Megacity In Depth
A megacity of over 10 million people grows faster than its housing and services can keep up. Learn how one develops - its site, its growth, its opportunities and challenges - and how top-down and bottom-up strategies try to make it liveable.
Revise this, the fun way
Play it interactively, earn XP and build a streak, free.
Start revising freeWhat you'll cover
A city of over ten million 🏙️
A **megacity** is an urban area with a population of more than **10 million** people. Many of the fastest-growing ones are in developing or emerging countries - Lagos in Nigeria is one example. A megacity grows so fast that its housing, jobs and services struggle to keep up. This module follows one in depth: where it sits, why it grows, the **opportunities and challenges** that growth brings, and the strategies used to make it more **sustainable**.
Three words for where and how 🗺️
To describe a city, geographers use three precise terms. Keep them apart - the exam rewards using the right one.
Match each term to its meaning 🔗
- Site
- Situation
- Structure
- The physical land the city is built on
- Its position relative to coast, routes and region
- The way land use is arranged from centre to edge
Site or situation? 📍
A megacity is described as being built on "low, flat land around a coastal lagoon". Which term does that description give?
- Site - the physical land the city stands on
- Situation - its position relative to other places
- Structure - how its land use is arranged
- Growth - how fast it is expanding
Why megacities grow so fast 📈
Two forces drive the explosive growth of a megacity:\n\n- **Rural-urban migration** - people move in from the countryside. **Push** factors drive them out (rural poverty, few jobs, poor services); **pull** factors draw them in (jobs, schools, hospitals). - **Natural increase** - migrants are mostly **young adults**, so many children are born in the city, and the population keeps climbing. Together these can add enormous numbers every year - far faster than housing and services can be built.
What pulls people in? 🧲
Select the TWO PULL factors that attract people from the countryside into a megacity.
- More jobs and higher wages in factories and services
- Better schools, hospitals and services
- Drought and failing harvests in the countryside
- Rural poverty and a lack of farmland
How the city fills up 🪜
An interactive activity.
Two sides of rapid growth ⚖️
Fast growth is not simply good or bad - it brings real opportunities and serious challenges at the same time, and the exam wants both.
How life varies across the city 🏘️
- Housing
- Employment
- Services
- Environment
- Planned houses in one area, self-built shacks in another
- Secure office jobs for some, insecure street trading for others
- Piped water and electricity in some districts, little in others
- Clean, green suburbs versus polluted, waste-strewn edges
Spot the bottom-up strategies ✅
Select the TWO strategies that are BOTTOM-UP - small-scale, community-led ways to improve life in a megacity.
- A site-and-service scheme where residents build homes with materials and land provided
- Small loans (microfinance) to help local people start businesses
- A government building a city-wide mass-transit rail network
- The state building a huge new planned district from scratch
Make the city liveable 🧭
An interactive activity.
The summary 📝
A megacity has over _____ million people. It grows through rural-urban _____, driven by push and pull factors, plus natural increase. Rapid growth brings jobs and services but also housing shortages and _____ settlements. Large government schemes are _____ strategies, while small community-led schemes such as site-and-service are _____.
Your turn ✍️
An interactive activity.
The grade-9 checklist 🌟
Two things lift a megacity answer into the top band. First, make sure your named city really is a **megacity** - over **10 million** people. A smaller major city will not answer the question. Second, when you describe how life varies across the city, organise it **thematically** - compare **housing, employment, services and environment** between the richer and poorer parts of the *same* city. And when you judge strategies, remember the strongest answer usually shows that **top-down and bottom-up work best together**, each solving the problems it is suited to.