Exploring the co-evolution of the geographies of air transport aviation and corporate networks

Abstract

In this paper we aim to contribute to the literature on the empirical parallels between urban hierarchies and the transport networks supporting and/or reflecting these hierarchies. We adopt a stochastic actor-based modeling framework to analyze the co-evolution of the world city hierarchy and global air passenger networks between 2000 and 2010/2011. The data are drawn from an inventory of the location strategies of globalized service firms across world cities and the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). Major findings include (1) exogenous effects, such as the impact of economic development and regionality; (2) endogenous micro-level effects producing macro-level patterns, such as preferential attachment processes; and (3) the two-way impact of both networks. (i.e., cities that are well connected in the aviation network tend to attract more major offices of globalized service firms, while the co-presence of major offices of globalized service firms in cities in turn stimulates the development of aviation connections between them).