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BUILDING YOUR OWN URBAN AREA
For this assignment, you must use the
Gridcity
program to design an urban area and
explain why it looks the way it does. Although the program cannot
consider many features of actual urban areas, this assignment is
designed to help you understand some of the key economic forces that
influence actual residential location. You are encouraged (but not
required) to incorporate into this assignment features of an urban
area with which you are familiar.
1. Building an Urban Area
Use the
Gridcity program to
design an urban area. You must follow these rules:
a. Your urban area must have at least
2
worksites and 4
household types. You may have a work site at the center of the grid
(13,13) and you may specify 2 worksites and 4 household types, but
otherwise you may not
use the default parameters for the worksites (step 1 in the program)
or for household income (step 2). (The nature of these "steps" will
become clear to you when you run the program.) However, you do not
have to change household parameters other than income, In other
words, you must change the location of the second work site (and add
more if you wish) and you must specify the income (and if you wish
the other parameters) of the 4 (or more) household types you
specify.
b. You may use the default
values for the housing production parameters (step 3), and are
indeed encouraged to do so (because changing them can lead to
unforeseen difficulties).
c. You may find the appropriate utility
level for each household class any way you want, but it probably a
good idea to start with option 2 for step 4.
d. Attach to your assignment a page
listing the parameters you selected (it can be a printout from the
program) and a page or two describing the equilibrium populations
and residential locations that characterize your city (which also
can be printouts).
2. The Assignment
Use your understanding of bid functions to figure out why the
pattern of residential location in your city takes the form it does.
For example, if household type 3 lives nearest to the CBD, figure
out what it is about that household type (relative to other types)
that leads it to live in this location. Make sure you examine the
location of each household type.
Hint: It is never
correct to say that a household type lives in a certain location
because it cannot afford the high transportation costs (or high
housing expenditures) at other locations. All explanations must
focus on the relative trade-off between
transportation costs and housing prices.
Present your findings in a two- or three-page report to the director
of the State Bureau of Economic Analysis (who understands bid
functions). Pay attention to your writing and to the precision of
your analysis; that is, make your explanation as clear and complete
as you can. If possible, you should also explain whether your urban
area contains features observed in actual cities, particularly
features that public officials might be concerned about. If you
wish, you also could speculate about characteristics of your city
(such as neighborhood amenities or traffic congestion) that cannot
be considered by Gridcity.
Finally, on the day that this assignment is
to be discussed, you should come to class prepared to draw a map of
your city on the board and then to explain to your classmates why
your city looks the way it does.