HISTORICAL PATH-DEPENDENCE OF THE URBAN-POPULATION DENSITY GRADIENT

Recent research has emphasized path-dependence and the effect of vinta ge factors in urban development. Jerusalem and Tel Aviv are cities whe re the modern CBD is not in its historic location. Distance from the h istoric center is taken as a proxy of housing and infrastructure vinta ge. A polycentric urban population density function is used to assess the relative importance of distance from the CBD and from the historic center in explaining population density. Additionally, I examine econ ometrically the validity of a number of population density functions, and analyze the structure of the error variance and the design of appr opriate measures of goodness of fit and hypothesis tests for regressio n models of population density. The results show that distance from th e historical center is an important factor in explaining population de nsity but its explanatory power has declined over time. It is more sig nificant than distance from the CBD in explaining residential density in Tel Aviv and gross density in Jerusalem. It explains a larger propo rtion of the variance in gross density in the inner city than does dis tance from the CBD, but vice versa in the suburbs.