The Arab City and the Challenges of Urbanization in Changing Communities: Greater Cairo as a Model

Abstract

Greater Cairo has expanded through consecutive conurbations consistent with the theory of spatial cycle, by population decrease due to aging families and buildings. A nozzle present at the center, rising at the edges and decreasing towards the margins, characterizes its density. Elites moved to the suburbs outside Greater Cairo in successive leaps, whereas slums expanded around the major urban cluster. Such explosive red areas benefited the January 25 Revolution through demonstrations and the disabling of the Center. The study recommends a periodic delocalization of overcrowded areas in new communities compatible with their cultures, a resistance to the establishment of new elite communities, and the displacement of administrative activities from the heart to a new administrative capital.