Concrete Jungle Essay

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Growth from an economic and monetary standpoint is a wonderful asset. However, too much uncontrolled growth may evolve into an untamable hurricane of concrete and smog. This transformation has been occurring in specifically the San Bernardino-Riverside area near Los Angeles, California. In David Carle’s essay, “Sprawling Gridlock,” Carle mentions many permeating issues regarding the rapid growth of Southern California. The author’s purpose in the essay is to define the problem regarding the rampant expansion of urbanization and its ties within the lives of people in metropolitan areas. Carle’s major points that feature the problems within growth and urbanization are traffic congestion, land development, and repairing/expanding infrastructure. The correlation between motorways and the spread of urbanization has its roots dating back to the early twentieth century. The residents of Los Angeles were influenced by the Pacific Electric Trolley company to live in the country and work in the city. One-hundred and ten million people utilized the services of the trolley cars in 1924. However, the freedom that the automobile presented, the creation of government-funded highways, and the notion of rapid- transit overshadowed the beneficial services of the trolleys. The first freeway in California opened on December 30, 1940 and in the 1960s alone, four-hundred fifty miles of freeways were developed in the state. According to Carle, traffic congestion in Southern California began to peak in the 1990s and it still overwhelms the lives of drivers. The sprawling gridlock of everyday traffic boiled the blood of its victims to a point where a term was coined to define the symptoms of frustration while driving. Consequently, “road rage” became an unfortunate norm of society. The enlargement and construction

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