. Describe in detail how the different transportation systems of the Heartland work together to create a successful hub. What are the major forms of transportation and how do they work together? Give specific examples.
The Heartland shows a "nested hierarchy" of levels from metropolis to village, and the different transportation systems bind these levels together. The presence of the Great Lakes provide a gateway to overseas regions. The system of rivers leading through the region, and especially the Mississippi River, connected the ports of Chicago and environs to mid-America and the South, and other rivers feeding into the Mississippi provide means of transporting goods and people around the region. Roads were developed throughout the region and have been augmented and added to regularly with national and state highways which today transport millions of people and millions of tons of goods around the region. In cities like Chicago, the roads and rail system move commuters into and out of the city every day. The railroads remain important means of moving goods, though they have been supplanted somewhat by the trucking industry, which is more versatile in where it can go. Chicago in particular is a vital link in national air travel as well. The different transportation systems work not only to bind the region together but to serve as routes carrying goods away from the Great Lakes gateway outward in all directions.
2. Describe and discuss how the urban system of the Heartland operates in an economic hierarchical pattern. What are the factors which create each level, and what is the function of each level?
New York has an influence on the cities of the Heartland, but it is Chicago that is central to the area and that dominates as the major metropolitan area. It serves as the transportation hub for the region. The second level is taken up with subregional metropolises such as St. Louis, Toronto, and Detroit These...