Home / Physical Landscape / History / Transportation / Issues / Future / Bibliography

Population Problems

In the Madina and oder working class quarters, population densities have grown over 260,000. THe Population ahs swelled from both natrul progressiona nd migration. Between 1975-1985 there was a 90% population growth.

Other causes for an increased population have been the decreese in infant mortality rate with better medicine and facilities. Therefore ther is also a rising life expectancy. There has also been a trend to Americanize and more people are adopting single family households instead of living with the comunity as had been done in the past.

Cairo had a rise in density of 65,000 per square mile in the mid 70's. That is greater than that of NYC even though in Cairo, aprtments do not go over 4 or 5 stories.

They are building northern suburbs to help combat population built at the expense of the rich fertile land of the Delta.

There ways that the people of Cairo combat the loss is that land is bought up from farms and turned into illigel settlements. Even though it is illega;. They dont have to provide water or services for them, and it helps allievate the city. by turning their cheek it helps them just as much ase illegal settlements.

Other ways to combat housing problems is to add floors to existing buildings and to subdivide older ones to create smaller spaces. In the new towns, highrises are now more prevalent. People also live on rooftops and in the tomb cities. This solves the problem for much of the lower class.e rooftops are amzing becasue an entire urban culture has developed on them in the poorer sections. There is even a considerable amount of them who keep live stock up there as well. As long as they do not build permanent structures, the government does not have a problem with them. There are an estimated 1/2 million people living on the roofs as of 1990. What is fascinating is that both these communities, with such large numbers also lack such basic services as water. In fact many of the old residents do not have such basic necesities as piped water or electricity.

Home / Physical Landscape / History / Transportation / Issues / Future / Bibliography