Conclusion

There are many things I learned from my block that better helped me understand how neighborhoods and cities develop and change.

My block was first developed, like most of the U District, where forests once stood. The nature we see now was planted after houses were constructed and so formed around the built environment. Transportation also played a large role in reshaping my block. As we learned in class, transportation networks can be hugely important for a city's development as it allows for efficiency over larger scales. However, their great structures can have large impacts on the surrounding environment, even being used as walls to form racial divides.

Finally, the pressures of increasing population will drive construction in previously unattractive locations. The noise pollution of the freeway and fast traffic made my block unappealing. However, as more people search for homes, new buildings are created even here to meet the demand. It is one of the city’s chief concerns to help this growth without becoming too confined. Finding places for people to live without having to push up against the uncomfortable borders of a city (internal and external) will allow growth without the side effects of, danger, increased cost, and unhappiness for its citizens. Through careful planning and smart use of modern technology, investments in better housing and infrastructure could allow Seattle to house as many as 1.3 million people in the same area if it could reach the same population density as a city like Tokyo.