The Interaction between Retailing and the Urban Centre Structure: A Theory of Spiral Movement

This paper deals with principles for the development of retailing and the urban centre structure. The main conclusion is that a projection of the trend of recent years could hardly be expected in spite of the fact that this is what most forecasts for retailing and centres are based upon. What is more likely to happen is a development in the form of a spiral movement which consequently makes it necessary to try other forecasting methods and other forms of mathematical models, different from the traditional ones. Such improved methods provide the basis also for an improved planning technique which in turn not only gives a split-second picture of the future situation, but also indicates how this situation is reached through extensive use of stage-planning.