ABSTRACT
Urbanization is one of the most profound cultural and ecological phenomena that have been identified, a leading cause of biodiversity decline, and is projected to increase in the foreseeable future. Understanding urbanization’s influence is hindered without an acknowledgment that the same term can mean different things to different groups. The two most fundamental components to a definition of what is urban are population size and population density. In addition to population size and density, impervious surface and anthropogenic land use are urban indicators and important ecological drivers that have an influence beyond the city limits. Most research on how urbanization affects organisms have been conducted on birds, plants, and terrestrial arthropods. Urban ecology is not just for ecologists – its findings will be used by planners and architects in the design of cities of tomorrow. Cities need and deserve study – they are ecosystems of our own making and part of an inadvertent global experiment on design and sustainability.
