It is pertinent to define some basic concepts involved in urban planning as this is a determinant factor in urban planning. These basic concepts are; urbanization, urban and urban planning;
URBANIZATION: This is defined as the agglomeration of people in relatively large number at a particular spot of the earth surface. Urbanisation is regarded as a process, whereby an increasing proportion of the world, nations or region’s population lives in developed areas (Falade, 2003). Conversely, another school of thought believes that urbanization is not about the population size, but must satisfy certain conditions like modernization, physical and economic development, as well as the heterogeneity in occupation (Wirth, 1938 and Harvey, 2000 and Oyeleye 2013). Urbanisation is not a bad phenomenon as many people wrongly assume Urban areas (and urbanized regions) facilitate agglomeration economies, which are a vital part of firms becoming internationally competitive, with costs reduced through the learning, matching, and sharing (of knowledge, labour, infrastructure) that happens between firms. Urbanization has also been linked to poverty reduction and innovation. Almost universally, access to basic urban services such as health, education, water, sanitation and electricity are higher in urban areas than in rural areas and are higher in larger urban areas than in smaller urban areas.
URBAN: The term urban includes land areas, populations and housing developments located in urbanized areas. Such as cities and towns or urban clusters. Urban areas feature densely populated landscapes, and typically have census determined population densities of more than 1000 residents per square mile.
URBAN PLANNING: Urban Planning is a large-scale concept concerned with planning and development at all levels (architectural, infrastructural, ecological, economical, and even political). During this process many problems & obstacles come up but luckily the same as any other kind of problems, there are solutions and precautions.
According to Wikipedia, Urban Planning is a technical and political process concerned with the development and use of land, protection and use of the environment, public welfare, and the design of the urban environment, including air, water, and the infrastructure passing into and out of urban areas, such as transportation, communications, and distribution networks.
On the other hand, English Lexicon describes Urban Planning as a branch of architecture dealing with the design and organization of urban space and activities besides determining and drawing up plans for the future physical arrangement.
Urban Planning must be accompanied by sustainability concept which enable us to carry out the urban development process in the right way to keep up sustainable environment for future generations.
In the process of urban planning and execution in urban cities, it faces different challenges. The basic concern of city-town planning is the internal form, structure, function and appearance of urban areas. Physical aspects such as buildings, roads, land use, etc., play an important role in urban planning, at the same time social, economic and technological forces should also be considered while planning so that a healthy environment is created in the city/town.
Apart from this problem, some factors also complicate the task of planning as follows;
HUMAN AND MATERIAL RESOURCES
In the execution of urban planning, there is the need for human and material resources but in the process of urban planning, they sometimes lack these resources. Relating to human resources, sometimes there are large numbers of workers but they are not skilled and experienced and sometimes vice versa. Also, the material (in form of fund) is usually not enough for the execution of urban planning.
URBAN SPRAWL
Urban Sprawl refers to the migration of a population from populated towns and cities to low density residential development over more and more rural land which resulting in:
Increase in Public Expenditure: They can actually play a part in the increases of public costs, because these changes in infrastructures and building must actually be paid for by someone- and it is usually the tax payers.
Increased Traffic: Populations will begin to use their cars more often, which means that there is more traffic on the roads.
Environmental Issues: When you think about going out to develop these lands you will have to worry about the wildlife that lives in these lands. You will be displacing them, and it can really cause a ripple in the environment.
HOUSING AFFORDABILITY
Affordable housing is housing deemed affordable to those with a median household income. Housing choice is a response to an extremely complex set of economic, social, and psychological impulses. Its effects are:
Housing expenditures: Housing affordability can be measured by the changing relationships between house prices and rents, and between house prices and incomes. There has been an increase among policy makers in affordable housing as the price of housing has increased dramatically creating a crisis in affordable housing.
Economy: Lack of affordable housing places a particular burden on local economies. As well, individual consumers are faced with mortgage arrears and excessive debt and therefore cutback on consumption. A combination of high housing costs and high debt levels contributes to a reduction in savings.
Transportation: Lack of affordable housing can make low-cost labor more scarce, and increase demands on transportation systems (as workers travel longer distances between jobs and affordable housing).
INDIVIDUAL CONTROL OR SMALL PARCELS OF LAND
Private ownership of small parcels of urban land sometimes interferes with the effective control of the space pattern of the city like the following: If a private owner enjoys unrestricted right to use his/her land as he wishes, he may build a shop or a factory in the residential area, thus decreasing the value of the nearby residences. If in a continuous residential area where two houses walls are shared, the problem arises in such areas when one house owner is willing to renovate the house and another is not in case of deterioration. They may develop conflict, which may turn out to be a problem in the future. If a private builder wants to undertake a project developing or reconstructing the building on the same land, he/she may face two problems, one is he/she may have to pay more money to the existing house owner and the second is he/she has to face the problems created by a neighbor. Both of such events are detrimental for the urban development.
SLUMS AND SQUATTER DEVELOPMENTS
Rapid urbanization due to rural - urban migration and natural population increase (Abiodun, 1985); inadequate housing and infrastructure; legal dualism in land administration and control. Lack of proper monitoring of physical development activities in urban areas which can lead to rapid deterioration of physical environment and provide breeding ground for prostitutes, criminals and social miscreants. They constitute affront for human dignity with associated adverse health implications on residents, and thus negate the goal of environmental sustainability.
URBAN FLOODING
It is very difficult to plan flood prone areas in urban settings. Lots of resources are expended in the process of curbing the effects of flooding. Also, absence of efficient storm water discharge system; ocean surge due to rise in sea level, extensive use of hard landscape elements; reclamation of swamps and natural storm water swales for building construction. Physical development on natural flood plains and non-adherence to physical development regulations result to flooding in low lying cities like Lagos and Port Harcourt Destruction of human lives, properties and means of livelihood as well as public infrastructure, leading economic losses. Destroys plants and animal lives, and thus leading to destabilization of the ecosystem which comes with adverse consequences.
MIGRATION
The continuous movement of people to urban areas can also be a problem. Just as plans are being made for existing infrastructures, more people still migrate to the same place. This can lead to congestion of houses in cities like that
UNIQUE ENVIRONMENTAL SITE
Every city/town occupies a unique environmental site, hills, valleys, rivers, waterfronts, or any other physical features make one city/town look different from another as following: Different sections of the city have unequal value as building sites as the underlying soil and rock formations affect the soundness of the foundations, characteristics of subsoil drainage, etc. All these make differences in the cost of underground construction. At the same time, rough terrain has different advantages and disadvantages for different kinds of buildings. Topography affects the routes of transportation. If a heavy rail line has to be constructed, it needs a level route, but if the city/town does not possess this feature, then transportation is affected. Breaks in transportation like from waterway to land-way or from roadway to railway prove advantageous for certain manufacturing and commercial activities. Some parts of the city provide better amenities than others. The amenities can be in the form of better view and access to market.
Features of physical site influence the spatial pattern of the city/town like:
i. Different sections of the city have unequal value as building sites as the underlying soil and rock formations affect the soundness of the foundations, characteristics of subsoil drainage, etc. All these make for differences in the cost of underground construction. At the same time, rough terrain has different advantages and disadvantages for different kinds of buildings.
ii. Topography affects the routes of transportation. If a heavy rail line has to be constructed, it needs a level route, but if the city/ town does not possess this feature, then transportation is affected. Means of transportation in turn influence the location of factories, commercial centers and residences.
iii. Breaks in transportation like from waterway to land-way or from roadway to railway prove advantageous for certain manufacturing and commercial activities. The location of many transportation breaks depends on the characteristics of physical site.
iv. Some parts of the city provide better amenities than others. The amenities can be in the form of better view and access to market. The city planner has to take into account these and other site features in designing the most effective spatial pattern for any individual city/town.
ARBITRARY POLITICAL BOUNDARIES
Effective urban planning requires that the city/ town be dealt with as an integrated natural unit. An adequate plan covers not only the built-up area of the city but also parts of the unoccupied hinterland, which need to be controlled in order to secure both orderly future growth of the city/ town and reasonable protection of its residents. Specific examples of difficulties resulting from the lack of integrated control or the lack of proper demarcation may be found explicitly in peripheral urban areas. But it is also true of inner city areas also. The following cases can help understand this problem properly:
i. During a real-estate boom, private owners may break up tracts of farmland into town-sized building lots. In case the city-town does not have a coordinated plan to handle such a situation, they (private owners) may create more urban building lots within a decade than probably will be needed for several generations. Such exaggerated subdividing activity distorts local land values and interferes with orderly urban growth.
ii. A person who builds in an unzoned area outside of municipal boundary lines may later find that his/her residence is the next door to a store or a petrol bunk. Even if an entire high-grade residential subdivision is erected as a unit, it may later be surrounded by cheaply constructed homes or hedged in by objectionable road- houses or factories. Therefore, a proper demarcation is required to control the haphazard growth in the fringe areas of the urban centre.
HERITAGE OF PAST CONSTRUCTION
With few exceptions, most of the cities of the town have grown without the early guidance of comprehensive city plans. Some which have grown, based on plan, have now outgrown their earlier designs. Consequently, most city planners have dealt primarily with built-up urban areas characterized by the established patterns of streets, transportation lines and buildings. Under these conditions, their work has been greatly limited and modified by the almost overwhelming heritage of past construction. The heritage of the city- town unfortunately does not comply with the contemporary needs. For example, the narrow streets of yesteryears may not be capable of handling the motor traffic of today, similarly factories, which were once properly located in the outskirts of the city, are now in the centre of the city. Thus, the heritage of the past does not satisfy the needs of the present population; hence it presents both urgent problems and formidable obstacles to the planner.
ANTICIPATION OF FUTURE CHANGE
The city planner cannot exactly say the future changes that may affect the city. But he can anticipate some of the changes and provide for it in the plan. These may turn out to be inadequate in the long run. Thus, a planner in trying to anticipate the future needs as related to the spatial pattern of the city faces exceptional difficulties because he/ she cannot always foresee new inventions or their effects. For example, unlike in the past, people now move in different types of automobiles, which the urban planner could not have anticipated about 50 years ago. Similarly, an urban planner cannot predict the prices of the urban land, or the population of the city/town in the near future. If he/she can predict, he/she can recommend for reserving certain parcels of land for parks, playgrounds, recreational centres, etc. that are actually needed by the expanding population of the city. The planner can only gamble by anticipating the future growth and recommending some things that may conform to the needs of the people in the long run.
Conclusively, the challenges that occur during urban planning and execution cannot entirely be exhausted.
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