The Origin and Development of Port Said City between Determinism and Possibilism

There is a mutual relationship between the environment and humans; the environment affects humans, humans in turn affect the environment, and there is an overlap between humans’ impact on the environment and being affected by it. The study aims to explore the connections between physical and human conditions. Port Said city is chosen as a model for the subject of the struggle between humans and the geographical environment, as the value of the role played and imposed by those physical conditions and the place of the human factor in it becomes clear. The emergence of Port Said city is due to a human factor, which is to serve the navigational purpose of the Suez Canal. Besides, the conditions of the physical environment in which Port Said originated had their great impact on city life. The matter in which human activity was only a response and subject to the command of those purely physical factors from which man tried to find the most appropriate to reach his goal. However, the human factor, which had a clear and tangible impact on changing many topographical features and showing a new image of life in a barren area, contributed to the emergence of the city in its final appearance. Hence, it is correct to point out that the environment does not decide or dictate to humans all aspects of their activity. Human life itself is capable of overcoming the difficulties it faces and benefiting from the capabilities offered to it by the environment.