What is the role of urban morphology in agglomeration economies?

There is increasing agreement that larger cities boost productivity and economic growth through offering greater 'agglomeration economies'. This thesis seeks to understand whether the size of cities is the only important factor in generating agglomeration economies, or whether the spatial organisation of cities may also play a role. In particular, the research explores how 'sharing, matching and learning' mechanisms (Duranton and Puga, 2003) work in cities, and how these are shaped by urban street networks. Here, 'sharing' includes the joint use of indivisible public goods, market places and supply chains; 'matching' includes complementary matches of skilled people in the labour market; while 'learning' includes the spread of knowledge and new ways of doing things. While these mechanisms are widely recognised as being important to agglomeration economies, there is less understanding of how they work concretely in cities, and how they might be influenced by the built environment.

Manchester in the UK has been chosen as a case study, with a particular focus on the textiles sector, which is concentrated in the city centre, and which is particularly productive compared with elsewhere in the UK. Analysing the spatial dimensions of agglomeration economies in cities such as Manchester is timely given the government's new industrial strategy. Further, UK cities have been gaining new powers to influence spatial design and infrastructure through devolution, and will benefit from understanding how such powers might influence future economic growth.

There are three main research stages:

- an analysis of data on industries and skills at a sub-city level in Manchester. This will enable a better understanding of how both industries, and people with different skills, spread themselves out across the urban fabric, and how this may facilitate or obstruct network formation - and hence agglomeration economies. This analysis will draw on 'industry space' mapping developed by Harvard Grown Lab, in addition to space syntax analysis. Industry space mapping goes beyond simply mapping economic diversity, to analyse how different industries are linked through shared skills sets and knowledge.

- an ethnographic case study will be carried out to better understand the role of urban space in 'sharing, learning and matching' economies in the textiles industry in north Manchester. An additional case study in East London will serve as a comparator;

- drawing on hypotheses developed through the ethnographic and city level research, the thesis will explore potential links between the spatial configuration of other global cities with productivity indicators, drawing on an existing set of space syntax maps, and the OECD Metropolitan Database.

The thesis is novel in developing concrete research to explore the spatial aspects of agglomeration economies in cities. The thesis draws on two methodologies in particular - space syntax, and 'industry space mapping' and brings them together for the first time. This is also the first time that the 'industry space' model has been mapped spatially across a city. Further, while space syntax analysis has been previously used to analyse the influence of building design on innovation and knowledge sharing, a similar approach has not been made at the urban scale.

This study contributes to the EPSRC remit to boost economic competitiveness in the UK, while also linking to the research theme of 'Manufacturing the Future', with its strong focus on the textiles industry.

The research is being carried out in close contact with Frank Neffke at the Harvard Growth Lab, with John Holden and Rupert Greenlagh at Manchester New Economy, and with Rudiger Ahrend, Head of the OECD Urban Programme.