Urban form and agglomeration economies – the impact of “edge cities”
Last week, I took a look at the contribution of agglomeration to Auckland’s recent economic growth. Based on observed changes to employment density over the period, plus agglomeration elasticities calculated by David Maré and Daniel Graham, I estimated that 11-12% of Auckland’s recent productivity growth was due to increased urban scale and density.…
54 Comments The contribution of agglomeration to economic growth in Auckland
We’ve written quite a bit about agglomeration economies, as they’re one of the most important forces shaping urban life. Agglomeration economies refer to the benefits of proximity for economic and social interaction – when you’re around more people, it’s easier to meet the right person (for business or relationships!),…
Agglomeration, trade, and the prospects for Christchurch
This article was originally posted on Making Christchurch, a group blog set up by Barnaby Bennett in the wake of the 2011 Canterbury Earthquake, at the invitation of Transportblog commenter Brendon Harre. While it’s focused on Christchurch, many of the ideas in the article apply everywhere.…
Guide to economic evaluation part 3: What is agglomeration?
Debates over major transport investments often get caught up in arguments over benefit-cost ratios, or BCRs. In recent years, projects such as the Transmission Gully and Puhoi to Warkworth motorways and the City Rail Link have been criticised for their low BCRs.…
The two-sided density dividend: Agglomeration economies in *consumption*
Why are people – both in NZ and around the world – increasingly choosing to live in cities?
The answer usually advanced in response to this question, at least from an economic perspective, is “agglomeration economies”. In this post I want to unpack a few things about agglomeration economies, before discussing why I think our current understanding places too much focus on production as opposed to consumption.…
Is CRL still value for money?
It’s said you shouldn’t respond to every stupid thing you see on the internet but sometimes it’s too hard to resist and that’s the case with an opinion piece published by Newsroom yesterday about the City Rail Link. The piece was written by University of Auckland economics Professor Tim Hazeldine suggesting we should stop building the CRL.…
Flashback Saturday: Stu Donovan on housing
Every weekend we dig into the archives. This ‘Flashback Saturday’ is a bit different from our usual, and as part of our “20/20 Vision on Housing” programme we’re doing a retrospective on ex-blogger Stu Donovan’s housing posts.
Stu is an economist and engineer, now living overseas.…
Studying cities in Amsterdam
This is a guest post by former blogger, Stuart Donovan. TL; DR: If you want to learn more about cities, then here are two courses that run regularly in Amsterdam. Applications for the 2020 intake close in the next 2-3 months.…
Flashback Saturday: Re-analysing the City Rail Link’s benefits
Every weekend we dig into the archives. This post was first published in November 2011.
It has been frustrating to see the assessment of the City Rail Link’s benefits become so politicised over the past few months. You would think that something like undertaking a cost-benefit analysis of a transport project would be a fairly objective task, but as we have learned there are so many assumptions made when assessing transport projects – that the objectivity of the process has really become something of a myth.…
Flashback Sunday: Does building roads harm the economy?
Every weekend we dig into the archives. This post by Matt was originally published in January 2014.
Most proposals to build new roads or widen existing ones seem to boil down to an ultimate belief that it will “help the economy”.…
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