Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
8.2. The challenge of governance in fragmented metropolitan areas
American metropolitan areas are often a mosaic of incorporated areas
(municipalities). In contrast to the European model, this fragmentation is not a
legacy of the historic rural settlement, but a phenomenon which is consubstantial
with the process of urban growth.
Incorporation is a major event in the civil life of a local community. When the
population of a city decides to incorporate, it drafts a charter, specifies elected
bodies, including a city council, and often a mayor. Elevated to the level of
municipality, the city gains autonomy. The city votes on its own taxes and manages
a budget that enables it to fund its own public services: schools, water supply and
sanitation, public transport. The commissions (boards) that govern these districts are
elected bodies with broad decision-making authority. Only a fraction of the United
States territory is incorporated, mainly in urban areas. There are nearly 36,000
incorporated areas covering 368,655 km² in the 48 conterminous states -
approximately 5% of the territory - according to the 2000 census. The geography of
incorporated areas is changing as local communities developing in once sparsely
populated areas can easily decide to join a neighboring incorporated area at any
time.
Similarly, a city can annex land which is not incorporated if a majority of voters
living in the territory to be annexed do not object. Annexation is the second unique
mechanism of local public administration in the United States. It is also eventually
possible for an incorporated area to be annexed by a neighboring incorporated town
on the condition that a majority of resident voters agrees. City centers thus have a
certain degree of elasticity, to use a concept popularized by David Rusk [RUS 03].
Observers agree, however, that incorporation has taken precedence over annexation
in the 20th century. Fragmentation of the structures of governance in urbanized and
metropolitan areas has become a tool for social exclusion in its own right.
Gradually, suburbs are incorporated to resist the annexation attempts of the city
center. The municipal boundaries of the largest cities on the Atlantic coast have not
changed in over a century. The consolidation of 1898 was the last extension of New
York City boundaries. According to David Rusk, the metropolises of the West and
South have retained more flexibility, as shown in the example of Houston, Texas.
This comes in a part from more recent urbanization and the existence of large tracts
of unincorporated territory in the heart of metropolitan areas.
Suburban incorporation is tantamount to territorial selfishness. Prosperous
residential communities, in an attempt to avoid high taxes and city center easements,
while retaining control over permitted land uses, frequently adopt incorporation as
