The Illusory Boundary: Environment and Technology in History

The City as an Artifact of Technology and the Environment

The City as an Artifact of Technology and the Environment Joel A. Tarr It is useful to think of cities as human creations imposed upon the natural landscape.∞ Cities are actually interrelated systems that depend on the utilization of technology for their continued existence. Yet, as systems, cities and their built environments bear many similarities to living environments, or ecosystems. Over time, the technologies used by urban inhabitants to form their built environments placed increasing burdens on the natural environments of their sites and their hinterlands. Through their use of technology, urbanites reshaped and scarred the landscape, constructed a built environment above- and underground, and contaminated air, land, surface water, and groundwater as their ecological footprints expanded.≤ The extent of these impacts depended upon a combination of natural and anthropogenic factors. Critical natural factors were climate, hurricanes and wind patterns, topography, geology and earthquake hazards, soil characteristics , and hydrology. The natural environmental characteristics of the site had a profound e√ect on the city as it grew, shaping and driving settlement patterns, the design of the built environment, the economy, and the health of the population. Anthropogenic factors shaping the site included population increase, territorial expansion, industrial growth and decline, changing energy and resource use, and construction of a built environment. The actions of individuals, groups, corporations, and governments pursuing various ends, including economic growth, land development, and the acquisition of power, drove these developments. The events that impacted the environment included both purposeful actions and unintended e√ects. Major natural events such as hurricanes, earthquakes, and floods; public health threats; various nuisances, including water, air, and land pollution; and the depletion of natural resources helped to drive the public to consider urban environ- 146 | Joel A. Tarr mental factors. Technology played a major role both in creating negative environmental conditions and in helping to mitigate them.≥ This essay focuses primarily on the environmental history of American cities. European cities, especially in the more industrialized nations, have similar histories, but change occurred at a somewhat di√erent pace and occasionally with di√erent outcomes.∂ American urban history itself can be divided into four overlapping periods. These periods are those of the compact walking city (1790–1870); the industrializing networked city (1870–1920); the rise of metropolitan regions (1920–60); and the spread and splintering of cities (1960–2008). These are not fixed or absolute time periods but rather conform largely to the changing spatial and economic character of cities, shaped primarily by technological applications in industrial development, public and private infrastructure construction, and transportation and communications . In each period it is possible to identify distinctive environmental patterns. Cities often faced similar issues revolving around the need to meet their requirements for water, clean air, land, materials, and energy in the context of population, spatial, and economic growth, but with varying outcomes. The Environment of the Compact Walking City, 1790–1870 America’s first urban network developed along the Atlantic seaboard, while the second extended along the inland waterways of lakes and rivers and was eventually linked with coastal cities by canals and railroads. Cities in both networks were primarily commercially oriented, compact in size, and densely populated. The urban population grew from 202,000 in 1790 to more than 15 million in 1870. In 1790 no city had a population of more than 50,000, but in 1870 twenty-five exceeded that figure, with three having populations of more than 300,000 and one with a number close to a million. Still, except for a few major cities, such as New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, and St. Louis, in 1870 cities were still restricted in area.∑ They had limited public transportation systems (hacks, omnibuses, and horsecars) and provided few municipal services. Their confined areas resulted in relatively small environmental impacts compared with those of later generations, but population increase and spatial growth, as well as the extension of their ecological footprints, altered this situation.∏ Americans founded cities in locations where nature o√ered various attractions , such as on coastlines where the land’s natural contours created harbors , on rivers and lakes that could be used for transportation, water supplies, The City as an Artifact of Technology and the Environment | 147 and waste disposal, and in fertile river valleys with extensive food, timber, and animal resources. Nature not only provided benefits but also caused many of the irritations of daily urban life, such as bad weather and pests...