Von Thunen’s Agricultural Land Use Model:
1. Isolated state
2. Single market at center
3. Market price, p, same for all producers of a given crop
4. Featureless plain
5. Yield per unit acre same everywhere
6. Transportation costs are proportional to distance and invariant to direction
7. Farmers maximize profits
Rural Geography (Ch.14 pp. 199-201)
Symbolic model: LR = Y (p-c) - Ytd
Wheat (p) Wheat (p') Wheat (p")Yield 100 100 100Price 10 12 20Cost 5 5 5Transport 0.20 0.20 0.20
0
200
400
600
800
1000
1200
1400
1600
0 6 12 18 24 30 36 42 48 54 60 66 72
Distance to Market
Ren
t Wheat (p)
Wheat (p')
Wheat (p")
Rural Geography (Ch.14 pp. 199-201)
Rural Geography (Ch.14 pp. 199-201)
Wheat Barley OatsYield 100 100 100Price 10 8 6Cost 5 4 3Transport 0.20 0.08 0.02
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100105110115120125130135140145150
Distance to Market
Ren
t
Wheat
Barley
Oats
Urbanization in the 1990s
• Urban population as a percent of total population (Fig. 18.6)
– low-levels in Sub-Saharan Africa
– Variation in urbanization in Southwest Asia/North Africa
– Low urbanization in South Asia
– Singapore 100 percent urban
– Pacific Rim: only Japan, S. Korea, and Taiwan are highly urbanized.
Urban Geography: Urbanization and Location
Urbanization in the 1990s
• Distribution of Great World Cities (Fig. 18.7)
– Western Europe, N. America, E. Asia
– Regional megalopolis in S. Florida
– Urban complex in Germany’s Ruhr-Rhine zone
– Randstad in Netherlands
– megalopolitan development in Japan.
Urban Geography: Urbanization and Location
Urbanization in the 1990s
• Megacities
– Many of largest cities in poorer countries
– By 2025, 15 cities with more than 20 million.
– Stand alone cities in developing countries
– Conurbations in developed countries
– By 2025 New York will no longer be among the world’s 10 largest cities.
– Fast growing cities in Asia, Africa, and South America
Urban Geography: Urbanization and Location