IV. THE CITY AND ITS HINTERLAND
Far from being an arbitrary clustering of people and buildings, the city is the nucleus of a wider zone of activity from which it draws its resources and over which it exerts its influence. The city and its hinterland represent two phases of the same mechanism which may be analyzed from various points of view.
1. Just as Galpin, in his Social Anatomy of a Rural Community, was able to determine the limits of the community by means of the area over which its trade routes extend, so the city may be delimited by the extent of its trading area. From the simpler area around it the city gathers the raw materials, part of which are essential to sustain the life of its inhabitants, and another part of which are transformed by the technique of the city population into finished products which flow out again to the surrounding territory, sometimes over a relatively larger expanse than the region of their origin. From another point of view the city sends out its tentacles to the remotest corners of the world to gather those sources of supply which are not available in the immediate vicinity, only to retail them to its own population and the rural region about it. Again, the city might be regarded as the distributor of wealth, an important economic rôle which has become institutionalized in a complex financial system.
Chisholm, George G. “The Geographical Relation of the Market to the Seats of Industry,” Scott. Geog. Mag., April, 1910.
Galpin, C. J. “The Social Anatomy of an Agricultural Community,” Agricultural Experiment Station of the University of Wisconsin, Research Bulletin 34 (Madison, Wisconsin, 1915).
Deals primarily with trade routes of an agricultural area, but throws considerable light on the urban trade area. (V, 2; X, 2.)
Levainville, Jacques. “Caen: Notes sur l’évolution de la fonction urbaine,” La Vie Urbaine, V (1923), 223–78.
Through its emphasis on the economic functions of the city this study makes clear the significance of the trade areas.
Newspapers, business houses, and mail-order houses in particular have published numerous discussions and graphic statements of their circulation or their trade relations with the surrounding territory. Such documents are to be found in numerous specialized trade and commercial journals. In addition there are government reports and publications of chambers of commerce bearing on this question.
2. One of the outstanding prerequisites of any city is a local transportation system which makes possible ready access of the population living in diverse sections to their places of work, the centers of trade, of culture, and of other social activities. The city consists of not merely a continuous densely populated and built up area, but of suburbs and outlying regions which by means of rapid transit are within easy reach of urban activities. This area has been termed the commuting area. Although the inhabitants of this larger area of settlement may not be under the same taxing, policing, and governing authorities as the inhabitants of the city proper, they think of themselves as part of the same metropolis and actively participate in its life.
Edel, Edmund. Neu Berlin, volume L in “Grossstadt Dokumente Series,” edited by Hans Ostwald, Berlin, 1905.
Discusses the changes brought about by recent growth in the city of Berlin, with emphasis on the recently built-up suburbs. (VII, 1, 2, 4.)
Lueken, E. “Vorstadtprobleme,” Schmollers Jahrb., XXXIX (1915), 1911–20.
Discussion of the governmental and technical problems brought about by the rise of the suburbs. (IV, 3; V, 1; VI.)
Wright, Henry C. “Rapid Transit in Relation to the Housing Problem,” in Proceedings of the Second National Conference on City Planning (Rochester, 1910), pp. 125–35.
Considers the possibility of distributing the urban population in the suburbs by building up a rapid transit system. (VI, 2, 3, 10.)
3. That part of the inhabitants of a given metropolitan area who actually are under the same administrative machinery may constitute only a relatively small part of the inhabitants of the metropolitan district as a whole. The size of the administrative unit tends to lag behind the size of the metropolis proper. Suburbs are incorporated gradually, and changes in charters and legal organization often do not keep pace with the rapid expansion of the district. The city of London proper is only a relatively small part of metropolitan London. As a result of such anomalous situations many difficulties occur in interpreting statistical data compiled by governmental agencies.
Gross, Charles. Bibliography of British Municipal History (New York, 1897). (I, 2; VI, 7.)
Howe, Frederic C. European Cities at Work (New York, 1913).
A general survey of the structure and the government of the European city. (II, 3; VI; VII, 1.)
——. The British City: The Beginnings of Democracy (New York, 1907). (II, 2, 3; VI.)
Kales, Albert M. Unpopular Government in the United States (Chicago, 1914).
A discussion of the administrative problems of the city, emphasizing the anomalous situations brought about by legal restrictions in the face of urban development. (VI, 7; X, 1, 2.)
Maxey, C. C. “Political Integration of Metropolitan Communities,” National Munic. Rev., XI (August, 1922), 229–53. (IV, 2; VI, 7.)
Wilcox, Delos F. The American City: A Problem in Democracy (New York, 1906).
A work dealing mainly with the administration of the city. Chapter i, “Democracy and City Life in America,” chapter ii on “The Street,” and v on “The Control of Leisure” are suggestive. (VI; VII, 5.)
4. One of the latest phases of city growth is the development of satellite cities. These are generally industrial units growing up outside the boundaries of the administrative city, which, however, are dependent upon the city proper for their existence. Often they become incorporated into the city proper after the city has inundated them, and thus lose their identity. The location of such satellites may exert a determining influence upon the direction of the city’s growth. These satellites become culturally a part of the city long before they are actually incorporated into it.
Taylor, Graham Romeyn. Satellite Cities: A Study of Industrial Suburbs (New York and London, 1915).
The most comprehensive study of its kind. (III, 4; VII, 2; IX, 1.)
Wright, R. “Satellite Cities,” Bellman, XXV (November 16, 1918), 551–52.
5. The city has come to be recognized as the center of culture. Innovations in social life and in ideas gravitate from the city to the country. Through its newspapers, theaters, schools, and museums, through its traveling salesmen and mail-order houses, through its large representation in the legislatures, and through many other points of contact with the inhabitants of the rural periphery about it, the city diffuses its culture over a large area. The city is in this respect an important civilizing agent.
Desmond, S. “America’s City Civilization: The Natural Divisions of the United States,” Century, CVIII (August, 1924), 548–55.
Holds that America is creating a new type of city civilization of a decentralized type. Several outstanding American cities are described as cultural entities and as exerting a dominating influence over a large rural area, thus suggesting the emergence of cultural provinces. (III, 1, 2, 3; IX, 2.)
Petermann, Theodor. “Die geistige Bedeutung der Grossstädte,” in the volume, Die Grossstadt (Dresden, 1903).
One of the best concise statements on the cultural significance of the city from the standpoint of the rural periphery. (IV, 6; IX, 1, 2; X, 1, 2, 3.)
Wells, Joseph. Oxford and Oxford Life (London, 1899).
An example of a cultural type of city from the functional standpoint, and its influence. (II, 2, 3; III, 4.)
There are a number of studies of cities as cultural centers. The city of Moscow has often been described as the city of churches, for instance, and as such has exercised an influence over the life of Russia all out of proportion to its function in other respects. Similar studies are available of Rome, Venice, Dresden, and a number of others.
6. With the advent of modern methods of communication the whole world has been transformed into a single mechanism of which a country or a city is merely an integral part. The specialization of function, which has been a concomitant of city growth, has created a state of interdependence of world-wide proportions. Fluctuations in the price of wheat on the Chicago Grain Exchange reverberate to the remotest part of the globe, and a new invention anywhere will soon have to be reckoned with at points far from its origin. The city has become a highly sensitive unit in this complex mechanism, and in turn acts as a transmitter of such stimulation as it receives to a local area. This is as true of economic and political as it is of social and intellectual life.
Baer, M. Der internationale Mädchenhandel, Vol. XXXVII in “Grossstadt Dokumente” (Berlin, 1905).
Shows that the large city is the center of the world white-slave traffic. (III, 4; VII, 5; IX, 4.)
Bernhard, Georg. Berliner Banken, Vol. VIII in “Grossstadt Dokumente” (Berlin, 1905).
While primarily a study of Berlin banks, shows the large city as the center of the economic life of the world. (III, 4; V, 1; IX, 1, 4.)
Jefferson, Mark. “Distribution of British Cities and the Empire,” Geog. Rev., IV (November, 1917), 387–94.
“English cities are unique in that they have taken the whole world for their countryside.... The conception of the British empire as the direct result of English trade in English manufactures, which in turn are largely a response to English treasures in coal and iron, is strongly reenforced by the distribution of her great cities.” (III, 4; VI, 8.)
Olden, Balder. Der Hamburger Hafen, Vol. XLVI in “Grossstadt Dokumente” (Berlin, 1905).
The influence of world-commerce on the city. (III, 3, 4; IV, 4; V, 1; IX, 1, 4.)
Penck, Albrecht. Der Hafen von New York, Vol. IV of the collection, “Meereskunde” (Berlin, 1910).
An excellent view of the traffic in the harbor of New York. (III, 2, 3, 4.)
Zimmern, Helen. Hansa Towns (New York, 1895).
An historical example of a typical function of cities in world-economy. (I, 2; II, 2.)