Megalopolis

megalopolis (mĕgəlŏp`lĭs) [Gr.,=great city], a group of densely populated metropolitan areas that combine to form an urban complex. It was first used in its modern sense by Jean Gottman (1957) to describe the huge urban area along the eastern seaboard of the United States from Boston to Washington, D.C. According to Gottman, it resulted from changes in work and social habits.

---

megalopolis

A major conurbation. Generally the term describes any densely populated social and economic entity encompassing two or more cities and the increasingly urbanized space between them. It particularly came to describe the urbanized region of the northeastern U.S. that arose in the second half of the 20th century. Stretching between the metropolitan areas of Boston on the northeast to Washington, D.C., on the southwest, it included the metropolitan areas of New York City, Philadelphia, and Baltimore, Md. The name, meaning “great city,” was coined by French geographer Jean Gottmann.

---

Megalopolis

Ancient city, central Peloponnese, Greece. Occupying both banks of the Helisson River, it was founded in 371–368 BC by Epaminondas of Thebes as the seat of the Arcadian League. Attacked several times by Sparta, it joined the Achaean League in 234 BC. It declined rapidly after being plundered by Cleomenes III of Sparta in 223 BC, and by the 2nd century AD it lay in ruins. The nearby modern town lies in a rich lignite-bearing region that fuels thermal power stations.

---

megalopolis, megapolis

A thickly populated urban region usually consisting of one or more large cities and surrounding suburbs.

---

Megalopolis 

a term signifying a group of conurbations; derived from the name of the ancient Greek city of Megalopolis, which arose as a result of the merger of more than 35 settlements of Arcadia.

The megalopolis is a highly urbanized, spontaneously evolving form of urban settlement in a number of highly developed capitalist countries; it has resulted from a high concentration of population. (Population density in megalopolises of the United States is 2.7 persons per hectare and in Japan, Great Britain, and the Federal Republic of Germany, 8-10 persons per hectare.) Basic features of the megalopolis are linear nature of construction, extended mainly along transport highways; general polycentric structure, caused by the interaction of large cities situated relatively close to one another; and disruption of the ecological balance between the activity of man and the environment. The term was first used to signify a continuous urban sprawl (more than 1,000 km long and in places up to 200 km wide) along the Atlantic coast of the USA—the conurbations of Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington (population, 40 million). Some of the largest megalopolises that are now being formed are Southern California (12 million), Tokyo-Osaka in Japan (55 million), Rhine-Ruhr in the Federal Republic of Germany (10 million), and London-Liverpool in Great Britain (30 million).

REFERENCES

Gottmann, J. “Megalopolis ili urbanizatsiia severo-vostochnogo poberezh’ia SShA.” Geografiia gorodov. Moscow, 1965. (Translated from English.)
Pokshishevskii, V. V., and V. M. Gokhman. “Problema giperurbanizatsii v razvitykh kapitalisticheskikh stranakh i ee geograficheskie aspekty.” Nauchnye problemy geografii naseleniia. Moscow, 1967.
Cutler, J. “Megalopolis: Intermetropolitan Coalescence.” Journal of Geography, 1969, vol. 68, no. 8.

F. M. LISTENGURT