Challenges of Urbanization

The Challenges of Urbanization

The People: why were the three groups below drawn to cities in the Northeast and Midwest? 

1. Immigrants

Immigrants were drawn to cities in the Northeast and Midwest.  This was because cities often had the most amount of jobs for unskilled laborers, such as jobs in mills or factories.  Also, immigrants often arrived in or near cities, so they were the most convenient places to live.  Another reason was that cities were often the cheapest places to live.  That was why immigrants were drawn to cities in the Northeast and Midwest.

2. Farmers
Farmers were drawn to cities in the Northeast and Midwest because they could no longer farm and needed jobs.  Many devices were invented during the late 1800s and early 1900s that allowed a few people to do work that originally involved many people, like the steal plow and McCormick reaper.  This meant that many farmers were now out of jobs and, as mentioned above, there were plenty of jobs in the cities.  So former farmers were drawn to cities.

3. African-Americans 
African-Americans were drawn to cities because of the conditions in the South.  There was a lot of racial violence in the South, so African-Americans moved to the North, where there had not been slaves for a while longer than int he South, to escape the racial violence.  However, there was stil discrimination and segration in the North, yet it was better than in the South, so African-Americans were drawn to cities int he Northeast and Midwest.

The Problems: What was done in response to the following five problems? 

4. Lack of safe and efficient transportation
Improvements in mass transit, systems made to transport large amounts of people, were created to address the issue of the lack of safe and efficient transportation.  For example, underground subways were installed in Boston and electric street cars in San Francisco. The population was growing too quickly for mass transit to come to be any help with the problem.

5. Unsafe drinking water
First public waterworks were created to address the issue of unsafe drinking water.  When the water continued to cause diseases, such as typhoid fever and cholera, some cities because to filter the water or use chlorination. However, there was constantly the issue of those in the city not having the plumbing that would make access to this water possible and in some places the water was still not safe.

6. Lack of sanitation 
There was a large problem about lack of sanitation in cities.  To solve this problem, cities hired "scavengers".  These people would sweep the streets, clean outhouses, and collect garbage.  Yet, there were often issues with these jobs being down correctly.  Many cities created sanitation departments and sewer systems by 1900.  That was mainly what cities did to address the issue of sanitation, or lack of it.

7. Fire Hazards
Units of firefighters were created to address the issue of fires in cities.  At first, these were volunteer groups, but these people were not always available, so the first full time fire department was created in 1853 in Cincinnati, Ohio.  Another response to fire hazards was having new buildings built with bricks, stone, and concrete instead of wood, which is very easy to burn.  That was how fire hazards were addressed.

8. Crime

The first police force was created to address crime in New York city in 1844.  These police units were created to address the issues of crimes such as thieves and pickpockets in cities.  However, these forces were often too small to actually stop crime, but were created in response to the crime.