Quote:
Originally Posted by Yuri
I say Rhine-Ruhr is a (polycentric) metro area. Madrid is a “city”, a (monocentric) metro area.
This thread cares about the latter, asking on how much a “city” can grow.
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You keep ignoring the points that others are making, and failing to properly distinguish between monocentric cities, polycentric cities, and megalopoli.
There are 3 categories here, not 2.
The Rhein-Ruhr region, or the Midlands conurbation in England, or Washington-Baltimore, are not “polycentric cities” but agglomerations of multiple cities. The Bay Area even fits this definition (but is more constrained by geography).
Tokyo, London or Los Angeles ARE polycentric cities with multiple commercial/financial centers. These contrast with a city like Chicago, which is truly monocentric.
I.e., one can live in London and commute from Essex into Liverpool Street, work in the City, party in Shoreditch, etc and never set foot in the West End or Knightsbridge or Kensington & Chelsea, and vice versa. Downtown Chicago on the other hand is one large CBD.
The point I am making is that there is probably a practical limit to how big a truly monocentric city like Chicago can grow because it becomes inefficient. There is no limit to how large a Tokyo/London/LA polycentric city can grow because people don’t actually have to get themselves from one part to the other; you can work in one “node” and live near-ish and never travel to the other parts.
Obviously that is true of the multi-city urban agglomerations (the 3rd category) that you keep mentioning as well, but this is not under debate.