Urbanization has been one of the dominant contemporary processes as a growing share

of the global population lives in cities. Considering this trend, urban transportation
issues are of foremost importance to support the passengers and freight mobility require-
ments of large urban agglomerations. Transportation in urban areas is highly complex
because of the modes involved, the multitude of origins and destinations, and the amount
and variety of traf c. Traditionally, the focus of urban transportation has been on
passengers as cities were viewed as locations of utmost human interactions with intri-
cate traf c patterns linked to commuting, commercial transactions and leisure/cultural
activities. However, cities are also locations of production, consumption and distribu-
tion, activities linked to movements of freight. Conceptually, the urban transport system
is intricately linked with urban form and spatial structure. Urban transit is an important
dimension of mobility, notably in high density areas.

No discussion about the urban spatial structure can take place without an overview of
urbanization, which has been one of the dominant trends of economic and social change
of the twentieth century, especially in the developing world.

Urbanization. The process of transition from a rural to a more urban society. Statis-
tically, urbanization re ects an increasing proportion of the population living in
settlements de ned as urban, primarily through net rural to urban migration. The
level of urbanization is the percentage of the total population living in towns and
cities while the rate of urbanization is the rate at which it grows.

This transition is expected to go on well into the second half of the twenty- rst century,
a trend re ected in the growing size of cities and in the increasing proportion of the
urbanized population. Urban mobility problems have increased proportionally, and in
some cases exponentially, with urbanization since it concentrates mobility demands
over a speci c area. Since 1950, the world’s urban population has more than doubled, to
reach nearly 3.5 billion in 2010, about 50.6 percent of the global population. This is the
outcome of three main demographic trends:

Natural increase. It is simply the outcome of more births than deaths in urban areas,
a direct function of the fertility rate as well as the quality of healthcare systems
(lower mortality rates, particularly for infants). Phases in the demographic transition
 are commonly linked with urbanization rates. Although this factor played an impor-
tant role in the past, it is of much lesser importance today as fertility rates in many
developed countries have dropped signi cantly, in some cases such as Western
Europe, Japan and South Korea below replacement rate.
Rural to urban migrations. This has been a strong factor of urbanization, particu-
larly in the developing world where migration accounted for 40–60 percent of the
urban growth. Such a process has endured since the beginning of the industrial revo-
lution in the nineteenth century, rst in the developed world and then in the devel-
oping world. The reasons for urban migration are numerous and may involve the
expectation to nd employment, improved agricultural productivity which frees rural
labor or political and environmental problems where populations are constrained to
leave the countryside.
International migration. The growth in international migration has been an impor-
tant factor in the urbanization of major gateway cities, such as Los Angeles, Miami,
New York, London and Paris. This process has a tendency to take place in the largest
cities, but there is a trickle down to cities of smaller size.

Current global trends indicate a growth of about 50 million urbanites each year, roughly
a million a week. More than 90 percent of that growth occurs in developing countries
which places intense pressures on urban infrastructures, particularly transportation, to
cope. By 2050, 6.4 billion people, about two-thirds of humanity, are likely to be urban
residents. What can be considered as urban includes a whole continuum of urban
spatial structures, ranging from small towns to large urban agglomerations. This also
raises the question about optimal city size since technical limitations (road, utilities)
are not much of an impediment in building very large cities. Many of the world’s
largest cities (Figure 6.1) can be labeled as dysfunctional mainly because as city
size increases the rising complexities are not effectively coped with by managerial
expertise.
Global urbanization and the emergence of large cities has been a signi cant process
with far-reaching economic and social impacts:

• Urbanization involves a much higher level of concentration of the global popula-

tion, which used to be more dispersed. Higher levels of concentration are easier
to service from a market perspective, but are also prone to congestion and
diseconomies.
• Several mega-cities of more than 8 million have emerged. These cities command
a large share of the global wealth creation and dominate their respective national
economies. Many act as global cities.
• Urban residents have different activities, lifestyles and levels of consumption than
rural residents, particularly in developing countries.

Demographic and mobility growth have been shaped by the capacity and requirements
of urban transport infrastructures, such as roads, transit systems or simply walkways.
Consequently, there is a wide variety of urban forms, spatial structures and associated
urban transportation systems.

Urban form. Refers to the spatial imprint of an urban transport system as well as the
adjacent physical infrastructures. Jointly, they confer a level of spatial arrangement
to cities.
Urban (spatial) structure. Refers to the set of relationships arising out of the
urban form and its underlying interactions of people, freight and information. It tries
to evaluate to what extent speci c urban structures can be achieved with speci c
transport systems.

In light of transport developments, the urban spatial structure can be categorized by its
level of centralization and clustering (Figure 6.2):

Centralization. Refers to the setting of activities in relation to the whole urban

area. A centralized city has a signi cant share of its activities in its center while a
decentralized city does not. Large employers such as nancial institutions are the
main drivers of centralization.
Clustering. Refers to the setting of activities in relation to a speci c part of the
urban area. A cluster of activities is therefore a concentration around a speci c focal
point, which tends to be transport infrastructures such as a highway interchange, a
transit terminal or a smaller town that has been absorbed by the expansion of the
metropolis.

Although the four types of urban spatial structures shown in Figure 6.2 are possible, the
most signi cant trend that has impacted urban spatial structures has been decentraliza-
tion while maintaining a high level of clustering (Type C). This is re ective of a
multicentric city. The decentralization of activities resulted in two opposite effects.
First, commuting time remained relatively stable in duration. Second, commuting
increasingly tends to be longer and made by using the automobile rather than by public
transit. Most transit and road systems were developed to facilitate suburb-to-city, rather
than suburb-to-suburb, commuting. As a result, suburban highways are often as
congested as urban highways.
Dispersed urban land development patterns have been dominant in North America
over the last 50 years, where land is abundant, transportation costs were low, and
where the economy became dominated by tertiary and quaternary activities. Under
such circumstances, it is not surprising to nd that there is a strong relationship
between urban density and automobile use. For many cities their built-up areas
have grown at a faster rate than their populations. In addition, commuting became
relatively inexpensive compared with land costs, so households had an incentive to
buy lower-priced housing at the urban periphery. Similar patterns can be found in
many European cities, but this change is occurring at a slower pace and involving a
smaller range.
Even if the geographical setting of each city varies considerably, the urban form and
its spatial structure are articulated by two structural elements:

Nodes. These are re ected in the centrality of urban activities, which can be related
to the spatial accumulation of economic activities or to accessibility to the transport
system. Terminals, such as ports, train station, rail yards and airports, are important
nodes around which activities agglomerate at the local or regional level. Nodes
have a hierarchy related to their importance and contribution to urban functions, with
high order nodes such as management and retailing and lower order nodes such as
production and distribution.
 Linkages. These are the infrastructures supporting ows from, to and between nodes.
The lowest level of linkages includes streets, which are the de ning elements of the
urban spatial structure. There is a hierarchy of linkages moving up to regional roads
and railways and international connections by air and maritime transport systems.

Depending on their nature, urban nodes and linkages provide for a functional connec-
tivity, implying interdependent urban functions related to trade, production and tele-
communications. Urban transportation is thus associated with a spatial form which
varies according to the modes being used. What has not changed much is that cities tend
to opt for a grid street pattern. This was the case for many Roman cities built in the rst
century as it was for American cities built in the twentieth century. The reasons behind
this permanence are relatively simple: a grid pattern jointly optimizes accessibility and
available real estate. Obviously, many cities are not organized as a grid. They corre-
spond to older cities, many former forti ed towns, as well as cities which grew from
a constrained location such as an island or a river junction. Local geographical and
historical characteristics remain important in uences on the urban form.
In an age of motorization and personal mobility, an increasing number of cities are
developing a spatial structure that increases reliance on motorized transportation, partic-
ularly the privately owned automobile. This has caused a shift from a grid pattern
towards curvilinear and cul-de-sac patterns that are commonly found in suburban areas
(Figure 6.3).
The conventional street grid is mostly the outcome of the streetcar suburbs that
emerged in the early part of the twentieth century. It conferred optimal accessibility and
use of available space. The diffusion of the automobile was a driver in the shift in the
street network towards a more curvilinear pattern. This implied a reduction in the
level of connectivity as well as the density of land use. This was part of a paradox: while
the automobile was becoming the dominant support of urban mobility it was also
increasingly associated with local disturbances. Planners responded by developing
cul-de-sac suburban patterns with the goal to reduce and even eliminate through move-
ments on a large number of residential streets and having them taking place on main
arterials. By the 1950s, the conventional cul-de-sac pattern became prevalent in suburban
developments. Although this pattern minimizes non-local circulation, it also generates
more movements and energy consumption.
Dispersion, or urban sprawl, is taking place in many different types of cities, from
dense, centralized European metropolises such as Madrid, Paris (Photo 6.1) and
London, to rapidly industrializing metropolises such as Seoul, Shanghai and Buenos
Aires, to those experiencing recent, fast and uncontrolled urban growth, such as
Mumbai and Lagos. Recent urban expansion is consequently almost all geared towards
the automobile.

Historically, movements within cities tended to be restricted to walking, which made

medium and long distance urban linkages rather inef cient and time-consuming. Thus,
activity nodes tended to be agglomerated and urban forms compact. Many modern
cities have inherited an urban form created under such circumstances, even though they
are no longer prevailing. The dense urban cores of many European, Japanese and
Chinese cities, for example, enable residents to make between one-third and two-
thirds of all trips by walking and cycling. At the other end of the spectrum, the dispersed
urban forms of most Australian, Canadian and American cities, which were built rela-
tively recently, encourage automobile dependency and are linked with high levels of
mobility. Many major cities are also port cities with maritime accessibility playing an
enduring role not only for the economic vitality but also in the urban spatial structure
with the port district being an important node. Airport terminals have also been
playing a growing role in the urban spatial structure as they can be considered as cities
within cities.
The evolution of transportation has generally led to changes in urban form. The
more radical the changes in transport technology have been, the more the alterations
on the urban form. Among the most fundamental changes in the urban form is the
emergence of new clusters expressing new urban activities and new relationships
between elements of the urban system. In many cities, the central business district
(CBD), once the primary destination of commuters and serviced by public transporta-
tion, has been changed by new manufacturing, retailing and management practices.
Whereas traditional manufacturing depended on centralized workplaces and transporta-
tion, technological and transportation developments have rendered modern industry
more exible. In many cases, manufacturing relocated in a suburban setting, if not
altogether to entirely new low cost locations offshore. Retail and of ce activities are
also suburbanizing, producing changes in the urban form. Concomitantly, many impor-
tant transport terminals, namely port facilities and rail yards, have emerged in suburban
areas following new requirements in modern freight distribution brought in part
by containerization. The urban spatial structure shifted from a nodal to a multi-nodal
character (Figure 6.4).
The urban spatial structure basically considers the location of different activities as
well as their relationships. Core activities are those of the highest order in the urban
spatial structure, namely tertiary and quaternary activities involved in management
( nance and insurance) and consumption (retailing). Central activities are concerned
by production and distribution with activities such as warehousing, manufacturing,
wholesaling and transportation. Peripheral activities are predominantly residential or
servicing local needs. A central area refers to an agglomeration of core and/or central
activities within a speci c location. The emergence of a CBD (in the central area of a
city) is the result of a historical process, often occurring over several centuries (depending
on the age of a city), that has changed the urban form and the location of economic
activities. Obviously, each city has its own history, but it is possible to establish a
general common process:
 Pre-industrial era. For cities that existed before the industrial revolution, the CBD
was limited to a small section of the city generally near the waterfront, the market
and/or a site of religious or political importance. These were locations where major
transactions took place and thus required nancial, insurance, warehousing and
wholesale services.
Industrial revolution. With the industrial revolution came mass production and
mass consumption. This permitted the emergence of a distinct retailing and whole-
saling part of the CBD while manufacturing located outside the core. Major terminal
facilities, such as ports and rail yards, were also located in proximity to the city core.
Managing these expanding activities also created an increasing need for of ce
space that located nearby traditional places of nancial interaction. As the industrial
revolution matured, major transportation axes spurred from the central area towards
the periphery.
Contemporary era. After the Second World War, industries massively relocated
away from central areas to suburban areas, leaving room for the expansion of admin-
istrative and nancial activities. The CBD was thus the object of an important accu-
mulation of nancial and administrative activities, particularly in the largest cities as
several corporations became multinational enterprises. These activities were even
more willing to pay higher rents than retailing, thereby pushing some retail activities
out of the CBD. New retailing sub-centers emerged in suburban areas because of
road accessibility and because of the need to service these new areas. Warehousing
and transportation, no longer core area activities, have also relocated to new periph-
eral locations close to modern terminal facilities such as container terminals and
airports. The spatial structure of many cities became increasingly multi-nodal (or
multicentric).

Initially, suburban growth mainly took place adjacent to major road corridors, leaving
plots of vacant or farm land in between. Later, intermediate spaces were gradually lled
up, more or less coherently. Highways and ring roads, which circled and radiated from
cities, favored the development of suburbs and the emergence of important sub-centers
that compete with the central business district for the attraction of economic activities.
As a result, many new job opportunities have shifted to the suburbs (if not to entirely
new locations abroad) and the activity system of cities has been considerably modi ed.
Different parts of a city have a different dynamism depending on its spatial pattern.
These changes have occurred according to a variety of geographical and historical
contexts, notably in North America and Europe as each subsequent phase of urban
transportation developments led to different spatial structures. Sometimes, particularly
when new modern urban road infrastructures are built, the subsequent changes in the
urban form can be signi cant.
Although transportation systems and travel patterns have changed considerably
over time, one enduring feature remains that most people travel for between 30 and
40 minutes in one direction. Globally, people are spending about 1.2 hours per day
commuting, wherever this takes place in a low or a high mobility setting. Different
transport technologies, however, are associated with different travel speeds and capacity.
As a result, cities that rely primarily on non-motorized transport tend to be different than
auto-dependent cities. Transport technology thus plays a very important role in de ning
urban form and the spatial pattern of various activities. Still, the evolution of the urban
form is path-dependent, implying that the current spatial structure is obviously the
outcome of past developments, but that those developments were strongly related
to local conditions involving the setting, physical constraints and investments in
infrastructures and modes.

The amount of urban land allocated to transportation is often correlated with the level of
mobility. In the pre-automobile era, about 10 percent of the urban land was devoted to
transportation which was simply roads for a predominantly pedestrian traf c. As the
mobility of people and freight increased, a growing share of urban areas was allocated
to transport and the infrastructures supporting it. Large variations in the spatial imprint
of urban transportation are observed between different cities as well as between different
parts of a city, such as between central and peripheral areas. The major components of
the spatial imprint of urban transportation are:

Pedestrian areas. Refer to the amount of space devoted to walking. This space is
often shared with roads as sidewalks may use between 10 and 20 percent of a road’s
right of way. In central areas, pedestrian areas tend to use a greater share of the right
of way and in some instances whole areas are reserved for pedestrians. However, in
a motorized context, most pedestrian areas are for servicing people’s access to trans-
port modes such as parked automobiles.
Roads and parking areas. Refer to the amount of space devoted to road transporta-
tion, which has two states of activity: moving or parked. In a motorized city, on
average 30 percent of the surface is devoted to roads while another 20 percent is
required for off-street parking. This implies for each car about 2 off-street and
2 on-street parking spaces. In North American cities, roads and parking lots account
for between 30 and 60 percent of the total surface.
Cycling areas. In a disorganized form, cycling simply shares access to pedestrian
and road space. However, many attempts have been made to create spaces speci -
cally for bicycles in urban areas, with reserved lanes and parking facilities
(Photo 6.2). The Netherlands has been particularly proactive over this issue making
biking paths part of the urban transport system: 27 percent of the total amount of
commuting is by cycling.
Transit systems. Many transit systems, such as buses and tramways, share road
space with automobiles, which often impairs their respective ef ciency. Attempts to
mitigate congestion have resulted in the creation of road lanes reserved for buses
either on a permanent or temporary (during rush hour) basis. Other transport systems
such as subways and rail have their own infrastructures and, consequently, their own
rights of way.
Transport terminals. Refer to the amount of space devoted to terminal facilities
such as ports, airports, transit stations, rail yards and distribution centers.
Globalization has increased the mobility of people and freight, both in relative
and absolute terms, and consequently the amount of urban space required to
support those activities. Many major terminals are located in the peripheral
areas of cities, which are the only locations where suf cient amounts of land are
available.

The spatial importance of each transport mode varies according to a number of factors,
density being the most important. Further, each transport mode has unique performance
and space consumption characteristics. The most relevant example is the automobile.
It requires space to move around (roads) but it also spends 98 percent of its existence
stationary in a parking space. Consequently, a signi cant amount of urban space must
be allocated to accommodate the automobile, especially when it does not move and is
thus economically and socially useless. In large urban agglomerations almost all the
available street parking space in areas of average density and above is occupied
throughout the day. At an aggregate level, measures reveal a signi cant spatial imprint
of road transportation among developed countries. In the United States, more land is
thus used by the automobile than for housing. In Western Europe, roads account for
between 15 percent and 20 percent of the urban surface while for developing countries
this gure is about 10 percent (6 percent on average for Chinese cities but growing fast
due to motorization).

Urban land use comprises two elements: the nature of land use, which relates to which
activities are taking place where, and the level of spatial accumulation, which indicates
intensity and concentration of activities. Central areas have a high level of spatial accu-
mulation and corresponding land uses, such as retail, while peripheral areas have lower
levels of accumulation. Most economic, social or cultural activities imply a multitude
of functions, such as production, consumption and distribution. These functions
take place at speci c locations and are part of an activity system. Some are routine
activities, because they occur regularly and are thus predictable, such as commuting
and shopping. Others are institutional activities that tend to be irregular. Others are
production activities that are related to manufacturing and distribution, whose
linkages may be local, regional or global. The behavioral patterns of individuals, institu-
tions and rms have an imprint on land use in terms of their locational choice. The
representation of this imprint requires a typology of land use, which can be formal
or functional:

Formal land use representations are concerned with qualitative attributes of space
such as its form, pattern and aspect and are descriptive in nature.
Functional land use representations are concerned with the economic nature of
activities such as production, consumption, residence and transport, and are mainly a
socioeconomic description of space.

Within an urban system each activity occupies a suitable, but not necessarily optimal
location, from which it derives rent. Transportation and land use interactions mostly
consider the retroactive relationships between activities, which are land use related,
and accessibility, which is transportation related. These relationships have often
been described as a classic “chicken-and-egg” problem since it is dif cult to identify
the triggering cause of change: do transportation changes precede land use changes
or vice versa? There is a scale effect at play as large infrastructure projects tend
to precede and trigger land use changes while small-scale transportation projects
tend to complement the existing land use pattern. Further, the expansion of urban
land uses takes place over various circumstances such as in lling (near the city center)
or sprawl (far from the city center) and where transportation plays a different role in
each case.