Central Business District

G. A. Rice, University of Helsinki, Finland

& 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Introduction
Glossary
Edge Cities Refers to patterns of large-scale urban
The central business district (CBD) is that part of the city
sprawl into the rural vastness of the US. Edge cities are
which contains the principal commercial streets and main
quite different from other noncentral urban
public buildings. Throughout history the CBD has been
developments, like British New Towns, in scale,
characterized by a number of land use changes that in-
intensity, and accessibility. Also unlike New Towns,
clude industrial, residential, commercial, administration,
edge cities were not specifically
and consumption. These spatial and temporal changes
designed to manage the overflow of post-war
have been used to support and reject a number of theories
baby boomers but rather, they are a more explicit
and delimitations of the CBD. However, in the wake
attempt to attract corporations
of post-war decentralization and the rising popularity of
and light industries through offering tax
polycentric regions in both Europe and the US much of
cuts and a local skilled labor force.
this work has itself come under criticism. The main thrust
Technopoles Very similar to European
of the criticisms suggest that CBDs are now more likely to
industrial districts especially those found in Northeast
experience atrophy due to the frenetic rise of suburban
Central Italy. While both technopoles and industrial
lifestyles, capital flight, and edge cities in regions like
districts aim to nurture a specific industrial
Southern California. Notwithstanding, parallel develop-
atmosphere, in the former case the emphasis is on
ments like inner-city regeneration suggest that CBDs are
attracting established research-based companies and
now at the heart of a more widespread back to the city
innovation centers which cater to smaller high-
movement that (re)promotes the attractiveness of city
technology companies. Technopoles tend to follow a
center living through gentrification, enchanting cultural
number of stages from proto-type to larger
districts, and an uber-cool social scene.
agglomeration that may eventually evolve into edge
The following entry will chart the ways in which the
cities or large urban centers outside older
CBD has been used to make a number of theoretical
established cities. Southern California is a case
contributions to human geography. This is evident from
in point and thus is often referred
the definitional nuances and the various ways in which
to as a polycentric region.
CBDs have evolved and subsequently been delimited.
Zone of Assimilation An area adjacent to
While CBD evolution takes on local morphological
the central business district (CBD) characterized
characteristics, the case of Boston shows how CBDs
by extensive redevelopment and the spread
evolve internally and expand physically. This is compli-
of new and typically upmarket shops and office
mented by a more general treatise of CBD evolution
developments (cf. zone of discard). This is the
based on North American and Canadian cities. Various
favored frontier and the physical direction that
approaches to CBD delimitation are also discussed to
the CBD tends to extend along. As long as
demonstrate the importance of urban land rent and
demand for space in the CBD continues to rise,
changes across the land use surface. The entry then fin-
the zone of assimilation will be constantly pushed
ishes off by suggesting that retail decentralisation is one
and reshaped.
of the biggest threats to the future of the CBD. The case
Zone of Discard An area at the edge of the CBD
of the UK mirrors more general trends in Europe and the
characterized by transitory business, boarded up
US and raises challenging issues for national planning
premises, and unsuccessful commerce. The rent
and policy guidelines. The proliferation of regional malls
levels tend to be less expensive than in the
is testament to the purported porosity of these guidelines
main CBD which attracts smaller low-market
that continue to galvanise various reactive urban renais-
retailers, warehouse activities, and wholesale
sance initiatives encapsulated by the contemporary CBD.
trading premises. In many cities including
Sacremento and Phoneix the zone of discard
represents the old CBD that has become outstripped by Defining the Central Business District
newer developments and more general supply side
changes in the retail and service sectors ;(cf. zone of The CBD typically refers to the commercial heart of the
assimilation). city. The term is often used interchangeably with
downtown and city center to describe a distinct land use

18
 Central Business District 19

pattern that is delimited from the rest of the urban
settlement (see below). In Canadian and US cities with
more mixed downtown areas the terms midtown and
uptown are also used to distinguish them from the geo-
graphical heart of the city in the CBD. In Waterloo,
Ontario, uptown refers to the prime shopping area to
distinguish it from downtown Kitchener. Other examples
include the midtown area of New York City and uptown
Minneapolis centered about the intersection of Lagoon
Street and Hennepin Avenue. In world cities such as
London the separation of business functions from the
CBD and the shopping area in Oxford Street was under
way by the end of the sixteenth century and by the
nineteenth century the principal shopping area became
detached from the main city (this refers specifically to the
financial district). Smaller cities like Glasgow have fol-
lowed a similar geographical shift with the current CBD
located to the west of where the city first began to grow at
‘Mercat Cross’.
The definitional nuances and spatial fragmentation of
the CBD have enabled a number of theories to emerge. A
set of approaches that capture the general spirit of these
theories are collectively known as core-frame models.
These models suggest that the core of the CBD is distinct
from the wider frame (or fringe) due to differences in the
types and intensities of land use (Figure 1).
This core-frame spatial organization is also evident in
non-Western cities like Cape Town where the CBD is
flanked by industrial parks in the southern suburbs of
Claremont, Rondebosch, and Wynberg. Similarly, in UK
cities other activities requiring less relative centrality,
including court houses and libraries, are located toward
the edge of the core while functional nodes make up the
surrounding frame. Glasgow’s CBD is a case in point with
the Mitchell Library, Sheriff Court and warehouse clus-
ter located outside the main core area that is demarcated
by primary retail streets. These frame functions tend to
be focused around smaller nuclei but in cases like the

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Figure 1 Core-frame model after Horwood, E. M. and Boyce, R. R. (1959). Studies of the Central Business District and Urban
Freeway Development. Seattle: University of Washington Press, taken from Scargil, D. I. (1979). The Form of Cities, p 90. London: Bell
and Hyman.
20 Central Business District
Tees Valley outside Newcastle in Northeast England the
nuclei can grow into an extensive industrial complex. In
Southern California the growth of light industrial tech-
nopoles in Palmdale are located some 60 miles to the
north of the CBD in Los Angeles. In other cases, this
decentralization proper is flanked by widespread resi-
dential sprawl and the rise of suburbia that in turn is
stabilized by ‘megamalls’, including the Mall of America
and the West Edmonton Mall. Consequently, core-frame
definitions of the CBD are now well overstretched.
Despite definitional nuances and morphological vari-
ations, it is generally accepted that the CBD is charac-
terized by a concentration of high-order service activities
that include retailing, office, legal, and other municipal
functions. The literature suggests that there are three
main reasons for the clustering of these activities with
‘unique accessibility’ being the first and most important.
This is an ‘all roads lead to Rome’ type scenario and
places the CBD at the hub of the primary transport
network. Chicago’s famous Loop is designed in this way
with office complexes built above railway stations to fully
exploit the local labor force. Second, the clustering of
commercial activity can also bring economic advantages.
While land use varies in the CBD, most of the functions
are complimentary and independent. Firms can achieve
external economies of scale by having access to what is, in
effect, a proximate pool of common services. Numerous
studies of London show the extent of spatial linkages
between different types of office activities that include
press, industry, insurance, banking, and commodities.
Third, there are also behavioral reasons that help explain
the centrality of high-order service activities. In the
business world a city center address arguably carries
more prestige and the ability to afford such an expensive
location is perceived as a sign of success. The ‘skyscraper
infatuation’ that swept through 1920s America was
characterized by the erection of prestigious tower
buildings established as landmarks to illustrious entre-
preneurs. Furthermore, the social scene and leisure
economy concentrated in and around the CBD further
facilitates personal communication and tacit forms of
knowledge favored by many businesses.
Evolution of the CBD
As the geographical concentration of commercial activity
in the city, various CBD forms have been recognizable
since at least the end of the eighteenth century. However,
the manner in which the CBD functions is medieval as
the linkages within the core area often need to be ac-
cessible by foot, which places an upper limit on the
distance between functions that benefit from being linked
together. This is particularly the case in smaller low-rise
urban centers like San Jose where city officials only need
to walk one block to purchase spare car parts. However,
in cities such as New York and London commercial
pressure on space over time eventually led to the ex-
clusion of (most) other central business functions ex-
emplified by emergence of global financial districts in
Lower Manhattan and Canary Wharf, respectively. Re-
search in smaller US cities including Philadelphia show
that, as long as this pressure remains constant then the
evolution of the CBD will always be in flux rather than
some static element on the urban landscape. While
scholars support this general thesis, there is less agree-
ment about the precise sequence of driving forces behind
CBD evolution. In European cities like Utrecht the CBD
evolved from the Industrial Revolution, whereas in Latin
American and African cities rural to urban migration was
the most important factor. To expose this lacuna the
literature has focused on a number of trophy case studies
to launch more general ideas about CBD evolution.
The Case of Boston
While scholars rightly continue to identify various local
factors as driving forces behind CBD evolution, the case
of Boston contributes something much more significant
to our understanding of the process. It is the evolution of
Boston’s CBD from 1840 to 1920 that established a
connection between the ways in which the CBD evolves
internally ‘and’ expands physically. The evolution of
Boston’s CBD also fits with the various urban land rent
models which suggest that those land uses least able to
pay the highest rent will be relegated toward the edge of
the city in zones of discard (discussed below).
The evolution of Boston’s CBD from 1840 to 1920 is
based around the emergence of ‘modern’ functional areas
that sprouted from three specialized nuclei (Figure 2).
In 1840 food markets, warehouse, and financial func-
tions were largely restricted to central locations to gain
access to Boston’s large European immigrant population.
By 1880 Boston’s commercial activities had expanded to
meet the demands of regional distribution that in turn led
to the expansion of business premises. As a consequence
many central residential areas suffered the social dis-
organization created by the problems of eviction and
residential relocation. By 1920 Boston’s CBD had split
into more specialized functions than had initially spurted
its growth. Finance and administration coalesced and
expanded their accommodations into premium locations
within the existing limits of the CBD, rather than at the
expense of peripheral residential locations. By contrast
the food industry reorganized their facilities by de-
centralizing into adjacent residential areas based upon
the differing threshold populations required to support
different types of retail function. This is because on the
supply side different retail functions have different
conditions of entry (thresholds), and thus demand

1840
Food
markets
Finance Finance
Warehouses
Extent of
CBD in 1920
Figure 2 Evolution of Boston’s CBD 1840–1920. From Ward, D. (1968). The emergence of central immigrant ghettoes in American
cities: 1840–1920. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 58, 343–359.
minimum trade areas for their support. On the demand
side, consumers spend different proportions of their in-
come on different goods and services and purchase them
with differing degrees of frequency. This produces the
hierarchy of retail functions found in most American and
European cities.
A CBD in Seven Stages
Other types of approaches are more schematic in ex-
plaining CBD evolution. A number of generic evo-
lutionary stages are proposed to account for the ways in
which the CBD can be characterized by various moments
of evolution ranging from ‘inception’ to the ‘city of
realms’. While there can be overlap between any of the
individual stages, schematic approaches assume that
there is a ‘normal’ trajectory that CBD evolution will
follow. North American and Canadian cities are thought
to be shaped (to different degrees of intensity) by the
forces outlined below ad seriatim:
Inception
The original setting of a town or city contains pervasive
influences on the future of the city and its citizens.
Canadian settlement frontiers were linked to the building
of railroads that nurtured the growth of prairie towns that
grew through phases of urban redevelopment charac-
terized by various inceptions.
Exclusion
Once a town has been founded, growth occurs through
the mechanism of the rent gradient (discussed below)
that delimits the CBD from its surrounding area. This is
evident in US cities such as Chicago where the CBD is
the first of five zones radiating outward to form distinct
concentric circles. The ‘Chicago model’ has greatly en-
hanced our understanding of how a CBD evolves by
demonstrating that certain activities are ‘pushed’ outward
Central Business District 21
1880 1920
Food
markets
Food
markets Wholesale
Finance
Admini-
stration
Retail
Warehouses
Current
boundaries
due to the limited amount of central land coupled with
the rent-paying abilities of particular functions. Retailing
is often used as a primary indicator of exclusion as
higher-order services including department stores can
afford a central location while smaller shops and neigh-
borhood centers cannot. Exclusion also extends to non-
CBD uses such as residential, industrial, wholesale, and
vacant land that characterize the zone of discard. The
spatial patterns associated with exclusion are directly
related to the physical direction of CBD growth along
the zone of assimilation.
Segregation
While exclusion drives certain uses ‘out’ of the CBD,
segregation drives certain land uses apart ‘within’ the
CBD. As the clustering of activities grows in the CBD,
the likelihood of functional segregation increases because
greater amounts of one type of activity tend to ultimately
exclude other CBD functions. New York’s financial dis-
trict in lower Manhatttan and Vienna’s Museum Quarter
are cases in point. This functional segregation is a result
of previous land uses becoming so self-contained that
they lack any significant external linkages or economies
of scale.
Extension
As the CBD continues to evolve, distinctions are made
between different types of extensions. In the nineteenth
century the typical CBD was a compact unit at the focus
of crosscutting routes and the typical residential area was
a ‘bead on a string’ shaped by suburban railway lines.
After World War I, CBDs generally began to grow out-
ward in thin alignments along arterial streets in the zone
of assimilation, although cities like Chicago arguably
extended into its hinterland as concentric circles. How-
ever, it is not the physical direction of the extension from
the CBD but rather, the potential trade losses to outlying
locations that have come to dominate the literature.
22 Central Business District
Replication and readjustment
Replication and the dynamic of adjustment are major
concerns for the economy of the CBD. This is part of a
more general trend of decentralization whereby the CBD
experiences a trade deficit due to the rise of comparative
services in suburbia and other outlying areas. The rise of
regional shopping malls in the UK and technopoles in the
US are indicators of this decentralization. The realization
that business and trade can be successfully located out-
side the CBD is not just a consequence of limited central
land supply, but also due to greater individual mobility
and wider consumer choices. After World War II, in-
creasing decentralization and capital flight suggested that
CBDs lacked the relative urban weight that they once
had. The failure of various attempts to reshuffle the
hierarchy back in favor of the CBD prompted a number
of critical scholars to raise concerns about an ‘urban
crisis’ or the ‘crisis of contemporary urbanity’. This doom
and gloom thesis became particularly influential in the
1960s and 1970s when the slowdown of manufacturing
and heavy industry gave rise to a number of subsequent
problems including high levels of unemployment and
inflation.
Redevelopment
As a result of decades of urban decay in the CBD, re-
development and physical planning have taken on more
teleological roles. At first these redevelopment initiatives
attempted to stamp out urban decay only to realize that
social problems cannot be solved by physical planning
solutions alone. Since the 1980s redevelopment of the
CBD has shifted to improving urban livability for con-
ditionally more prosperous residents. This is part of a
widespread willingness of municipal authorities to accept
change ‘only if ’ it is ‘for the better’. Thus, inner-city
slums are not replaced with similar low-income housing
but rather upmarket postmodern flats bankrolled by the
private sector under the aegis of the neoliberal local state.
The selectivity associated with the redevelopment
agenda remains one of the most debated areas in human
geography and right across the social sciences.
A city of realms
Despite continuing decentralization, the final stage in the
evolution suggests that the CBD will remain the location
of highly specialized functions. While there is general
acceptance that some activities have moved out of the
CBD, there is no universal agreement that this de-
centralization spells euthanasia for the CBD. This opti-
mism is partly related to the purported success of various
forms of civic boosterism, the exploitations of location
specific assets, and cultural regeneration programs col-
lectively referred to as ‘selling places’. Appellations in-
cluding the European City of Culture and UK City of
Architecture of Design and events like the Olympic
Games reinforce the symbolic importance of the CBD as
an integral component of urban civic consciousness. The
ethos behind such initiatives is to (re)bolster the eco-
nomic and cultural values of the CBD as the prime lo-
cation for business and social life.
Delimiting the CBD
Just as the CBD has evolved through a number of dif-
ferent stages there have been various attempts to delimit
its boundaries traditionally defined by a ‘blighted zone’
(of discard), characterized by obsolete and deteriorated
property. At the most visible level the CBD can be
delimited by the highest buildings, the heaviest
concentration of traffic and pedestrian flows, and a large
daytime working population and a low residential
population. However, there is general agreement that
these observations only provide crude indicators of the
CBD’s magnetism and are therefore not entirely
satisfactory.
The main theoretical contributions for delimiting the
CBD have come from approaches that employ land val-
ues and indices. These include floor space, business in-
tensity, and valuation of properties. The application of
land rent is based upon earlier principles most associated
with von Thunen’s explanation of agricultural land uses.
His central idea is that the economic gain from farming
land decreases with an increase in distance from the
market (CBD) due to more expensive transport costs. In
urban environments the general assumption with land
value delimitations is that individual land uses will
compete for the most desirable central location in or as
near to the CBD as possible. Potential benefits can in-
clude unique attributes such as strategic location, local
market demand, integration with regional clusters, and
human resources. However, these potential benefits come
at a cost of having to pay the highest amount of rent to be
closest to or at the peak land value intersection (PLVI).
This is an area in the CBD where the main roads and
other transport links intersect, but the actual position of
the PLVI can shift depending on the direction of CBD
growth along the zone of assimilation. A useful general-
ization based on North American cities shows how the
CBD builds up around the PLVI first before extending
out along the main transport corridors (Figure 3). Any
further increases in distance away from the PLVI means a
drop in land values which in turn produces changing
physical urban land use patterns (retail, office, and
residential).
The schematic representation in Figure 3 is based on
the land value surface that is, a reflection of accessibility
within the urban area. Since accessibility differs across
the urban area land use patterns are based on the ability
to pay rent for the most accessible locations in the CBD.

Roads intersecting at
city center
Figure 3 Idealized outline of the CBD according to Murphy and
Vance 1954 taken from Scargil, D. I. (1979). The Form of Cities,
p 87. London: Bell and Hyman.
Retailing (1)
Location rent
Industrial (2)
Residential (3)
Distance from the city center
(1)
(2)
(3)
Figure 4 The Alonso Model after Alonso, W. (1946). Location
and Land Use: Toward a general theory of land rent. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press taken from Johnston, R. J.,
Gregory, D., Pratt, G. & Watts, M. (2000) (eds.) The Dictionary
of Human Geography (4th edn.), p 21 Malden, MA: Blackwell,
(See also http://www.xreferplus.com/entry/733934)
This is supported by a number of other models which
suggest that the land use most dependent upon accessi-
bility outbids other potential users. Figure 4 shows that
retailing (usually malls, department stores, and flagship
stores) is most dependent upon accessibility followed by
offices and then residential land uses. The resulting type
of land use pattern is also associated with steeper
declines in the offer price curve for those functions
(retailing) that are most dependent upon a central
location.
Central Business District 23
The CBD and the Threat of
Decentralization
Many changes have occurred in Western society since
1945 that have implications for the twentieth-
first-century CBD. These changes include fluctuating
urban economic performance, the rise of global neoli-
beralism, and advances in process and product technol-
ogies. Notwithstanding, it is now near customary to claim
that decentralization, especially in retailing, has had the
biggest impact on the fate of the CBD. More recently the
academic literature has been concerned with the con-
tinued growth of retail parks and regional malls in the
UK and mega malls in North America that are purported
to threaten the long-term future of the CBD. This poses a
problem because while CBDs are expected to compete
with one another at the interurban scale, they must first
and foremost be able to survive in their own regional
economies. These trends have been complimented by a
strong current of deindustrialization exemplified by the
rise of technoploes in the US and growing support for
polycentric regions in European planning circles. This
restructuring of the space economy is particularly
problematic because in relation to retailing and business
parks at least, the CBD is unable to fully exploit the
general shift toward major space units and the demand
for adjacent car parking.
The Case of UK Retailing
As decentralization continues apace a number of CBDs
have experienced propulsive growth at out of town lo-
cations. In the case of the UK this trend is nothing new, as
retailing has existed at non-CBD locations since before
the end of the nineteenth century. It wasn’t until 1947
that the Town and Country and Planning Act officially
established a centralized system of planning. This meant
a traditional approach to retailing as both central and
local government aimed to preserve a hierarchy of
shopping centers in accordance with central place theory.
Consequently, proposals for peripheral sites were per-
ceived as a threat to the established retail hierarchy and
the viability of the CBD as a whole. This stands in
marked contrast to the post-war situation in North
America where out of town regional shopping centers
and mega malls were commonplace.
However, since the 1960s the British retail environ-
ment has altered dramatically through decentralization
that reflected both morphological and organizational
changes. The opening of Brent Cross in 1976 was fol-
lowed by other out of town malls including the Metro
Centre, Meadowhall, Merry Hill, Lakeside, Bluewater,
and Braehead. These out of town sites offer good road
access, large amounts of free parking, major retail
chains acting as anchor tenants, and some form of
24 Central Business District
nonretailing activity such as the ice rink at Braehaed and
the concert venue at the Trafford Centre in Manchester.
One influential approach usefully captures this retail
decentralization in three waves:
• decentralization
Wave 1 – commencing in the late 1960s involved the
of food retailing in the form of free-
standing superstores and hypermarkets.
• Wave 2 – beginning in the 1970s, was the decentral-
ization of stores selling household goods, including
do-it-yourself goods, furniture, carpets, electrical
goods, and motor accessories.
• Wave 3 – from the mid-1980s onward was associated
with the exodus of comparison goods such as ‘high
streets out of town’.
With the election of Margaret Thatcher in 1979 the New
Right aggressively pursued the politics of deregulation
through ‘opening up’ the UK economy for international
business. Shortly afterward, moves to make planning more
‘business friendly’ began with the Department of the En-
vironment’s Circular 22/80. This asked local authorities to
prioritize planning applications that contributed to na-
tional and local economic activity. In recognition of these
evolving changes a final draft of the National Planning
Guidelines in England and the National Planning and
Policy Guidelines in Scotland was drawn up and planning
authorities were asked to facilitate retail development, not
only in existing centers but where appropriate on-sites
detached from such centers. These neoliberal conditions
set the scene for the fiercely competitive ‘store wars’ that
continue to pose a threat to British CBDs today.
While shopping malls pose a threat to the British
CBD, they have also been at the forefront of the ‘back to
the city movement’. A number of cities up and down the
UK including Birmingham, Leeds, and Glasgow have
used the seductive trappings of retailing as a privileged
tool to gain competitive advantage in their respective
regional hinterlands. The new Bullring Mall has injected
d1 billion into the center of Birmingham and the White
City development in London is expected to generate
more than d2 billion of fresh investment in the next 10
years after it opens in 2008. In Glasgow city center, the
opening of Buchanan Galleries Shopping Mall in 1999
reflects another attempt where the CBD is attempting to
become more competitive with out of town retail de-
velopments at Braehead and Glasgow Fort. Thus, the use
of malls in the CBD is as much about restoring the
downtown area as a center for economic activity as it is
about capitalizing upon consumer demand for high order
and salubrious retail facilities. This trend is compounded
by more recent political shifts that will provide cities
with the chance to elect their own mayors. Despite an
initial lukewarm take up, the UK Government is pushing
the idea of a mayoral model that if successful may pro-
vide stronger leadership for CBDs in the future.
Conclusions
Throughout much of the twentieth century, CBDs served
as areas of supreme importance and all surrounding areas
sorted themselves into ranks of decreasing eminence.
This economic determinism meant that high-order ser-
vices including retailing were located in the CBD based
on their ability to pay rent. However, the use of the term
CBD is now more debatable than ever before; many cities
now have ‘central business’ all over the central area. This
is a result of continuing pressure on finite CBD space that
intensified in the post-war period. Consequently, the
emergence of more polycentric regions has become a
threat to traditional central place type urban patterns. In
both North America and Europe this threat has created a
more competitive space economy consummated by
various non-CBD developments including shopping
malls, suburbia, technopoles, and edge cities. However,
since the 1980s these developments have galvanized a
number of CBD initiatives encapsulated by a more
general ‘back to the city movement’. This ongoing re-
invention of the CBD reiterates the competitive advan-
tage of cities through taking stock of various tax breaks
and financial incentives that thrive in a climate of de-
regulation. This approach has had some success in the
CBDs of world cities like London, New York, and Tokyo.
Whether or not the CBDs of smaller cities can regain
their dominance in relation to proximate ex-urban lo-
cations remains to be seen.
See also: Chicago School; Gentrification; Land Rent
Theory; Retail Geographies.
Further Reading
Bourne, L. S. (ed.) (1971). Internal Structure of the City: Readings on
space and environment. New York: Oxford University Press.
Frieden, B. J. and Saglyn, L. B. (1990). Downtown malls and the city
agenda. Society 27, 42--49.
Gelder, K. and Thornton, S. (eds.) (1997). The subcultures reader.
London: Routlege.
Hall, T. (2006). Urban Geography (3rd edn.). London: Routledge.
Knowles, R. and Wareing, J. (1976). Economic and Social Geography
made simple. London: W. H. Allen.
Lawless, P. and Brown, F. (1986). Urban Growth and Change in Britain.
London: Harper and Row.
Lefebvre, H. (1970). The Urban Revolution. Minneapolis, MN: University
of Minnesota Press.
Mumford, L. (1986). What is a city? In Miller, D. L. (ed.) The Lewis
Mumford reader. New York: Pantheon Books.
Park, R. E. (1997). The city: Suggestions for the investigation of human
behaviour. In Gelder, K. & Thornton, S. (eds.) The Subcultures
Reader. London: Routledge.
Scargill, D. I. (1979). The form of cities. London: Bell and Hyman.
Scott, A. J. (2002). Industrial urbanism in late-twentieth century
California. In Dear, M. J. (ed.) From Chicago to L.A.: Making sense of
urban theory. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Ward, D. (1968). The emergence of central immigrant ghettoes in
American cities: 1840–1920. Annals of the Association of American
Geographers 58, 343--359.
 Central Business District 25

Relevant Websites http://www.easternct.edu/depts/amerst/Malls.htm

Shopping Centre Studies.
http://www.icsc.org/index.php
http://www.brc.org.uk/
ICSC.
British Retail Consortium.