Cities have been spreading our for all of recorded history. From
the “walking city” (pre-1880) to the “streetcar city” (1880-1920) to the “automobile city”
(post- 1920). Are we now looking at the “smartphone city” (post-2007)? Perhaps, but there is no "death of distance" to speak of. The biggest and priciest places (London, Hong Kong, New York, San Francisco, etc.) continue to grow (mostly outward) and thrive. Growth is always the best indicator.
There is seemingly enough agglomeration "glue" to hold the large metro areas together -- and to justify high land prices. The growth we are getting is pretty "smart". This is not the popular "smart growth" prescribed by people who assert they are somehow smart enough to plan whole metropolitan areas. Rather, we are getting smarts in the form of spontaneous spatial arrangements that "click" for large numbers of people and firms.
Qian An, Jim Moore and I have been looking at the 2009 NHTS. These data are for the 50 largest U.S. metro areas. Places within metro areas are classified by NHTS as "Urban" "Suburban" and "Second City" (middle three rows, below). Data below are for the three major trip types. The differences within each table among means and variances (with the exception of commuting variances) are fairly small. Area
Commuting Times (Minutes, Solo Drivers, One-Way)
Area
|
Means
|
Variances
|
Metro
|
25.2
|
338.7
|
Urban
|
22.8
|
214.7
|
Suburban
|
24.5
|
292.4
|
Second City
|
23.6
|
308.5
|
Town and Country
|
28.4
|
457.0
|
Means
|
Variances
|
Home-Based Shopping Trips (Minutes, Solo Drivers, One-Way)
Area
|
Means
|
Variances
|
Metro
|
14.3
|
130.1
|
Urban
|
14.3
|
141.4
|
Suburban
|
13.3
|
107.9
|
Second City
|
13.0
|
113.8
|
Town and Country
|
16.5
|
164.3
|
Home-Based Social/Recreational Trips (Minutes, Solo
Drivers, One-Way)
Area
|
Means
|
Variances
|
Metro
|
18.8
|
241.6
|
Urban
|
19.9
|
257.7
|
Suburban
|
18.4
|
225.7
|
Second City
|
18.1
|
233.4
|
Town and Country
|
19.2
|
258.2
|
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