Unit 7 APHUG Terms

AP Human Geography Terms & Definitions

Basic Business

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

Business Service

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

Central Place

A market center for the exchange of services by people attracted from the surrounding area.

Central Place Theory

A theory that explains the distribution of services; larger settlements are fewer and provide services for a larger number of people.

Clustered Rural Settlement

A rural settlement where the houses and farm buildings are close together, with fields surrounding the settlement.

Customer Service

A service that meets the needs of individual consumers, including retail, education, health, and leisure services.

Dispersed Rural Settlement

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

Economic Base

A community’s base of economic businesses.

Enclosure Movement

The process of consolidating small landholdings into larger farms in England during the 18th century.

Food Desert

An area with a substantial number of low-income residents and poor access to a grocery store, usually beyond one mile.

Gravity Model

A model which states that the potential use of a service is related to the number of people and inversely to the distance to the service.

Hinterland

The area surrounding a central place from which people are attracted to its goods and services.

Nonbasic Business

A business that sells its products primarily to customers in the same settlement.

Primate City

A city that is the largest settlement in a country with over twice the population of the second largest.

Public Service

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

Range

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

Settlement

A permanent collection of buildings and inhabitants.

Threshold

The minimum number of people needed to support a service.

Urbanization

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

Annexation

Legally adding land area to a city in the United States.

Carbon Capture and Storage

The process of capturing waste CO2, transporting it to a storage site, and depositing it where it will not enter the atmosphere.

Central Business District

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

Concentric Zone Model

A model of urban structure where social groups are spatially arranged in a series of rings.

Density Gradient

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

Gentrification

A process of converting a low-income area to a middle class, owner-occupied area.

Megalopolis

A continuous urban complex in the northeastern United States.

Metropolitan Statistical Area

An urbanized area of at least 50,000 in population and surrounding areas connected to it.

Multiple Nuclei Model

A model of city structure where social groups are arranged around nodes of activities.

Peripheral Model

A model consisting of an inner city surrounded by suburban residential and business areas.

Public Housing

Government-owned housing rented to low-income individuals.

Redlining

A practice of refusing financial services based on neighborhood location.

Rush Hour

The period of heaviest traffic in the morning and evening.

Sector Model

A model of urban structure where social groups are arranged in sectors or wedges.

Smart Growth

Legislation to limit suburban sprawl and preserve farmland.

Sprawl

Development of new housing sites at low density not contiguous to existing areas.

Suburb

A residential or commercial area situated within an urban area but outside the central city.

Sustainable Development

Development that meets present needs without compromising future needs.

Underclass

A group in society prevented from participating in the material benefits of a more developed society.

Urban Area

A central city and its surrounding built-up suburbs.

Urbanized Area

An urban area with at least 50,000 inhabitants.

Zoning Ordinance

A law that limits the uses of land and maximum density of development in a community.