Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
PREDICTIVE RESEARCH ON LOCATION
The geographer's tradition of model building to predict location of characteristics of
private enterprise has been applied to recreational geography in terms of the transfer of
location theory and site selection methods. Within the research on location theory,
transport cost has played a significant role based on Von Thünen's agricultural land use
model, and Vickerman (1975) simplistically applied the model to predict urban recreation
businesses. Yet the use of concepts such as locational interdependence, where the
potential buyers are not uniformly distributed in space, means that businesses may be
able to exercise a degree of control over their clients by their location. Such studies based
on the early work of economic geographers such as Reilly (1931), Christaller (1933) and
Lösch (1944) developed a number of principles which geographers have used to underpin
locational modelling recreational research. While subsequent research by Isard (1956)
and Greenhut (1956) can be added to the list, S.L.J.Smith (1983a:106) summarises the
contribution of such studies to the analysis of recreational location choices by business:
• A firm with relatively low transportation costs and a relatively large market area will
have a greater chance of success than a firm with high transportation costs and a small
market area.
• Some trade-offs are possible between transportation costs, production costs, land rents
and market size.
• Transportation costs include both the cost of bringing resources to the site of the firm
and the costs of distributing the product to the customer. The relative costs of
transporting both resources and products determine, in part, where the firm will locate:
high resource transportation costs pull a business close to the resource; high product
transportation costs pull a business close to the market.
• Some types of business seek to locate close to each other; some are indifferent to each
other; some are repelled by each other.
• Different locations will be attractive to different types of businesses. Attractiveness is
based on resources; market location; transportation services; availability of capital,
labour and business services; and personal preferences of the decision-maker.
• Firms in any given industry will tend to divide up the available market by selecting
different locations to control different spatial segments of the market.
• The size of the market and the number and location of competitors tend to limit the size
of the potential development.
These need to be examined in relation to the decision-making of entrepreneurs and
individual firms. In terms of site selection methods, feasibility studies have provided a
starting point for geographers seeking to assess the most suitable site from a range of
alternatives, with the purpose of maximising profit (or wider social benefits in the public
sector) though comparatively little research has been published given the scope of such
studies (i.e. sources of capital, management issues, design and development issues,
market size, population characteristics, economic profile of the potential market and the
suitability of the site) and the tendency for such documents to remain commercially
sensitive in both the public and private sector. What is evident from the existing research
