Tenerife has three large population areas that are very different and distributed: The Metropolitan Zone, the South Zone and the North Zone. With several protected natural parks -48.6% of the territory- and an urban swarm around the island, in the last half century the insular coastal platform has become a highly urbanized metropolitan system. The high level of population in a relatively small territory -more than 900,000 inhabitants in just over 2,000 km2- and the strong urbanization have turned the island of Tenerife, in the words of architect Federico García Barba; on an "island-city" or "island-ring".