“…The most commonly used one alludes to their role in the national urban systems, mediating between the territory and the large metropolis (Maturana et al, 2017). In this context, intermediate cities establish relational networks with other urban hubs (Llop et al, 2019), tending to develop conurbation practices, both in their functional aspect, which involves the dynamics of the whole, and their physical one, which refers to the phenomenon of the encounter of urban structures (Véliz, 1995;Moreno, 2010, Patiño, 2010Larrosa, 2012). In Chile, the joint operation of intermediate urban units has created metropolization processes that do not yet have a clear definition: 'urban complex" (Hidalgo, Arenas & Aliaga, 2009), "larger intermediate agglomerations' (Martínez, Altman & Rodríguez, 2013), 'conurbations' (Maturana, 2015) or 'intermediate urban systems" (Napadensky, Monti & Villouta, 2017…”