Spatial development of urban functions in the Center of Koriyama City

Abstract

The objective of this study is to clarify the spatial development of urban functions in a medium-sized city by analyzing the distribution and process of agglomeration of urban functions in the center of Koriyama City, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. Defined urban functions include the retail, restaurant, office, and hotel function. In terms of horizontal distribution, the agglomeration of retail functions becomes a centripetal pattern, although they were linearly distributed along traditional main road. Restaurant functions are distributed behind a conglomeration of retail functions. Office functions migrate from narrow internal blocks to broad external blocks along arterial roads. Distribution of hotel functions changes from blocks close to the station where there are Japanese style inns to blocks along main streets where there are modern hotels. As a result, spatial arrangement of urban functions performs horizontal differentiation of circular structure, as retail and hotel functions are in the core zone, restaurant functions are in the zone surrounding the core zone, and office functions are in the outermost zone. In terms of vertical distribution, retail functions dominate on lower floors, and the proportion of office functions is the highest on medium-high floors. On higher floors, however, retail, office and hotel functions are in the state of equilibrium. This shows that the vertical differentiation of functions does not reach higher floors.