Polycentricity or dispersion?: Changes in center employment in metropolitan Sydney, 1981 to 1996

Much recent literature in urban studies, geography, and planning portrays a n inexorable evolution toward polycentricity as a new "postmodern" metropol itan form. However, detailed and comparable empirical investigations, at on ce both comprehensive and disaggregated, are more elusive. A study by Gordo n and Richardson (1996) of employment trends in Los Angeles-the archetypal polycentric metropolis-produced the surprising conclusion that a process of generalized dispersion rather than a clustering in major suburban subcente rs seemed well established for the period 1970 to 1990. This paper adapts t he Gordon-Richardson methodology to an investigation of centered versus non centered employment trends in Sydney, Australia, between 1981 and 1996. Bas ed on a detailed statistical analysis, the study suggests some parallels to the Los Angeles experience in the 1980s but uncovers a recentralization tr end in the 1990s. The findings underline the importance of locality-specifi c factors and the need for further systematic and comparative research.