  In experiments on electron transport the macroscopic inhomogeneities in the
sample play a fundamental role. In this paper and a subsequent one we introduce
and develop a general formalism that captures the principal features of sample
inhomogeneities (density gradients, contact misalignments) in the magneto
resistance data taken from low mobility heterostructures. We present detailed
assessments and experimental investigations of the different regimes of
physical interest, notably the regime of semiclassical transport at weak
magnetic fields, the plateau-plateau transitions as well as the
plateau-insulator transition that generally occurs at much stronger values of
the external field only.
  It is shown that the semiclassical regime at weak fields plays an integral
role in the general understanding of the experiments on the quantum Hall
regime. The results of this paper clearly indicate that the plateau-plateau
transitions, unlike the the plateau-insulator transition, are fundamentally
affected by the presence of sample inhomogeneities. We propose a universal
scaling result for the magneto resistance parameters. This result facilitates,
amongst many other things, a detailed understanding of the difficulties
associated with the experimental methodology of H.P. Wei et.al in extracting
the quantum critical behavior of the electron gas from the transport
measurements conducted on the plateau-plateau transitions.
