City Life Dbq

According to Edward Glaeser, there are many benefits of living in the city as opposed to living in the suburbs or other places, such as enabling creativity and productivity, are more friendly to the environment. One of these benefits he wrote about is that “cities magnify human strengths” (Document 2). He explains how they attract talent and improve it based on competition which allows for social and economic mobility. He also explains how cities “use less motor vehicles” (Document 1). The reason he says this is present in cities, people walk on foot a lot more, which reduces the need for motor vehicle such as cars or motorcycles, which release a lot of Co2 and other greenhouse gases that are harmful to the environment. Glaeser also writes

how cities “spur innovation by facilitating face-to-face interaction” (Document 2). The reason this occurs is because when people talk face to face, they come up with new ideas that can be helpful to the people who live there, especially since humans are such social creatures. Therefore, living in a city can not only provide benefits for you, but also for the environment and overall innovation and productivity in the world. While there are many advantages to living in an urban area, there are also many things that can cause the uprise and downfall of city.
There are many factors that contribute to the success or decline of a city, and there are very many of these factors to take into consideration when looking at the history of a city like Timbuktu.

One thing that can lead to the uprise of a city is the ability to “attract people and enable them to collaborate” (Document 3). The reason this would help a city thrive is because when people are making inventions to make the city more efficient, life in the city becomes more enjoyable and then it improves the economy of the city. Another thing that helps cities thrive is a good education system (Document 3). The reason this helps is because when people in the city are well educated, then they are able to come up with better ideas to help the city become a better place and improve living conditions there, which would make for a more successful city. One thing that could cause the decline of a city would be “leaving empty houses for sale” (Document 4). This is because it lowers the economy of the city and other prices of homes which will impact the city in a negative way. This also may cause people to move out of the city. Another thing that could cause the decline of a city would be something called the “edifice complex”, where the city thinks that “new office buildings and sports arenas and transport systems will help the city thrive” (3). The reason this does not help the city is because when there are just buildings sitting around not being occupied, they lose value and

the overall value of the buildings in the city go down, driving people away from the city. Many of these traits have been evident in real life scenarios, and very much so in the rise and fall of the city of Detroit. When a city has more of the traits of a thriving city than a declining city, they will grow and become a much more successful and productive place.
Timbuktu had tons of advantages helping it become the superpower it once was.

One of these things was that they had so many “wells containing sweet water” (Evidence A). Since Timbuktu had so much fresh drinking water, they were not only able to support themselves, but also the animals and crops they had. Another advantage Timbuktu had over other cities was that it was in such a central location in Africa (Evidence B). This helped Timbuktu tremendously as they had tons of items that went through them during their trade routes. These products included gold, ivory, copper, cloth, horses, swords, glass, brass, ceramics and many models. The reason this would help them is that they have many ways of spending their money that they make from trading to help their lives easier on a day to day basis, making survival much easier and the ability for the city to grow. Another edge Timbuktu had on other cities around the world was its diversity. People from all over, such as “black African farmers and river people, as well as white Arab and Berber merchants” (Evidence C) populated the city, which made it a place for people to go and live, no matter what their background is. This encouraged many scholars to go study in Timbuktu, which made Timbuktu a major center for learning, especially in the studies of Islam, due to its high Muslim population. A byproduct of Timbuktu being a learning hub of the world, their hand written books became a lucrative product for them to sell, due to

their extremely capable and intelligent citizens. There were tons of things that allowed Timbuktu to become such as successful city, but all empires must fall at some point. Timbuktu’s decline had many contributing factors, but one of the main reasons for its decline was Morocco’s invasion of Timbuktu.
After Morocco invaded Timbuktu, they lost their control over the gold market (Evidence F). This was a very large issue because gold was what made them the most money, and is also the main reason Morocco invaded them in the first place; to control the gold trade. Because Timbuktu’s gold trade was their main source of income, this had a hugely negative effect on their economy. Also as a result of the Moroccan invasions was that “political unity fell apart due to Moroccan invasion in west African empires” (Evidence G). This resulted in administrative centers being left, like schools being abandoned, and how cultivated land was left to waste as the people fled from Timbuktu. This would negatively affect a city in the sense that it would decrease the rate of productivity in the city, with people not learning to come up with revolutionary new ideas or farming to create food. Not only did Timbuktu lose a lot of its income by losing the gold trade and having people abandon their farms, a “series of revolts and civil wars broke out as the people of former west African empires developed smaller states” (Evidence G). The reason this was an issue was that this made what trading they had left much harder. It disrupted other trading markets like salt, which was now a large source of income for the city without the gold trade. While Timbuktu may have had other factors such as drought and disease, one of their biggest reasons for downfall was the Moroccan invasions of Timbuktu which really weakened the city as a whole and caused the decline of Timbuktu. As well as the Moroccan invasions of Timbuktu, another large reason for their fall was how trade routes had changed.
Over the years from the 14th to the 18th centuries, the trade routes around the globe had drastically changed and was another large reason for the fall of Timbuktu. The trade routes around 1300 were very concentrated in North Africa and southwest Asia, which would make Timbuktu a very popular trading center. However, the trade routes by 1750 had drastically changed, with trans Atlantic trade being much more popular than trade routes over land (Evidence I). This would have been a big issue for Timbuktu and its economy. Before, they were a central trading hub, but now since trade is all over the world, and now especially after losing the gold trade, they don’t have any great ways to make money from trading. Adding on to the idea of trans Atlantic trade, many cities close to the Atlantic thrived, while others far from it declined in population. From the 1500s to the 1800s, cities like London, Paris, Amsterdam, and Lisbon gained in population, compared to Venice, who lost population over the same time period (Evidence J). As is evident from the location of these cities, cities that were easily accessible from the Atlantic Ocean grew and thrived, while cities that were not easily accessible from the Atlantic Ocean, like Timbuktu and Venice, declined in population. Not only was it just the trade routes that changed, but also other countries were now dominating the trade industry and exploring. These countries included France, Spain, and England (Evidence H). Not only was it hard to reach Timbuktu from the Atlantic Ocean, other countries were providing fierce competition. Since countries like Spain were exploring wester parts of Africa, they most likely put trading posts in those areas, which would also stop people from traveling inland to Timbuktu to trade. As the world and the way it traded started to change, Timbuktu was not able to keep up with the rest of the world, as its once beneficial location now was somewhat of a disadvantage.
Looking at the history of cities like Timbuktu and Detroit, there are lots of factors that contribute to s cities success or failure. As we have seen with the sudden change in success of these cities from rise to fall, these factors can change very quickly and have a huge impact on not only that city and its economy, but the cities surrounding it as well.