Small Towns in the Context of “Borrowed Size” and “Agglomeration Shadow” Debates: the Case of the South Moravian Region (Czech Republic)

Abstract

Small towns play a key role in providing services for its wider hinterland. However, emerging economic importance of the largest agglomerations and increasing involvement of settlements in urban networks have transformed a relationship between the size of settlements and their expected urban function. In this context, the concepts of “borrowed size” and “agglomeration shadow” serve to explain the impact of network externalities on urban function but pay a little attention to service function of small towns. The paper aims at revealing the extent to which the provision of services is determined by location of small towns within a regional urban system strongly affected by a metropolitan area. The results show coexisting occurrence of the processes of borrowed size and agglomeration shadow and the importance of tourist and commercial attractiveness of particular places (towns) to final provision of services.

The Geography of Borrowing Size: Exploring Spatial Distributions for German Urban Regions

“…Moreover, they spill over to surrounding areas or cities (Parr ). This understanding is thereby enriched by the concept of borrowed size, in which the role of urban benefits is an essential explanatory variable for urban development (Burger et al ; Hesse ; Malý ; Meijers & Burger ). To support regional development, agglomeration economies can be linked to the regional spatial and functional structure: improvements in regional transport and information and communication technologies support borrowing size in urban regions (Brezzi & Veneri ).…”

“…Currently, there is a variety of papers (Burger et al ; Malý ; Meijers & Burger ) dealing with the question why some smaller cities in proximity to larger cities have special prerequisites for relatively high economic and population growth. Here, the borrowed size concept is used to explain the need for geographical proximity and functional connectivity to foster economic advantages and a thriving regional economy (Burger et al ).…”

The (MIS)Compliance of Objectives of New Cap – Legislative, Academic and General Public Perspectives

“…Since a statistical threshold of this homogenous group of respondents was not met, the yielded data is indicative. In addition, the quantitative insufficiency of the responding sample is at least partially offset by the consideration of similar case studies performed abroad, e.g., in Italy (Severini & Sorrentino, 2017) as well as domestically, e.g., about small rural towns in South Moravia (Malý, 2016) or about the cooperation of municipalities in South Bohemia (Dušek, 2017), as well as abroad, e.g., in Poland about certain regions and their organic farming under the auspices of the new CAP (Śpiewak, 2016). Then, secondly, the identification and assessment of the potential for reconciliation of these objectives within each of these three spheres (legislative, academic and general public) is finally completed by the assessment and inter-position of these objectives across these three spheres.…”

Human and demographic capital in peripheries of the Pilsen Region, Czechia

“…V transformačním období nebyla nižším sídelním střediskům věnována velká pozornost. Až v posledních zhruba deseti letech se objevují nové studie věnované roli velmi malých měst postsocialistických zemí Evropy na venkově, v periferních územích nebo také v okolí metropolí (Vaishar, Zapletalová 2009;Kühn 2015;Malý 2016;Czapiewski, Bański, Górczyńska 2016).…”