many of us, with entirely too many freedoms, & were mucking up their real estate… & as far as theyre concerned, they created “us” through their industrial revolution, & can do with “us” as they please.. even convince masses to go along voluntarily… because they know how stupid we are, as they invented the Dept. of Education (created by Rockefeller)…. So they have their international enforcement arm the U.N. (created by Rockefeller) implement the plan, right out of George Orwell’s “1984”, & hardly ANYbody notices. Why would they notice? They get their news from MSNBC (created by Rockefeller), & CNN & Fox (Rockefeller subsidiaries indirectly). They even convince the stupider of us that MSNBC is a peace loving liberal network, even though they are a subsidiary of GE, the biggest military contractor in human history (owned by Rockefeller…. Address of MSNBC is 30 Rockefeller Plaza).
Sooo….herd us all into cities (Nazi Ghettos), try to kill us off with “planned parenthood” (previously Nazi eugenics, previously Ford Foundation eugenics), & whats next? Concentration camps??...yup…. already built by FEMA in Ft. Lee NJ, Ft. Dix NY, & allll over the country.
So…..lean forward.
I thought D of Ed was Carnegie... Oh well, might as well be the same thing.
You are only a slave so long as you deny the nature of the prison into which you were born.
No, it was Rockefeller.... created the education system to make us all mindless, politically correct (wearing blinders), and just stupid enough not to realize we are slaves.... aka Liberalism. Heres his quote when he started the Dept. of Education..
"In our dreams, people yield themselves with perfect docility to our molding hands. The present education conventions of intellectual and character education fade from their minds, and, unhampered by tradition, we work our own good will upon a grateful and responsive folk.
We shall not try to make these people, or any of their children, into philosophers, or men of science. We have not to raise up from them authors, educators, poets or men of letters. We shall not search for great artists, painters, musicians nor lawyers, doctors, preachers, politicians, statesmen -- of whom we have an ample supply.
The task is simple. We will organize children and teach them in a perfect way the things their fathers and mothers are doing in an imperfect way."
I stand corrected. However, regarding the original charter of the dept. of education (1867; preceded the second Morrill Act of 1890-my understanding is that this was the initiation of federal funding via land grants, etc.), wasn't it the Carnegie foundation that was seeking ways, other than war, having determined that it was excessively costly repairing the inevitable collateral damage to infrastructure that resulted, to manipulate the collective psyche of societies? After much discussion it was determined that to manipulate education, converting it, gradually, into a form of operand conditioning (which has been greatly aided by computer-aided education, which requires zero intellectual exchange and is akin to mice pressing a lever for sugar water), would enable the power structure to gain complete control of the collective intellect, and thus their habits, opinions and behaviors?
I can't help but think that the success of their aims is reflected in the fact that Americans are so pro-Department of Education. It is as if they think, "Education? Yeah, we like education. They should have a department for that." Teachers will tell you that it is a tragedy that they are forced to teach to standardized tests (operand conditioning), yet they continue to support the federal department. They will argue all day that you "can't measure education with a standardized test," yet they sincerely believe that we need the D. of Ed. to ensure a national standard of education... Isn't that like trying to run with one foot nailed to the floor? Or maybe like $hitting into one hand while wishing into the other? They don't staff the Department of Education with teachers for a reason (but at this point most teachers are just as indoctrinated having worked their way through the very same operand conditioning machine.
Operand conditioning, great for teaching dolphins to do tricks...
For the record, I'm not trying to correct you on any points, but am sincerely interested in critical discourse.
Shalom.
Well said.... Before the D. of Ed we were basically number one in the world in education. Since its start we are now something like 29 or 30 in the world. Here in NY schools are more of a babysitting service than a school, only they find the time to indoctrinate the young while theyre at it. But, as Hitler said, get them while theyre young. And if you notice, a lot of this conditioning is targetted more powerfully at girls/women. Because as Hitler also said, Get the women, as go the children, and will follow the men.
37th last I checked...
I'm just now having to wrestle with the notion of putting my oldest into kindergarten and am really trying to find viable options outside the pub. school system. I'd like to think that the system can be changed, but at the same time, I don't want to subject him to the same creepy propaganda that I hear so many around me spewing as if it were "knowledge."
Incidentally, I dropped out halfway through the ninth grade; best decision I ever made. My folks were big on teaching us to sniff out bull$hit; to always seek the bigger picture. Literacy and curiosity are all one really needs to educate oneself. I went to college until halfway through the second year, I was excused from college by a professor after he'd made a big deal of the Geo. Orwell quote that states that you go to college to get one last chance to learn how to read. Everything else lends itself to that. Obviously, I am paraphrasing, but I don't really feel like looking up the quote right now. Incidentally, I think that the prof was joking because he seemed pretty shocked when I just said, "Thanks," and walked out of class and went to get y tuition money back...
Not without increasing the food suppy first !!!
We have moved from an age of specialization for efficiency (i.e. - some folks raise crops while others manufacture implements, etc.) to the point where we now have a large segment of the population that actually produces nothing or little of value to society. So in essence, the real producers must carry these non productive members. This is called over population. This is not to blame anyone, but it is something we ought to address rationally.
The human race cannot be judged to be an intelligent race, if it cannot come up with an effective way to keep its population under control here on Earth. I have personally recommended a system of child credits where everyone would automatically get one replacement child credit (or child permit) registered to their name, probably in the form of a new social security number. People could do whatever they want with this child credit (or child permit), they could use it themselves, they can leave it to their relatives, or they can sell it on the open market. The would automatically enable every couple to potentially have two replacement children. If people decide to have more than one replacement child per person, they will be required to purchase more child credits on the open market at whatever the going rate was, even if they had to borrow the money from the government to do this, and pay fines in the form of exorbitant interest rates as a consequence. This sounds like the simplest, fairest and easiest system of controlling world population to me. - Rick Carter
(Once people have reached their replacement child limit, they might even be required to buy insurance to cover themselves, in the event that they have an unauthorized child. They could potentially keep their insurance rates low if they use some reliable form (or forms) of birth control.) - RC
(People might even opt to buy insurance ahead of time, just to initially cover themselves against multiple births.) - RC
That plan won't work. Too many minorities will holler "racism" because they can't pump out as many babies as they wish.
Not if you stop the child tax credit after two kids per household. It would apply to EVERYONE and thus be egalitarian and non-discriminatory. However, I disagree regarding penalization. The cost of raising children is penalty enough. Perhaps the state can start paying for VOLUNTARY sterilization, too...
Well instead of our government killing us why dont they just be honest and tell everyone the truth! They must profit more from mass murder! Population control! My father told me about that 25yrs. ago! He worked around Generals for a bit! I thought he was crazy! I quess not!HUH
Just close our borders. The US would be able to control its population without millions of legal and illegal immigrants swamping our social services, schools, hospitals, employment offices, etc.
Otherwise the US will soon become just another third world country with slums everywhere.
Although your post sounds drastic, I agree with it. Close borders (Canada`s as well), cut off foreign aid and spend funds for the wellbeing of citizens at home, health, education and advancement of own country.
Anyone seen a story coming from MSNBC about the black panthers offering a $10,000 reward for Zimmerman " dead or alive "??
Yes. And we've also seen your nonsense posted everywhere. Give it a rest.
All the cities are going to be twice the size of Texas? Collectively or individually?
It'll be fine! We're due for a global pandemic any time now. Pandemics are natural population control mechanisms and with so many people crowded in cities, it won't take long for a huge population decrease. Especially if it originates in China where urban growth means poor dirty living conditions side by side with livestock and no access to medical care.
"Coruscant…the entire planet is one big city." - Captain Obvious
START A WAR! INDUCE A PANDEMIC! CONVENE THE DEATH PANELS!
Don't think these things are not on the agenda people
You forgot toxic vaccines, killing people with prescription drugs, GMO foods and endocrine dsiruptors (Bt-thanks, Monsanto, and BPA)... Oh yeah, and nuclear contamination...