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Information Technology and Urban Form: Challenges to Smart Growth

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  • Ivonne Audirac

    (Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Florida State University, iaudirac@garnet.acns.fsu.edu)

Abstract

This article discusses how information and communications technology (ICT), construed either as evolutionary or revolutionary, permeates two broad urban research traditions of metropolitan change. It reviews research findings from these two research traditions concerning metropolitan population and employment redistribution. It suggests that synergies between ICT and our car, truck, and airplane society may be a thrust behind well-established urban decentralization and deconcentration trends. Furthermore, a review of research on ICT-intensive firms, assumed to be the “glue†of urban agglomerations, reveals that metropolitan dispersion and regional deconcentration are also occurring in this sector. Although both centrifugal and centripetal forces are shaping the form of the information age metropolis, rather than central city renaissance or absolute urban dissolution, the resulting spatially distributed network pattern is polycentric and evolving into a regional constellation of ICT agglomerations interconnected via high-speed transportation and digital networks. The increasingly spread-out metropolitan form embodies the time-sensitive logic of the information age. However, such logic poses serious challenges to smart growth’s metropolitan agenda.

Suggested Citation

  • Ivonne Audirac, 2005. "Information Technology and Urban Form: Challenges to Smart Growth," International Regional Science Review, , vol. 28(2), pages 119-145, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:inrsre:v:28:y:2005:i:2:p:119-145
    DOI: 10.1177/0160017604273624
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    Cited by:

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    2. Yigitcanlar, Tan & Lee, Sang Ho, 2014. "Korean ubiquitous-eco-city: A smart-sustainable urban form or a branding hoax?," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 100-114.
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    4. Wu, Guoqiang & Hong, Jinhyun & Thakuriah, Piyushimita, 2019. "Assessing the relationships between young adults’ travel and use of the internet over time," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 8-19.
    5. Elizabeth A. Mack & Tony H. Grubesic, 2009. "Broadband Provision And Firm Location In Ohio: An Exploratory Spatial Analysis," Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG, vol. 100(3), pages 298-315, July.
    6. Bris, Myriam & Pawlak, Jacek & Polak, John W., 2017. "How is ICT use linked to household transport expenditure? A cross-national macro analysis of the influence of home broadband access," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 231-242.
    7. Sergejs Gubins & Jos Ommeren & Thomas Graaff, 2019. "Does new information technology change commuting behavior?," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 62(1), pages 187-210, February.
    8. Mack, Elizabeth A. & Rey, Sergio J., 2014. "An econometric approach for evaluating the linkages between broadband and knowledge intensive firms," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 105-118.
    9. Elizabeth A. Mack & Luc Anselin & Tony H. Grubesic, 2011. "The importance of broadband provision to knowledge intensive firm location," Regional Science Policy & Practice, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 3(1), pages 17-35, March.
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