A View of Studies on the Urban Land Value Gradients, and the Points at Issue

Abstract

We can show the following about our theme.Our study about the urban land value gradients means that we try to look for the essence on the formation of urban land values. And through the trial we can make clear the formative factors of land values. We think that at the same time it becomes an effective way for explaining the regional characteristics or structures of the city.There are three questions raised as to the old studies on the urban land value gradients. The first question is that they have been so wedded to Thünen's theory that they have mostly used the deductive methods. The objective circumstances concerning cities have greatly changed lately. More, we could know the fact which the residential land value gradient of Tôkyô Metropolitan Area fell drawing the concaved curve toward the suburbs recently. But, only such deductive methods are not enough in the explanation for this tendency, too. Accordingly we need to investigate the actual land prices, and make up the microscopic distribution maps of land prices. Thus we should look for a new formative theory on urban land prices without adhering to the old concepts through examining the conditions synthetically and analytically.The second question is that most urban land values have the aspect that they show the concentric zone structures in general. It is certain that the deductive considerations based on the premise of an idea of Thünen's circles can be useful in the macroscopic analysis. But, his theory is disregarded in regional characteristics. Therefore by using the way alone, we can't (merely) explain the regional differences on the fluctuations of the actual land prices in the city from the reality of the concentric zone structures or the land price gradients. Thus we can clear up the formative factors of the actual land prices in each region through analyzing the conditions accurately.The third one is that in most of the old studies they have thought the fluctuations of the agricultural land values (or rents) as a basis of the level of the urban land values (or rents). Moreover, they have thought that the agricultural land values are decided by the land productivity and competitive crops. We have some doubt about such points through investigating the reality in Tôkyô Metropolitan Area.In a nutshell, it is thought that the former studies have taken the problem up from a side notwithstanding being supposed to have the complicated factors on the formation of urban land values nowadays. Therefore, after this we need to take it up in many sided using together the macroscopic and microscopic, synthetic and analytic, or deductive and inductive methods.