Urban Geography and City Models: Key Terms and Concepts

Annexation

Legally adding land area to a city in the United States

Basic industry

A business that sells its products or services primarily to consumers outside the settlement.

Boomburbs

Rapidly growing suburban cities that have large populations (often over 100,000) but still look and feel like suburbs rather than traditional urban centers.

Brownfields

Abandoned or underused industrial and commercial sites where redevelopment is complicated by real or suspected environmental contamination (like pollution or hazardous waste).

Business services

A service that primarily meets the needs of other businesses, including professional, financial, and transportation services.

Census tract

An area delineated by the U.S. Bureau of the Census for which statistics are published; in urban areas, census tracts correspond roughly to neighborhoods.

Central business district (CBD)

The area of a city where retail and office activities are clustered.

Central Place Theory

A theory that explains the distribution of services based on the fact that settlements serve as centers of market areas for services; larger settlements are fewer and farther apart than smaller settlements and provide services for a larger number of people who are willing to travel farther.

Clustered rural settlement

A rural settlement in which the houses and farm buildings of each family are situated close to each other, with fields surrounding the settlement.

Concentric zone model

A model of the internal structure of cities in which social groups are spatially arranged in a series of rings.

11. Consumer services

A business that provides services primarily to individual consumers, including retail services and education, health, and leisure services.

Council of government

A regional governing body made up of representatives from local governments (cities, counties, towns) within a metropolitan area.

Density gradient

The change in density in an urban area from the center to the periphery.

Dispersed rural settlement

A rural settlement pattern characterized by isolated farms rather than clustered villages.

Economic base

A community's collection of basic businesses.

Edge city

A node of office and retail activities on the edge of an urban area.

Entrepots

A port or trading center where goods are imported, stored, and then re-exported—often without the goods being fully processed.

Exurbs

Residential areas located beyond the suburbs, often on the outer fringe of metropolitan regions.

Filtering

The process by which housing passes from higher-income groups to lower-income groups over time.

Gentrification

A process of converting an urban neighborhood from a predominantly low-income, renter-occupied area to a predominantly middle-class, owner-occupied area.

Gravity model

A model that holds that the potential use of a service at a particular location is directly related to the number of people in a location and inversely related to the distance people must travel to reach the service.

Greenbelt

A ring of protected open space or rural land around a city, where development is restricted or completely banned.

Infilling

The process of developing vacant or underused parcels of land within existing urban areas, instead of expanding outward.

Market area (hinterland)

The area surrounding a central place from which people are attracted to use the place's goods and services.

Megacities

An urban settlement with a total population in excess of 10 million people.

Metacities

An urban settlement with a total population in excess of 20 million people.

Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA)

In the United States, an urbanized area of at least 50,000 population, the county within which the city is located, and adjacent counties meeting one of several tests indicating a functional connection to the central city.

Micropolitan statistical area

An urbanized area of between 10,000 and 50,000 inhabitants, the county in which it is located, and adjacent counties tied to the city.

Mixed use development

An urban development pattern where multiple land uses—such as residential, commercial, retail, offices, and sometimes public spaces—are combined in the same area or even the same building.

Multiple nuclei model

A model of the internal structure of cities in which social groups are arranged around a collection of nodes of activities.

New Urbanism

An urban design movement that promotes walkable, mixed-use, and community-oriented neighborhoods as an alternative to urban sprawl.

Nonbasic industries

A business that sells its products primarily to consumers in the community.

Peripheral model

A model of North American urban areas consisting of an inner city surrounded by large suburban residential and business areas tied together by a beltway or ring road.

Primate city

The largest settlement in a country, if it has more than twice as many people as the second-ranking settlement.

Public services

A service offered by the government to provide security and protection for citizens and businesses.

Range (of service)

The maximum distance people are willing to travel to use a service.

Rank-size rule

A pattern of settlements in a country such that the nth largest settlement is 1/n the population of the largest settlement.

Redlining

A process by which financial institutions draw red-colored lines on a map and refuse to lend money for people to purchase or improve property within the lines.

Sector model

A model of the internal structure of cities in which social groups are arranged around a series of sectors, or wedges, radiating out from the central business district.

40. Service

Any activity that fulfills a human want or need and returns money to those who provide it.

Settlement

A permanent collection of buildings and inhabitants.

Smart growth

Legislation and regulations to limit suburban sprawl and preserve farmland.

Social area analysis

Sprawl

Development of new housing sites at relatively low density and at locations that are not contiguous to the existing built- up area.

Squatter settlement

A residential area where people illegally occupy land and build makeshift housing, usually on the outskirts of a city.

Suburbanization

The process by which people move from urban areas (cities) to the suburbs, leading to the growth of residential communities on the outskirts of cities.

Threshold

The minimum number of people needed to support a service.

Urban renewal

The process of redeveloping and revitalizing deteriorated urban neighborhoods, often by clearing slums and building new housing, infrastructure, or commercial spaces.

Urbanization

An increase in the percentage of the number of people living in urban settlements.

Urbanized area

In the United States, an urban area with at least 50,000 inhabitants.

Zoning ordinance

A law or regulation that defines how land in specific areas can be used—such as for residential, commercial, industrial, or agricultural purposes.