Outer Suburbs

Commuter Zone

CBD

Inner City

Inner Suburbs

• Chicago, 1920s

The Burgess Urban Land Use Model

• CBD – core of the city. Contains shops, offices and entertainment. Few residential. High buildings.

• Inner City – Mixed land use of small industries, small houses and offices.

• Inner Suburbs – Housing dates 80 – 100 yrs. Terraced houses with back yards.• Outer Suburbs – Semi-detached houses 1930+ Council houses. Shopping parades. Out-of-town shops.

• Commuter Zone – Green belt around urban areas. Beyond it, small towns and villages. High cost housing.

Theory of Bid Rent

Ren

t

Distance from CBD

Retail

Industry/commercial Residential

Rent

a

b

c

a Retailingb Industry/commercialc Residential

City limits

ab

c

The diagrams to the right show what various land-users are prepared and able to pay for good access to the CBD.

Burgess's work is based on the bid rent curve. This states that the concentric circles are based on the amount that people will pay for the land. This value is based on the profits that are obtainable from maintaining a business on that land. The centre of the town, will have the highest number of customers so it is profitable for retail activities. Manufacturing will pay slightly less for the land as they are only interested in the accessibility for workers, 'goods in' and 'goods out'. Residential land use will take the surrounding land

LAND USE IN THE CBD = much of it is retail (shopping) but what type?

In the CBD explain why you might expect a higher number of Comparison and Specialist shops, rather then convenience shops…. See the next slides!

More shops and services in larger settlements

The number of shops and services in a settlement depends upon the threshold population, which is the minimum number of people required by a shop/service to make a profit. Shops and services are classified according to their threshold population:

department store – 350 000 people

can be quite far

not oftenspecialist (high order)

bank – 15 000 people

reasonable – even the next town

fairly oftencomparison (middle order)

general store –200 people.

shortvery oftenconvenience (low order)

example and estimate of threshold population

maximum distance customer prepared to travel

frequency of use

classification

Convenience, comparison or specialist?

Types of shops and services

Choose which column to put each type of shop or service into.

Key terminology for explaining CBD characteristics…