CHICAGO HOYT MODEL

ZAMORA´S URBAN PLAN

We define city as an urban settlement where a group of people live. This means that Zamora is a city.

Zamora is a small city in the northwest of Spain, next to Portugal, in the community of Castille and Leon. Probably it started more than two thousand years ago with a Celtic settlement. It’s easy to guess why these first settlers chose this place to inhabit:  On the top of a small hill (with a good vision of the surrounding land), just by a big river that gives food and protection from the south and by another small river that flows calmly to the main river on the north.

The urban plan of Zamora shows an irregular layout with some buildings that determine the historic past of our city: for example, the first medieval wall (which goes from the castle to Plaza Mayor) or the Cathedral. This area is known as the historic centre. This city distribution was created as small neighborhoods (called parish) surrounding churches, so there was always a church in the middle of a square and its parish around it. As the city increased its population, the second wall had to be built. But inside any of the walls of the city the distribution of the parishes surrounding a church has been maintained until recently.

Above all topics, the historic centre of my city has a cultural function. Here they are located the most important Romanic buildings and most of the Romanesque churches, which attracts tourism, but it has little economic importance as there are few shops in this area. Only the town hall, other political institutions, the main library and some museums are inside this first medieval wall. In my opinion, the main problems affecting this zone of the city are the ones derived from the great number of old houses abandoned and uninhabited and the lots without any edification that leads to a low density of population without many services as clinics, supermarkets, secondary schools, etc. The solution could be to force building new houses in abandoned houses and lots. On the contrary, the main commercial area is located around two streets in the second wall: many shops and restaurants are located around them. These straight streets were created at the end of the XIX century with a modernist square and modernist buildings. In my opinion, the main problems here are the high prices that flats and houses have around the two main commercial streets. But in general, in this city there aren’t many problems: the prices of houses are lower than in other cities, there isn’t pollution, it’s a safe city, noises are not excessive and you can go walking to most places...

Later, in the second half of the XX century, as the city's population started to increase, the small river was diverted from its course and some working neighborhoods such as Los Bloques, San Lázaro or San José Obrero were created out of the city walls. In theses neighborhoods low income families settled: in Los Bloques in small flats and In San José Obrero or San Lázaro in small single-family houses. And as a way of modernize the city, the old walls of the city were partially removed to build big buildings. A big neighborhood with linear distribution of straight streets and a some big avenues with trees was created outside the walls; I mean, Avenida Requejo, Avenida Príncipe de Asturias, Avenida Tres Cruces y Avenida Víctor Gallego with all its surrounding streets. A little apart from it the train station was built. Also the small universitary campus and the hospitals are settled in this area. But this expansion zone had a main residential purpose: no more than big buildings with lots of flats can be seen here. The main problems here are the traffic and the difficulty to park in these streets. On the contrary, by the other side of the river there have always been small single-familiar houses with a more anachronistic distribution of the streets.

A big residential area was created at the end of the XX century with big residential buildings: Las Viñas. As an anecdote, it’s worth mentioning that a great number of people that lived of agriculture from the villages of the province bought a flat here with the money received from the European Union grants. Also a residential neighborhood of big buildings with smaller flats was created on the other side of the railway: Peña Trevinca. And just by it, the only big supermarket in Zamora was built by the main road that goes across the city.

At the beginning of this century some residential neighborhoods as la Perla or Siglo XXI has been created offering the possibility to live in a big house to media-high economic class. Especially in Siglo XXI, the houses are bigger but the people is car-dependant because it’s out of Zamora and the public transport comes from time to time. But its pattern is clearly the one of a Garden City.

The conurbation village in Zamora par excellence is Morales del Vino: located 5 kilometers south of Zamora. Other conurbation villages are Moraleja del Vino, Villaralbo and Roales. The main problems affecting the outskirts of Zamora are the ones related with secondary schools and clinics, apart from dependence of a car to come to Zamora. Of course, the solution to these problems would be a good public transport between these villages and the city.

WORLD CITIES

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PHYSICAL EUROPE

SPAIN´S POPULATION IN 2015

Spain's population is unevenly distributed according to historical factors. Big cities like Madrid or Barcelona have a population density of 700inhabitants per square kilometer while rural areas have a population density of less than 50 inhabitants per square kilometer.

During the last centuries there have been some historical factors that have affected the distribution of Spain´s population: In the late 19^th century there was a population growth, and most of the people came to the industries of coastal and island regions. Later, in the 20^th (during the 1970s), there was an economic crisis that rose unemployment, making coastal areas lose much of their population. Also, there was a modernization of the countryside in the late 20th century, and the predominance of the tertiary sector consolidated the heavily populated areas of Madrid, the Mediterranean coast, Andalusia, Cantabria and the Canary Islands.

Socioeconomic and geographical factors also affect the population distribution, because nowadays, people are mostly located in areas where you can find a wide range of jobs and industries. And people, usually like to live in coastal areas with temperate climates.

Almost 60% of Spain's population is part of Andalusia, Catalonia and the Community of Madrid. Nevertheless, the majority of each province's population is located in their capitals.

ANALYZING AND DESCRIBING COUNTRY 1

This graph shows the structure of a society by sex, age at a given time and place. This pyramid we are analyzing shows the demographic structure of the Country 1 in the year 2012.

                   

Observing the sex ratio we can say that are born more boys than girls. We can also set that sex ratio matches at 50-54.  But when we look at the top of the pyramid it’s clear that women have a higher live expectancy, maybe as consequence of a healthier lifestyle of women.

This pyramid has concave sides and shows a high birth rate and also a high death rate. This means that it is an undeveloped country so their life expectancy is relatively short. As it is an expansive pyramid, this country is in stage 1.

Looking carefully at the pyramid we can see that it has a notch in the generation of 2003 -2009. It might be caused by wars, bad economic conditions or epidemics.

To decrease the high mortality rate in the Country, I think the government should improve some facts such as paying the families´ vaccines, or increasing the number of hospitals to reduce the deaths of young dependants. Also to increase the life expectancy the government should work on the good health habits of the population and, maybe, consider budget for pensions and retirement.

Life expectancy

Life Expectancy is the average of years that people from a specific place are supposed to live. The 10 countries with the highest life expectancy are Japan, Switzerland, Singapore, Australia, Spain, Iceland, Italy, Israel, France and Sweden and the 10 countries with the lowest one are Sierra Leone, Angola, Central African Republic, Chad, Côte d'Ivoire, Lesotho, Nigeria, Somalia, Cameroon and South Sudan. 

The cause of these huge gap in their life expectancy is that in the countries with more life expectancy people have medical assistance, and a better way of living; whilst the people of these countries of Africa cannot live because of the need of medicines and unfortunately they don’t have any food to eat and that´s why their life expectancy is under 60.

A brief summary of the factors affecting those differences are the access to natural resources, the quality of the sanity system of each country, the way of life, the economic power of people...