City Character, Second Cities, and Urban Growth Explained
This paper examines the nature of city character and its role in attracting people and industry, drawing on scholarship from urban planning and geography. Beginning with the difficulty of defining "city" as a concept, the paper moves through discussions of multifaceted urban identities, the differentiation of major global cities, the phenomenon of urban downsizing, and the emergence of second cities. Key questions addressed include why some second cities succeed while others fail, and what role transportation, resources, and strategic planning play in urban development. Examples ranging from Brighton, England, to Dubai, UAE, illustrate contrasting approaches to city formation and sustainability.
- Introduction: Defining the City: Challenges of defining city as a concept
- The City as a Multifaceted Entity: Cities as economic, cultural, and social hubs
- Differentiation and Dominance of Global Cities: How major cities dominate economies and imagination
- Urban Downsizing and the Rise of Second Cities: Declining growth rates and emergence of smaller cities
- Second Cities: Success and Failure: Factors determining second city success or failure
- Conclusion: Character, Planning, and Urban Identity: City character shaped by culture and strategic planning
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What makes this paper effective
- The paper uses a logical progression from broad definition to specific case studies, grounding abstract concepts in real-world examples such as Brighton and Dubai.
- It effectively synthesizes multiple scholarly and journalistic sources to support each stage of the argument, lending credibility to its claims about urban growth and decline.
- The analogy comparing cities to living beings gives the paper a consistent conceptual thread that ties together its discussion of character, culture, and function.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates the use of comparative analysis across urban examples — contrasting organically grown cities with strategically planned ones like Dubai — to draw broader conclusions about what drives city success. This technique allows the author to move from descriptive observation to analytical argument without overstating the evidence.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens by challenging a fixed definition of "city," then builds outward through layers of complexity: size and function, global hierarchy, downsizing trends, and second-city dynamics. The conclusion synthesizes these threads by returning to the central metaphor of city-as-living-being, connecting cultural identity (Memphis, Huntsville, Vail) to functional planning (Dubai). The structure is roughly five analytical sections bookended by an introduction and conclusion.
Introduction: Defining the City
The character of a city serves to attract or repel both people and industry. Caves (2005) states that the term "city" means "anything and everything" — in other words, Caves speaks of the many activities and events conducted within a city, including art, film, written publications, location, culture, institutional governance, and environmental and economic matters. Indeed, Caves describes the city as a sentient being, very much alive.
There is no definition that should be taken as a cut-and-dried, cookie-cutter account of what precisely comprises a city. Cities are extraordinarily diverse and readily differentiated from one another due to the distinct characteristics possessed by individual cities throughout the world. While some cities bear resemblances to one another, the cookie-cutter view is inaccurate. In fact, quite the opposite is true: each city's characteristics and very character are uniquely its own. As the Encyclopaedia Britannica's overview of cities reflects, urban settlements resist simple categorization across cultures and historical periods.
The City as a Multifaceted Entity
Gallion and Eisner (1983) state that the word "city" carries implications of "a concentration of people in a geographic area," whether that city be industrial, educational, governmental, or otherwise characterized. Cities are understood to be "commercial, industrial, financial centers" that provide jobs paying higher wages than those found in other geographic locations. Cities are also places of recreation and cultural activity, including the hosting of major sporting events.
This multifaceted nature means that no single function defines a city. Rather, the interplay of economic opportunity, cultural expression, governance, and social life together constitutes what a city is and how it is experienced by its residents and visitors alike.
Differentiation and Dominance of Global Cities
Foroohar (2006) explains that cities such as New York, Tokyo, and London "dominate our imaginations" because they are associated with legendary connections to "fortune, fame, and the future." These cities are also dominant in national economies and politics. However, Foroohar (2006) argues that the dominance of these enormously populated cities is beginning to wane, as their growth rate has dropped by nearly 50% over the last half-decade and is predicted to become stagnant within the next 25 years.
This shift in urban dynamics signals a broader reorganization of how and where people choose to live and work. As global city theory has long recognized, the commanding role of a small number of mega-cities in organizing the world economy is not necessarily permanent, and alternative urban centers are increasingly gaining relevance.
Conclusion: Character, Planning, and Urban Identity
This paper has examined the formation of what are known as "second cities" that arise from urban sprawl on city borders. Cities are much like living beings in that their character arises from the drivers that produce experiential and cultural growth — much like an individual whose character is formulated through both instruction and experience. The city is an individual location with its own tenets of living, varied forms of entertainment, and distinctive cultural activities.
For example, Memphis, Tennessee, is a blues cultural location with deeply historical significance for music, and Huntsville, Alabama, is known for its Redstone Arsenal and NASA's Space Center, while Vail, Colorado, is known for skiing, and St. Petersburg for its actors and artists. The life activities of those residing in a city are what form the intricately woven personality of that city and define its essence.
The functional purpose of a city also formulates its character, as is the case with Dubai. Located in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Dubai is characterized by aesthetic form, high functionality, and self-sustainability. While some challenges have emerged in certain aspects of the project, overall it represents an intelligently conceived and successfully developed model of urban planning and city development.
References
Caves, R. W. (2005). Introduction. In Caves, Encyclopedia of the City (pp. xxi–xxix). London and New York: Routledge.
Foroohar, R. (2006). Unlikely boomtowns. Retrieved from
The development of cities. (2008). City. How Stuff Works:
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