The results of landscape analysis revealed that the city experienced fragmented urban growth process, mostly towards the outlying areas; while the urban core experienced relative compact growth.
In the light of fragmented post-apartheid urban development and an increasingly unequal South African society, this paper discusses the question of visionary residential developments which already exist such as Cosmo City can provide an inclusionary remedy to socio-spatial division, or if they should rather be perceived as a new form of spatial division.
We also show that, even in the absence of a particular landscape feature or any exogenous source of amenities, fragmented urban sprawl is a natural development pattern for a city surrounded by a spatially varying agricultural environment.
Urban development often results in diminished forest cover and severely fragmented landscapes, but most research on effects of urban development has been focused on densely forested regions and has not distinguished remnant from recently established forest cover.
For example, urban development in Atlanta, Georgia, is relatively fragmented and the resampling results in a substantial reduction of the total area (from 2.0% of the study area in the original 30-m grid to 0.94% in the 1-km grid).
The results show that NUPs follow very specific and differentiated spatial patterns, namely, compact in Bogota, irregular but attached to the urban core in Lima, and highly fragmented and diffuse in Santiago, with different material expression of informal urban development as well.
Present-day Accra is characterized by fragmented economic and residential geographies that if left unchecked will undermine sustainable urban development.
The study area is comprised of more than 1264 km, encompassing large regions of continuous habitat with minimal urban development (Fig. 1, PMSP, MCSP, and TSP), as well as highly fragmented areas that extend east through Los Angeles (Fig. 1, areas east of the I-405).
So how is urban development different?
Moreover, it provides a sense of cohesion to this city's currently fragmented urban space.
