Geography · Unit 15

Cities and Urbanisation

The growth of towns and cities

More than half the world's population now lives in cities, a threshold crossed only recently and still moving. This unit is about that shift and what it does to the places absorbing it.

It covers settlement patterns, how cities are structured internally, the growth of megacities, and the challenges - housing, transport, informal settlement, services - that arrive when growth outpaces planning.

This unit breaks down into 20 short steps and 120 questions, starting at difficulty 1 and building to 3. Below you can see exactly what it covers, how the path is structured, and worked examples with explanations.

Steps: 20
Questions: 120
Difficulty: 1-3

What this unit covers

Urbanisation
Megacities
Settlement Patterns
City Structure
Urban Challenges

Where this fits

Follows Population and Migration. Connects to The Industrial Revolution, where rapid urbanisation begins.

Where people slip

Urbanisation is the change in the share of people living in cities, not the number. A country can add city dwellers while urbanising slowly, or urbanise fast with a small population.

How the unit is structured

Cities and Urbanisation runs as 20 short steps that unlock in order. 15 are practice rounds and 5 are challenge rounds that pull together everything before them. Questions start at difficulty 1 and climb to 3 as you progress.

Step 1 · easierStep 20 · harder

Challenge rounds

Example questions

30 real questions from this unit, with the answer and the reason behind it, grouped by what they practise. There are 120 in the unit altogether.

City Structure

Build the sentenceLevel 1
1. Build the sentence about the middle of a city.
Answer: The city centre is called the CBD
The centre of a city is called the CBD, or central business district.
Multiple choiceLevel 1
2. What is the CBD of a city?
- The central business district, with shops and offices
- The area of parks and forests
- The underground sewers
- The airport runway
The CBD (central business district) is the busy centre of a city, full of shops and offices.
Fill the blankLevel 2
3. The busy centre of a city, full of shops and offices, is often called the city centre or the ____.
- CBDcorrect
- suburb
- hamlet
- desert
CBD stands for central business district, the heart of a city.
Choose all that applyLevel 3
4. Which features are typical of the Central Business District? Select all that apply.
- High land values and rentscorrect
- Many shops, offices, and services
- Large open fields and farms
- The city's cheapest family housing
The CBD has the highest land values and is packed with shops, offices, and services rather than housing or farmland.
Fact or fibLevel 3
5. In Rio de Janeiro, wealthy neighbourhoods often sit near the coast while many favelas cling to steep hillsides.
Answer: True
Rio shows strong segregation, with richer districts near the beaches and poorer favelas built up the surrounding hillsides.
Match the pairsLevel 3
6. Match each urban zone to a feature you would typically expect there.
Answer: Central Business District = Department stores and offices; Inner city = Older terraced housing; Suburbs = Semi-detached family homes; Rural-urban fringe = Retail parks and open land
Each zone in the city has its own characteristic land use, from offices in the CBD to open space at the fringe.

Megacities

Fill the blankLevel 1
7. Delhi, one of the world's biggest megacities, is the capital region of ____.
- Indiacorrect
- Brazil
- France
- Canada
Delhi is a giant megacity in India.
Fact or fibLevel 2
8. The number of megacities in the world has grown a lot since 1975.
Answer: True
There were only a handful of megacities in 1975, but there are now more than thirty as urbanisation has accelerated.
Guess the numberLevel 2
9. How many million people must a city have to be called a megacity?
Answer: 10 million people
A megacity is defined as having a population of more than 10 million people.
Match the pairsLevel 2
10. Match each megacity to the country it is in.
Answer: Tokyo = Japan; Delhi = India; Shanghai = China; Cairo = Egypt
Tokyo is in Japan, Delhi in India, Shanghai in China and Cairo in Egypt.
Build the sentenceLevel 3
11. Build a true sentence about where most megacities are found today.
Answer: Most megacities are found in developing countries
Most megacities are now located in developing countries, where urbanisation is happening fastest.
Choose all that applyLevel 3
12. Which of these are typical global functions of a world city like London or New York? Select all that apply.
- Headquarters of many multinational companiescorrect
- A major stock exchange and financial marketscorrect
- Home to international organisations and embassiescorrect
- Producing most of the world's grain and food
World cities act as command centres for global business, finance and international affairs, hosting company headquarters, financial markets and international organisations.

Settlement Patterns

Choose all that applyLevel 2
13. Which of these were good reasons to build a settlement in a certain place long ago?
- Near fresh watercorrect
- On flat landcorrect
- Easy to defendcorrect
- Far away from any resources
Early people chose sites near fresh water, on flat land, easy to defend and close to resources.
Fill the blankLevel 2
14. Flat land was popular for settlements because it is easier to ____ houses and roads on.
- buildcorrect
- swim
- fly
- sail
Flat land makes it much easier to build houses, roads and farms.
Match the pairsLevel 2
15. Match each thing early settlers looked for to why it helped.
Answer: A river = Fresh water to drink; Flat land = Easy to build on; A hilltop = Easier to defend; A nearby forest = Wood for building and fires
Settlers looked for water, flat land, defence and resources like wood when choosing a site.
Multiple choiceLevel 2
16. Why were many of the first settlements built next to rivers?
- To have water to drink and usecorrect
- To be as far from water as possible
- To avoid meeting any other people
- To stay in total darkness
Early settlements grew near rivers because people needed water to drink, wash and grow crops.
Build the sentenceLevel 3
17. Build a sentence describing one way that sustainable cities try to cut pollution.
Answer: Sustainable cities use public transport to cut pollution
Sustainable cities such as Curitiba in Brazil use good public transport to reduce car use and pollution.
Put in orderLevel 3
18. Put these stages of urban change in the order they typically appeared in many developed countries, from earliest to most recent.
Answer: Urbanisation -> Suburbanisation -> Counter-urbanisation -> Re-urbanisation
Cities first grew through urbanisation, then spread through suburbanisation, then lost people through counter-urbanisation, before re-urbanisation drew people back to renewed centres.

Urban Challenges

Multiple choiceLevel 1
19. Which of these is a common problem in big, busy cities?
- Traffic jams and congestioncorrect
- Having too few people
- Having no buildings at all
- Having too much empty space
Heavy traffic and congestion are common challenges in large cities.
Picture questionLevel 1
20. 🚗 This picture shows a road packed with cars that can barely move. What is this city problem called?
- Traffic congestioncorrect
- A rainforest
- A desert
- A harvest
Too many vehicles causing jams is called traffic congestion.
Choose all that applyLevel 2
21. Which of these are challenges that fast-growing cities often face?
- Traffic congestioncorrect
- Air pollutioncorrect
- A shortage of housingcorrect
- Too much fresh, clean air
Growing cities often struggle with traffic, air pollution, housing shortages and waste.
Fill the blankLevel 2
22. When a city does not have enough homes for everyone, it has a housing ____.
- shortagecorrect
- garden
- holiday
- sunrise
A housing shortage means there are not enough homes for the number of people.
Odd one outLevel 2
23. Three of these are problems that cities face. Which one is the odd one out?
- Clean, quiet, empty streets
- Traffic jams
- Air pollution
- Piles of waste
Traffic, pollution and waste are city problems, but clean, quiet, empty streets are not.
Fact or fibLevel 3
24. An eco-city aims to reduce its environmental impact using ideas like renewable energy, recycling, and good public transport.
Answer: True
Eco-cities are designed to be more sustainable by cutting waste and pollution through green energy, recycling, and public transport.

Urbanisation

Fill the blankLevel 1
25. An urban area is a ____ area, full of buildings, roads and people.
- built-upcorrect
- empty
- farming
- underwater
Urban areas are built-up places like towns and cities, unlike open rural areas.
Multiple choiceLevel 1
26. What is a city?
- A large, crowded settlement where many people live and work
- A small group of farms in the countryside
- A single very tall building
- An area where no people live at all
A city is a large, densely populated settlement where many people live and work.
Choose all that applyLevel 2
27. Which of these are common reasons people move from the countryside to cities?
- More jobs to choose fromcorrect
- Better schools and educationcorrect
- More hospitals and servicescorrect
- More wild forests to explore
People often move to cities for jobs, education and services, a process called rural-to-urban migration.
Fact or fibLevel 2
28. More than half of all the people in the world now live in towns and cities.
Answer: True
Since around 2007, over half of the world's population has lived in urban areas.
Build the sentenceLevel 3
29. Build a sentence describing an integrated transport system.
Answer: Integrated transport links different modes so people can transfer easily
An integrated transport system links different modes, such as buses, trains and trams, so passengers can transfer between them easily.
Guess the numberLevel 3
30. In about which year did the world's urban population first grow larger than its rural population?
Answer: 2008 the year
Around 2008 the world passed the point where more than half of all people lived in urban areas for the first time.

Where these questions come from. Each unit starts as a plan of the concepts it should cover and the difficulty it should span. Questions are written against that plan with AI assistance, then checked by a validator that rejects anything without a single defensible answer, an explanation, or plausible wrong options. How we write questions sets out the whole process, and corrections are fixed in the bank and reach the site and the app the same day.

How you practise

This unit mixes 17 different question formats, so you are recalling and applying rather than recognising the same layout every time.

Build the sentence
Choose all that apply
Fact or fib
Fill the blank
Guess the number
Listen and choose
Match the pairs
Multiple choice
Odd one out
Picture question
Put in order
Sequence recall
Sort into groups
Spell it
Tap the pairs
True or false
Type the answer

Practise Cities and Urbanisation

120 questions across 20 steps. Start with step one and crawl at your own pace.

Play this unit

Read about Cities and Urbanisation

Explainers from our blog on what this unit covers. Each one ends with real questions from the bank.

How Urban Heat Islands FormCities are often warmer than nearby rural areas because buildings, roads and human activity change how heat is absorbed and released. Shade, vegetation and reflective surfaces can reduce the effect.July 29, 2026 · 5 min read

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