Chapter 12: Services

Chapter 12: Services

Consumer Services

Provides services to individual consumers who desire them and can pay for them.

Business Services

• Helps other businesses.

• They diffuse and distribute services

• Include:– Financial

services– Professional

services– Transportation– Communication

– Utilities services

Business Services

Public Services

Includes governmental services at various levels that provide security and protection for citizens and businesses.

Land Use

A large percentage of the world’s population still practiceAgriculture and live in rural settlements.

Clustered Rural Settlements

Families live close to one another and fields surround the houses and farms buildings.

Dispersed Rural Settlements

Farmers live on individual farms and are more isolated from their neighbors.

These are associated with more recent agricultural settlements in the developed world.

Central Place Theory

Examines the relationship between settlements of different sizes.

Especially their ability to provide various goods and services.

Developed by Walter Chistaller in the 1930’s.

Based on his study of settlement patterns in southern Germany.

The theory consists of two basic concepts:1) Threshold -- the minimum market needed to bring a firm or city selling goods and services into existence and to keep it in business2) Range -- the average maximum distance people will travel to purchase goods and services

Central Place Theory

Services will have a market area or hinterland

The Gravity Model

Predicts that the best location for a service is directly related to the number of people in the area

And, inversely related to the distance that people must travel for it

A place with more people will have more potential customers

People who are further away from a service will be less likely to use it

Rank Size Rule

• In many MDC’s there is a hierarchy of settlements from largest to smallest

• Rank size rule= a country’s nth largest settlement will be 1/nth the population of the largest settlement

• So the second largest city would be half the size of the largest

Central Place Theory Diagram

Primate City Rule

Many LDC’s as well as some European countries follow the primate city rule

A primate city is much larger and more important than any other city in the country

Buenos Aires, Argentina and Copenhagen Denmark are examples of these

Copenhagen, Denmark

Buenos Aires, Argentina

United Nations in NYC

NATO and the headquarters of the EU is in Brussels

Specialized producer-service centers

• Have management, research and development activities associated with specific industries.

• Detroit is a specialized producer-service center specializing in motor vehicles.

Dependent Centers

• Depend on decisions made in world cities for their economic well-being

• They provide relatively unskilled jobs

• San Diego is an industrial and military dependent center

CBD

• Central Business District = CBD• The center of a city where services

have traditionally clustered• Three types of retail services have

concentrated in the center because they require accessibility– These include services with a high

threshold• A large department store is a

high threshold service

High Range

• A retail store with a high range are specialized stores that are patronized less frequently– Example: Whole Foods

• Many high Threshold/high Range stores are moving to the suburbs

• Services that cater to people who work and/or live in the CBD are actually expanding

• Business services remain a part of the CBD as well– Banking– Advertising

Shopping in Baltimore’s Inner Harbor!

Built Environment and Social Space

• Land costs in CBD are high because of competition for accessibility

• Land use is more intensive in CBD• Built character more vertical• Infrastructure runs underground• Skyscrapers give the central city a

distinctive feature• Washington DC is the only large US

CBD that does not have a skyscraper..why?

No building is allowed to be higher than the U.S. Capitol dome!

What business/service would you run?