Why do so many people in Singapore live in urban settlements?

Answer 1

Simple Answer: Improvements in transportation and highways have led to urban sprawl Detailed Answer: Urban sprawl describes the expansion of human populations away from central urban areas into previously remote and rural areas, particularly resulting in low-density communities whose establishments are not in easy walking distance of each other. Traditional urban landuse models (ie, monocentric model) suggests that economic activity should be concentrated at a city centre (lowest transport cost). As such, one may predict that offices are located nearest to the centre, followed by manufacturers, followed by residents and lastly agricultural-use. This is because the need to reduce transportation cost falls, with each progressive type of land use. However, many countries are becoming less monocentric (ie, landuse patterns as described earlier are not that observable anymore). This is because the development of transportation and highways (ie, a circular highway around the perimeter of the island) has reduced the need to cluster around the city centre to reduce transport costs. One could use Google map, and you can see the circular highway im Singapore! The result is residents moving away the centre to outer areas as long as it is near around other these transportation nodes. This is known as urban sprawl. Singapore has tried to reduce urban sprawl through careful land use planning to prevent low population density in certain areas. As such, the effects should be less severe.