Tonight, on October 1, 2038, we celebrate the 20th anniversary of the millennial omnibus infrastructure bill that showed that all three major political parties could come together to address this nation's economic and security future. Urban infrastructure has already changed, in large part because of the efforts of engineers and the Millennial Legislation.
How did we get here? At the beginning of the third millennium, over six billion people lived in the world, and we had a projected population growth rate of 1.25%, which would have resulted in 9.6 billion people today. But the terrorist states' war, the regional nuclear conflict and last decade's food shortages and pandemics took a toll, limiting today's world population to eight billion. The food shortages further accelerated the movement of people into cities as every acre of arable land was pressed into production. Urban population now accounts for nearly 90% in more developed countries.