Much of the recent urban literature on suburban employment centres has neglected the role of high-order services, perhaps the principal component of 'edge cities', in the creation of the evolving multinucleated metropolitan structure. This paper specifically explores the role of high-order services in this process. We use employment by place-of-work data at the census-tract level to examine the changing intrametropolitan geography of employment in four finance, insurance and real estate (FIRE) services and eight business services in the Montreal area over the period 1981-96. We find evidence of central business district (CBD) decline in relative, but not absolute, terms. The resulting decentralisation has clearly assumed the form of polycentricity rather than of generalised dispersion. In spite of recent advances in telecommunications technologies, agglomeration economies continue to exert an important impact upon intrametropolitan location.

There is little consensus on where and how employment is decentralising in metropolitan areas. However, a number of key processes have been brought to light, and different cities have tended to display different processes: strong CBDs, suburban polynucleation, job dispersal, scattering, edgeless cities and perhaps 'keno capitalism'. This paper explores the distribution and growth of employment at a fine spatial scale. It is shown that, at this scale, there are very dynamic processes of growth and decline throughout metropolitan areas, but that these processes are organised at a wider scale by stable employment centres and by links between these centres. The structures and processes thus revealed suggest that the spatial economy of metropolitan areas should be approached as a chaotic system. From an empirical perspective, this means that, depending on the scale of analysis and the way data are considered, polynucleation, dispersal and chaos are all observed: this may partly explain the lack of consensus in the literature. The only process not evident within Canadian cities is scattering, but this process may in fact be occurring within some areas identified as suburban employment zones.

Since the late 1980s there has been considerable interest in the intrametropolitan location of economic activity. A growing number of studies examine in detail the spatial structure of particular metropolitan areas, or present comparisons at a relatively aggregated spatial and sectoral level. From these studies, certain authors have deduced a general pattern of metropolitan spatial development—one involving the suburbanisation of economic activity and the weakening of the central business district. The scarcity of comparable data covering different cities renders these generalisations somewhat tentative, however. In this paper we use a unique database to compare the spatial structures, and their evolution over time, for the four largest Canadian metropolitan areas: Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, and Ottawa – Hull. These data allow highly disaggregated spatial (census-tract level) and sectoral (thirty economic sectors) analyses. The results, which illustrate the existence of three distinct patterns of development amongst these four metropolitan areas, call into question the existence of a single model. In doing so they also raise a series of questions regarding possible explanations for these differences.

Scholarly interest in service industries, in general, and especially in producer services is a relatively recent phenomenon. The "modern" era of research on services dates only from the early to mid-1980s; it is only since this time that geographers, regional economists, regional scientists, and others have begun to analyze in a concerted and systematic way questions concerning the economic role and the locational dynamics of the full range of service activities, including producer services. The birth of the modern era was a long and difficult process for several reasons. On the one hand, the service researchers that pioneered the modern era had to contend with the prevailing paradigm-originally established in economics by Adam Smith in the late 18th century, reinforced by Karl Marx in the 19th century, and consolidated by Alfred Fisher and Colin Clark in the first half of the 20th century-that viewed all services as nonproductive activities-that is, as that which remained when productive (primary sector and manufacturing) activities had been accounted for. On the other hand, in spite of theoretical-quantitative "revolutions" within geography and regional economics early in the second half of the 20th century (which, in part, led to the creation of the interdisciplinary field of regional science), research on services was conceptually stagnant for several decades, being largely confined to the limited framework of central place studies. In this context, an almost total emphasis was placed on consumer services, to the exclusion of what now appears to be the most intellectually interesting and economically significant element of the service constellation: producer services.In order to place the present progress report in an appropriate historical and intellectual context, I will briefly review the major characteristics and achievements of the first 10 or 15 years of the modern era of service industry research. Before doing so, however, the notion of producer services requires some comment.

In spite of the considerable economic importance of high order (intermediate demand) services, research on the growth and location of these activities has remained at a fairly aggregate level. The behavior of the individual elements of this group has rarely been documented in detail. In this paper, we seek to determine if individual high order service activities are becoming spatially more concentrated or dispersed across the Canadian urban system, and to determine if differential rates of growth may be observed by region and by urban size category. These issues are of considerable importance in the ongoing debate concerning the impact of the tertiarization of the economy on uneven spatial development. We examine the performance and location of 17 individual high order service activities over a set of 152 Canadian urban areas with populations greater than 10,000 inhabitants. Most of these activities are highly concentrated in a small number of very large urban areas, and their level of concentration declined only very slightly over the period 1971-1991. We conclude with an examination of the factors underlying the geographic concentration of high order services at the upper end of the urban hierarchy. Key Words: high order services, employment, uneven development, spatial concentration, urban system.

COFrEY W. J. and POI. ~SE M. (1985) Local development: conceptual bases and policy implications, Reg. Studies 19, 85-93. Although local development is frequently cited as an option within the broader context of regional policy, the concept remains vague. The bases of the local development approach lie in its complementarity with three traditional pillars of regional theory and policy: capital and infrastructure policies; migration as an adjustment mechanism; and growth centre strategies. In examining the potential utility of local development as an effective element of regional development policy, we emphasize the emergence of local entrepreneurship and the role of the State in stimulating local initiatives. Local development policy may be generalized in terms of three options involving financial assistance, access to information, and social animation. Regional development policy Local development Entrepreneurship Human capital CorrrY W. J. and POL/:SE M. (1985) D6veloppement local: bases conceptuelles et port~e politique, Reg. Studies 19, 85-93. Bien que le d6veloppement local se voit proposer en tant que option dans le cadre plus large de la politique r~gionale, la notion reste floue. Les racines de la faqon centr~e sur le d~veloppement local remontent au point o6 elle constitue le compl~ment des trois axes fondamentales de la th6orie et de la politique r~gionales; ~ savoir, les politiques de capital et d'dquipement, la migration comme m~canisme d'ajustement, et les strategies en faveur des p61es de croissance. En examinant l'utilit6 6ventuelle du d6veloppe-ment local comme ~l~ment-cl~ de la potitique r4gionale, on souligne la naissance d'un esprit d'entreprise locale et le r61e de l'Etat afin d'inciter des initiatives locales. En bref la politique du d6veloppement local comprend trois volets; aide financi&e, acc~s ~t l'information et action sociale. Politique r~gionale Esprit d'entreprise D6veloppement local Capital humain COFFEY W. J. and POL~SE M. (1985) Ortliche Entwicklung: Begriffsgrundlagen und Implikationen der Zielsetzung, Reg. Studies 19, 85-93. Obschon 6rtliche Entwick-

No abstract

No abstract