Functional Polycentrism and Urban Network Development in the Greater South East UK: Evidence from Commuting Patterns, 1981-2001

In contemporary literature on changing urban systems, it is often argued that the traditional
central place conceptualisation is outdated and should be replaced by a network view that
emphasises the increasing criss-crossing pattern of interdependencies between spatial units.
This paper tests for urban network development by looking at commuting patterns in the Greater
South East UK. The analysis is based on census commuting interaction data for three points in
time during the past three decades (1981, 1991, and 2001). Although the empirical results
indicate that the Greater South East UK can still not be characterized as a polycentric urban
region or integrated urban network, there is some evidence for urban network development at
the local, intra-urban, level as well as a decentralization of the system at the regional, interurban, level.