Urban Economic GeographyCentral Place TheoryUrban Land Use/Development/Downtowns

RedevelopmentWorld Cities Hypothesis & Network

CENTRAL PLACE THEORY

What is it?A basic theory describing size

distribution of urban locations based upon these locations providing goods and services

Who is Christaller?

Who is Christaller?Walter Christaller, a German

geographer, originally proposed the Central Place Theory (CPT) in 1933 (trans. 1966). Christaller was studying the urban settlements in Southern Germany and advanced this theory as a means of understanding how urban settlements evolve and are spaced out in relation to each other.

Terms Hinterland – Area where a city is the

dominant producer of a particular good or service

Field of Influence – Any location where a city has influence

Centrality – Amount of draw to a particular place

Terms Consumer Range – Distance a consumer

will travel for a particular good or service Threshold – Minimum population needed to

keep a business in operation Hierarchy of market centers - Settlements

range in size from large cities - with many services to smaller villages and towns with some services, to small hamlets - which offer few services.

Order of Goods High Order

1. High Price

2. Low Frequency of Purchase

3. High Threshold

4. Large Consumer Range

Low Order

1. Low Price

2. High Frequency of Purchase

3. Low Threshold

4. Small Consumer Range

Order of Places

® The higher order of goods offered the higher order of the place

® Higher order places are more widely spread out

® Hierarchy development

Assumptions 1. There is an unbounded uniform plain

on which there is equal ease of transport in all directions. Transport costs are proportional to distance and there is only one type of transport.

Assumptions2. Population is evenly distributed over

the plain.

Assumptions3. Central places (settlements) are

located on the plain to provide goods, services, and administrative functions to their hinterlands. Examples of these are hardware shops (goods), dry cleaners (services), and town planning departments (administrative).

Assumptions4. Consumers minimize the distance to

be travelled.

Assumptions5. The suppliers of these functions act

as economic [agents]; that is, they attempt to maximize their profits by locating on the plain to obtain the largest possible market. Since people visit the nearest centre, suppliers will locate as far away from one another as possible so as to maximize their market areas.

Assumptions 6. It is assumed that these higher order

centres supply certain functions (higher order functions) which are not offered by lower order centres. They also provide all the functions (lower order functions) that are provided in lower order centres.[i.e., you can still buy bread and milk in Denver, but international airports do not exist in smaller towns and cities, like Parker.]

Assumptions7. All consumers have the same income

and the same demand for goods and services.

Relax Assumptions:

1. Population income variation--wealthy vs. non-wealthy areas, wealthy areas do not usually need as large of a threshold

2. Variation in transport surfaces

3. Consumer Behaviour/Individual Preferences

4. Profits

Shape of HinterlandsThe model in

CPT is explained

using geometric

shapes, such as hexagons and triangles

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same good or service

Is Central Place Theory applicable in the real world or is it just a theory?

Any contemporary real world examples of the patterns seen in CPT?

There are, however, some near perfect examples of Christaller’s theory to be found in the Canadian prairies and the Netherlands. Also Iowa and Wisconsin.

A GENERAL GRAPH CONCERNING FUNCTIONS !

Why doesn’t this always work?

- Large areas of flat land rarely exist- Transport has changed since his day- People/wealth are not evenly distributed- Folks don’t always choose the central place!- Purchasing power/needs not all the same- Governments have control over location of industry/towns- Perfect competition = unreal- Places don’t stay the same forever- Does not fit industrial areas

Market, - city, town, village, hamlet

Market area / hinterland

Consumers near center obtain services from local establishments.

The closer to the periphery the greater the % of customers who will chose to obtain services from other nodes (cities). People are equally likely to use the service, or go elsewhere.

Fast Food McDonald’s According to your text book McDonald’s has a

range of 3 miles. The typical threshold is 10,000 people.

Movie Theaters

Movie Theaters: Range?

Movie Theaters: Threshold - about 500 a night or 150,000

Ikea

Ikea

Ikea

Ikea

Ikea - Range?

Ikea - Threshold?