The significant industrial development to the east in Indiana is not included. The Chicago region, as defined here, lies in the northeastern corner of the state of Illinois, and is made up of Cook, DuPage, Kane, Lake, McHenry, and Will counties (seeįigure 11-1). This chapter examines the changes in land use associated with the historical evolution of economic development, population growth, and environmental interactions in the city of Chicago and its surrounding area. Indeed, Chicago has been aptly characterized by Cronon (1991) as “Nature's Metropolis.
Chicago has become one of the world's great industrial, financial services, and transportation centers because of the interaction between its urban core, with its vast array of services, and some of the world's most productive farmland, which stretches several hundred kilometers from the southwestern corner of Lake Michigan where Chicago is situated. Over the years the natural landscape of the Chicago region in the American Midwest has changed dramatically, from near-pristine prairie and forests in the pre-settlement period of the early 1800s, to an agriculture-dominated landscape by 1880, to the major metropolis of the twenty-first century. Simmons Department of Geography, Michigan State University Mills Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern UniversityĬynthia S. 11 Evolution of the Chicago Landscape: Population Dynamics, Economic Development, and Land Use ChangeĮdwin S.
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