Urban Geography Syllabus and Handouts

Click on the following weekly links to download handout documents and readings associated with this course.

Week 1: Urbanization and Urban Geography
Below are some basic documents for this course.

• GEOG 4210 Syllabus (Undergraduate Urban Geography Course)
• GEOG 4210 Referencing Document
• GEOG 4210 Report Expectations
• GEOG 4210 Research Questions Guidelines

• GEOG 4210 Writing Expectations
• GEOG 5210 Syllabus (Graduate Urban Geography Course)
• GEOG 5210 Report Expectations
• Article: Global Cities Revisited
• Article: Transit Deserts in Texas Cities
• Note-Taking Handout (from Stanford University's Center for Teaching and Learning)

Week 2: City Origins and Growth

• Video Questions: Guns, Germs, and Steel - Out of Eden

Week 3: Cities in America - The Story to 1945

• Video Questions: New York, The Country and the City

Week 4: Cities in America - 1945 to Present

• Esri StoryMap: Comparing Past and Present, Washington DC Today and in 1851
• Article: How Freeways Transformed America's Cities

Week 5: Foundations of Urban Form

• Video Questions: New York, The City of Tomorrow

Week 6: Changing Metropolitan Form

• Video Questions: Nowhere Fast!
• Growth Rings: US Population Change Maps by Metro Area
• Cool Climate Network: Carbon Footprint Maps
• Article: Decline of Detroit
• Article: The Shrinking City of Chicago
• Article: Taking Down Freeways Article

• Article: Mapping the Lasting Effects of Redlining
• Article: Imagining a City Without its Public Transportation

Week 7: How Neighborhoods Change

• Video: 400 Years on One New York City Block
• Article: Tarrant County Life Cycles

• Reference Document: Esri Tapestry Segmentation Reference Guide. (This is one example of an actual social area analysis tool)

Week 8: Urban Community Planning

• Esri StoryMap: Public GIS Services and Access to Community Information in the Salt Lake City Region
• Esri StoryMap: East New York Neighborhood Plan

Week 9: Participation in Community Planning

• Article: Arnstein's "Ladder of Citizen Participation"

Week 10: Regulation and Development

• Denton Zoning Districts

Week 11: Development of Regions and Metropolitan Areas

• Minneapolis-St. Paul Regional Planning Page (explore the "Regional Development Framework" and "Thrive MSP 2040" Links)

• The Regional Plan Association's "Megaregions" Page

• The Regional Plan Association's Main Page (the RPA is a New York-focused planning organization)
• Video Questions:  Chicago - Farming on the Edge (the Chicago segment we will view begins around the 12:00 mark)

Week 12: Planning for Small Towns

• Booneville Case Study Introduction
• Small Town Case Study: Megargel, TX
• Small Town Case Study: Endicott, WA
• Small Town Case Study: Marathon, TX

Week 13: Video Case Study and Project Work Week

• Video Questions: New York, The Center of the World

Week 14: Presentations

• Presentation Schedule

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