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Minggu, 27 Februari 2011

Central Place Theory

Apart from the simple lack of fuel and vehicles, the main reason why we will travel less is because our societies will be more local. Instead of thinking on a national or county level, we will think on a level that is small enough to control with our limited transportation but large enough to supply just about all of our needs. A hierarchical system of settlements will exist rather like the Central Place Theory. This is a system devised by Christaller which basically states that settlements grow on a hierarchical system. The larger the settlement, the more services it has but the fewer of them there are. An idealised layout is shown below.

Central Place Theory

In a society of the future, most people would live in the villages (up to approximately 1000 people although the ideal number for human society seems to be around 150), surrounded by farmland (natural or reclaimed) from which they grow all or most of their food. (These are not necessarily the present day country villages; they are just as likely to be suburbs where gardens, parks, and unused roads and building areas are converted to agricultural land.) These villages will have basic services such as a bakery, pottery, machinery shop, carpenters, etc. One building in the village would be converted into a communal hall used as a workshop, library, school, pub, meeting place, etc.

The next up the hierarchy would be the market town, surrounded by a number of villages/suburbs. This would still have to have areas to grow food but, being larger, it could contain services that do not exist in the level below. Doctors, dentists, vets, clothing manufacturers, glassmakers, boat and cart builders, specialist traders, and so forth. As the name suggests, it would also be the place where people would travel every so often to sell their spare food and wares for other things.

Above this would be the town proper. The likely reason for retaining large settlements like this would be that they held factories and industries such as coal mining, steel works and forestry, universities (and even centres for leisure activities). These would have another level of government which would be necessary for defence, emergency services and universal matters such as money.

In the present day central place theory, there are other levels, the city and conurbation, but these will not exist as individual entities. With so little transport and so much growing land needed, massive areas such as London and New York will have to break up into villages/suburbs and towns for the inhabitants to survive.

By Neo Plano Space with No comments

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