Year: 2004
Type: article
Abstract: The paper attempts an analysis of the Valley of Mexico Metropolitan Area –VMMA– (former Mexico City metropolitanArea) from those different perspectives that bear upon the process of urbanization and the economicand social challenges but, above, all those to any governance faced by this immense urban concentration.From that made of the physical process of urbanization, the signal fact of the growth of capital-shortsquatter settlements is pointed up along with a patent trend towards metropolitan sprawl and conurbationdevelopment leading to the creation of a so called «megalopolis» (a metropolis of metropolis) the which is alreadyin the process of covering the whole of central region of Mexico, this representing no less than 6 federalstates (Hidalgo, Mexico, Morelos, Puebla, Tlaxcala and the Federal District) and embracing more than30 million inhabitants (2000). It is also here argued that VMMA is facing huge economic and social challenges.The former the upshot of a lessening industrial growth along with the transforming of the metropolitaneconomy into a services one, this creating a split along the lines of ,on one side, a modern global services economyand on the other informal low income activities, these latter being marked by lessening returns overthe last ten years these leading in turn to squatter settlements, urban disorder and all ills else .The authorfinishes by blaming the blight of weak government and a feeble metropolitan administration for the host ofills borne by VMMA , these the outcome of a lack of a political willingness and an insufficient understandingof the problems involved on the part of both the government of the Federal District and the State ofMexico. Although these bodies are said to share responsibility for half of the metropolitan population andurban area, they exhibit marked differences when it comes to financial planning and the many sorts of resourcesnecessary to promote the same.
Author: Alfonso Iracheta Cenecorta
Institution: Universidad Autónoma del Estado de México
Language: Spanish
Topic: Latin American Urban Studies
Subfield: Urban Studies
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W36374576