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Fifty years of urban accessibility: The impact of the urban railway network on the land gradient in Berlin 1890-1936

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  • Ahlfeldt, Gabriel M.
  • Wendland, Nicolai

Abstract

As the first to use an archival data set on historical land values in Berlin, Germany, from 1890 to 1936, we investigate the impact of the rapid transport system on urban decentralization, using comparative statics of classical rent theory as a benchmark. We find that the monocentric model performs well over the entire period studied, revealing gradients that - although diminishing over time - turn out to be relatively steep in international comparison. Travel time to CBD measures incorporating the rapid transport network, however, clearly outperform traditional distance to CBD measures in terms of explanatory power. The evolution of the rapid transit network, and the subsequent changes in travel times to the CBD, explain almost three quarter of the overall trend in decentralization. Endogeneity concerns are addressed in an IV framework using a counterfactual transport network as an instrument.

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  • Ahlfeldt, Gabriel M. & Wendland, Nicolai, 2011. "Fifty years of urban accessibility: The impact of the urban railway network on the land gradient in Berlin 1890-1936," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 77-88, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:regeco:v:41:y:2011:i:2:p:77-88
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    Cited by:

    1. Chen, Shaopei & Claramunt, Christophe & Ray, Cyril, 2014. "A spatio-temporal modelling approach for the study of the connectivity and accessibility of the Guangzhou metropolitan network," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 12-23.
    2. Waights, Sevrin, 2018. "Does the law of one price hold for hedonic prices?," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 55(15), pages 3299-3317.
    3. Sadayuki, Taisuke, 2018. "Measuring the spatial effect of multiple sites: An application to housing rent and public transportation in Tokyo, Japan," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 155-173.
    4. Gibbons, Stephen & Lyytikäinen, Teemu & Overman, Henry G. & Sanchis-Guarner, Rosa, 2019. "New road infrastructure: The effects on firms," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 35-50.
    5. Pathak, Rahul & Wyczalkowski, Christopher K. & Huang, Xi, 2017. "Public transit access and the changing spatial distribution of poverty," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 198-212.
    6. Mitra, Suman K. & Saphores, Jean-Daniel M., 2016. "The value of transportation accessibility in a least developed country city – The case of Rajshahi City, Bangladesh," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 184-200.
    7. Kristoffer Moeller & Gabriel Ahlfeldt & Nicolai Wendland, 2013. "Chicken or egg? Transport and urban development in Berlin," ERSA conference papers ersa13p874, European Regional Science Association.
    8. Gonzalez-Navarro, Marco & Turner, Matthew A., 2018. "Subways and urban growth: Evidence from earth," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 85-106.
    9. Kristoffer Moeller, 2013. "Culturally clustered or in the cloud? Location of internet start-ups in Berlin," ERSA conference papers ersa13p455, European Regional Science Association.
    10. Ahlfeldt, Gabriel M. & Barr, Jason, 2022. "The economics of skyscrapers: A synthesis," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 129(C).
    11. Arturas Kaklauskas & Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas & Natalija Lepkova & Saulius Raslanas & Kestutis Dauksys & Ingrida Vetloviene & Ieva Ubarte, 2021. "Sustainable Construction Investment, Real Estate Development, and COVID-19: A Review of Literature in the Field," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(13), pages 1-42, July.
    12. Claudia N. Berg & Uwe Deichmann & Yishen Liu & Harris Selod, 2017. "Transport Policies and Development," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 53(4), pages 465-480, April.
    13. McMillen, Daniel, 2015. "Conditionally parametric quantile regression for spatial data: An analysis of land values in early nineteenth century Chicago," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 28-38.
    14. Hornung, Erik, 2012. "Railroads and Micro-regional Growth in Prussia," CAGE Online Working Paper Series 80, Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE).
    15. Hanlon, W.Walker & Heblich, Stephan, 2022. "History and urban economics," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(C).
    16. Konstantin A. Kholodilin, 2016. "War, housing rents, and free market: Berlin's rental housing during World War I," European Review of Economic History, Oxford University Press, vol. 20(3), pages 322-344.
    17. Gabriel M. Ahlfeldt & Kristoffer Moeller & Nicolai Wendland, 2015. "Chicken or egg? The PVAR econometrics of transportation," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 15(6), pages 1169-1193.
    18. Konstantin A. Kholodilin, 2015. "War, Housing Rents, and Free Market: A Case of Berlin's Rental Housing Market during the World War I," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1477, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    19. Miles, David & Sefton, James, 2017. "Houses across time and across place," CEPR Discussion Papers 12103, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    20. Nicolai Wendland, 2015. "All access: a micro-level case study on the secondary center of Berlin (1871–1936)," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 54(2), pages 375-399, March.
    21. Taisuke Sadayuki, 2017. "Measuring the spatial effect of multiple sites," RIEEM Discussion Paper Series 1703, Research Institute for Environmental Economics and Management, Waseda University.
    22. Rosa Sanchis-Guarner, 2012. "Driving Up Wages: The Effects of Road Construction in Great Britain," SERC Discussion Papers 0120, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    23. Zhonghao Zhang & Yaojen Tu & Xin Li, 2016. "Quantifying the Spatiotemporal Patterns of Urbanization along Urban-Rural Gradient with a Roadscape Transect Approach: A Case Study in Shanghai, China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(9), pages 1-19, August.
    24. Shen, Yu & de Abreu e Silva, João & Martínez, Luis Miguel, 2014. "Assessing High-Speed Rail’s impacts on land cover change in large urban areas based on spatial mixed logit methods: a case study of Madrid Atocha railway station from 1990 to 2006," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 184-196.
    25. Clapp, John M. & Eichholtz, Piet & Lindenthal, Thies, 2013. "Real option value over a housing market cycle," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(6), pages 862-874.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Transport innovations Land values Location productivity Economic history Berlin;

    JEL classification:

    • N7 - Economic History - - Economic History: Transport, International and Domestic Trade, Energy, and Other Services
    • N9 - Economic History - - Regional and Urban History
    • O12 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development
    • R33 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Real Estate Markets, Spatial Production Analysis, and Firm Location - - - Nonagricultural and Nonresidential Real Estate Markets

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    1. Historical Economic Geography

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