Polynucleated urban landscapes

Authors
Citation
M. Batty, Polynucleated urban landscapes, URBAN STUD, 38(4), 2001, pp. 635-655
Citations number
26
Categorie Soggetti
EnvirnmentalStudies Geografy & Development
Journal title
URBAN STUDIES
ISSN journal
00420980 → ACNP
Volume
38
Issue
4
Year of publication
2001
Pages
635 - 655
Database
ISI
SICI code
0042-0980(200104)38:4<635:PUL>2.0.ZU;2-H
Abstract
City systems show a degree of resilience and persistence that has rarely be en emphasised in urban theory. There is a fascination for recent and contem porary change which suggests that phenomena such as the rise of the 'edge c ity', for example, comprise the predominant forces determining how a polynu cleated landscape of cities is emerging. We argue here that such explanatio ns of polynucleation are largely false. Urban settlement structures from mu ch earlier times are persistent to a degree that is extraordinary. We show this in two ways: first, from empirical evidence of stable rank-size relati ons in the urban settlement system for Great Britain over the past 100 year s; and, secondly, from simulations based on weak laws of proportionate effe ct which produce aggregate patterns entirely consistent with these empirica l relations. We then propose various spatially disaggregate models of urban development which generate an evolution of polynucleated settlement from i nitial, random distributions of urban activity. These models simulate the r epeated action of agents locating and trading in space which illustrate how early settlement patterns are gradually reinforced by positive feedback. T hese produce lognormally distributed settlement structures that are charact eristic of city systems in developed countries. In this way, we begin to ex plain how aggregate urban structures persist in spite of rapid and volatile micro change at more local levels of locational decision-making. Polynucle ated urban landscapes are clear evidence of this phenomenon.