The Intrametropolitan Location Of High Order Services: Patterns, Factors And Mobility In Montreal

The issue of the interurban location of high order service activities (i. e., producer services and finance, insurance and real estate services) was one of the major areas investigated by service industries researchers during the 1980s; the spatial concentration of high order services in a relatively small number of large metropolitan areas is now a well documented fact. In the 1990s, researchers are increasingly turning their focus on the intrametropolitan location of these activities. In particular, certain studies have shown that high order services have begun to leave their “natural habitat†–the CBD–in order to locate in suburban office agglomerations. This paper explores the intrametropolitan location issue in the specific context of the Montreal Census Metropolitan Area (CMA), employing data derived from a detailed survey of 324 high order service establishments. We first examine patterns of intrametropolitan mobility, in terms of both establishments and employment; spatial stability, rather than decentralization, is evident. Next, we explore locational factors from the viewpoint of site attributes. Accessibility to the establishment for clients and land costs or rental prices emerge as the major factors. Finally, we conduct a logistic regression analysis in order to identify the principal characteristics of high order service establishments that may be used to explain their location within the Montreal CMA. The majority of the characteristics found to be statistically significant involve market linkages to clients, either in terms of the geographic distribution of clients or the types of clients served.