Urban Studies, Vol. 44, No.

9, 1713 1738, August 2007

Intrametropolitan Employment Structure: Polycentricity, Scatteration, Dispersal and Chaos in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver, 1996 2001
and Re my Barbonne Richard Shearmur, William Coffey, Christian Dube
[Paper rst received, June 2006; in nal form, October 2006]

Summary. There is little consensus on where and how employment is decentralising in metropolitan areas. However, a number of key processes have been brought to light, and different cities have tended to display different processes: strong CBDs, suburban polynucleation, job dispersal, scattering, edgeless cities and perhaps keno capitalism. This paper explores the distribution and growth of employment at a ne spatial scale. It is shown that, at this scale, there are very dynamic processes of growth and decline throughout metropolitan areas, but that these processes are organised at a wider scale by stable employment centres and by links between these centres. The structures and processes thus revealed suggest that the spatial economy of metropolitan areas should be approached as a chaotic system. From an empirical perspective, this means that, depending on the scale of analysis and the way data are considered, polynucleation, dispersal and chaos are all observed: this may partly explain the lack of consensus in the literature. The only process not evident within Canadian cities is scattering, but this process may in fact be occurring within some areas identied as suburban employment zones.

Introduction Interest in the location of employment within North American metropolitan areas, and the resulting spatial form of the latter, has been growing since the late 1980s and early 1990s when the phenomenon of intrametropolitan employment decentralisation began to receive considerable attention in both academic and public policy milieux. Important contributions by Gad (1985), McDonald (1987), Cervero (1989), Hartshorn and Muller (1989), Garreau (1991), Stanback (1991) and Giuliano and Small (1991), among others, called attention to the relative, and sometimes absolute, decline of many CBDs as centres of employment and the corresponding rise of suburban downtowns or edge cities. The ensuing set of research (for example, Cervero and Wu, 1997; Forstall and Greene, 1997; Bogart and Ferry, 1999; McDonald and Prather, 1994; McMillen and McDonald, 1997, 1998; Gad and Matthew, 2000) extended the range of metropolitan areas examined and rened methods for identifying suburban downtowns. In addition, several authors (Fujii and Hartshorn, 1995; Gordon and Richardson, 1996) began to question the relevance of the suburban downtown phenomenon, arguing that it was perhaps only a transitory state in

and Re my Barbonne are in INRSUCS, 385 Sherbrooke east, Montre al, Quebec H2X IE3, Richard Shearmur, Christian Dube Canada. Fax: 514 499 4065. E-mails: richard.shearmur@ucs.inrs.ca; christian.dube@ucs.inrs.ca; and remy.barbonne@ucs.inrs.ca. partement de Ge ographie, Universite de Montre al, C. P. 6128, Succursale Centre-Ville, Montre al, Quebec William Coffey is in the De H3C 3J7, Canada. Fax: 514 343 8008. E-mail: william.coffey@umontreal.ca. 0042-0980 Print/1360-063X Online/07/091713 26 # 2007 The Editors of Urban Studies DOI: 10.1080/00420980701426640

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RICHARD SHEARMUR ET AL.

the evolution of a more dispersed intrametropolitan employment geographyscatteration. More recently, this latter approach has culminated in the concept of the edgeless city (Lang, 2003), a highly dispersed metropolitan form. In a series of previous papers (Coffey and Shearmur, 2001a, 2001b, 2002; Shearmur and Coffey, 2002a, 2002b; Shearmur and Alvergne, 2002), we have contributed to the analysis of the intrametropolitan spaceeconomy, both methodologically and by extending the range of cities examined to include the Canadian and French contexts. In the present paper, we attempt to extend our analyses and to contribute to the more recent debate concerning the nature of the evolving spatial structure of employment in North American metropolitan areas. The present analysis extends our previous research in three ways. First, our data cover the more recent 1996 2001 period, one of rapid employment growth in Canadian cities. Secondly, we employ a ner set of spatial units than was possible in our previous research; this, in turn, has enabled us to rene our methodological approach. And, nally, our conceptual approach is considerably broader than was the case in our previous analyses; rather than seeking simply to identify employment centres, our goal is to identify and to achieve a better understanding of the spatial structure of employment in Canadas three largest metropolitan areas. Our principal point is that the intrametropolitan spaceeconomy is much more complex than either the edge city (polycentricity) or edgeless city (scatteration) approaches appears to acknowledge. Before presenting our data and methodology, and then our empirical results, we rst examine in more detail the issue of the spatial form of the intrametropolitan spaceeconomy. The Intrametropolitan Geography of Employment There is a general consensus in the literature that employment has been decentralising

within North American metropolitan areas. The relative proportion, and sometimes even the absolute number, of metropolitan jobs located in the CBD has been steadily declining. The CBD is no longer the sole (or even, necessarily, the principal) locus of metropolitan employment; the monocentric model of metropolitan spatial form now appears to be a relic of the past. A point concerning which there is much less consensus, however, is the spatial form of the decentralisation that is occurring. As noted briey in the preceding section, during the past two decades, much emphasis has been given to the edge city or suburban downtown phenomenonthe reagglomeration of decentralising employment in employment centres outside the CBD. According to this literature, a new wave of suburbanisation involving high-order services or front-ofce functions, which began to manifest itself in the early 1980s, has profoundly modied the space-economy of North American metropolitan regions. The economies of certain suburban areas have become increasingly large and diversied, and have developed agglomeration economies of a sufcient force to attract the types of activities formerly found uniquely in the CBD. In particular, this growth has concentrated, and is continuing to concentrate, in a limited number of suburban employment centres (Cervero, 1989), suburban downtowns (Hartshorn and Muller, 1989; Gad and Matthew, 2000), magnet areas (Stanback, 1991), or edge cities (Garreau, 1991), which are increasingly in direct competition with the CBD for the location of high-order service functions. In certain North American metropolitan areas, the CBD has been able to maintain its traditional economic role and importance; in others, growth is now shared between the CBD and suburban agglomerations; in others still, the CBD is losing ground to edge cities. Thus, North American metropolitan areas appear to have entered into a new phase of spatialeconomic development. Due to employment decentralisation, most North American metropolitan areas are now characterised by multinucleated or polycentric economic

INTRAMETROPOLITAN EMPLOYMENT STRUCTURE

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structures. In many metropolitan areas, one or more of these suburban centres now has a larger share of high-order ofce employment than that found in the CBD. In the major Canadian cities, the CBD retains a prominent role (Filion and Gad, 2006; Gad and Matthew, 2000; Shearmur and Coffey, 2002a), although large suburban ofce centres are emerging, particularly in Toronto (Charney, 2005). Other authors have observed a different form of decentralisationscatteration, the generalised dispersion of employment at relatively low densities, rather than the reagglomeration noted above. In the case of Atlanta, Fujii and Hartshorn (1995) have found that, while some ofce jobs have concentrated in employment centres, much employment remains scattered throughout the remaining zones of the metropolitan area. Similarly, Gordon and Richardson (1996) demonstrate that in Los Angeles, over the period 1970 90, the proportion of jobs in employment centres actually fell; in 1990, only 12 per cent of jobs were located in such centres. More recently, Lang (2003) has conceptualised this generalised dispersion as the formation of edgeless citiesa form of sprawling ofce development that is characterised by neither the density nor the relatively clear boundaries of edge cities. In his study of 13 US metropolitan areas, he nds that, in 1999, edgeless cities account for two-thirds of the ofce space found outside the CBD and for nearly twice the ofce space found in edge cities. The distinction between polycentricity and scatteration is a signicant one in terms of what it has to tell us about the role of agglomeration economies at the intrametropolitan scale. On the one hand, the appearance of a small number of employment centres or edge cities in a metropolitan area underscores the important role played by agglomeration economies; such a multinodal structure reinforces the idea that there are distinct advantages to economic activities being located in spatial proximity. Indeed, Filion et al. (2000), in their survey of workers in Toronto suburban centres, highlight the presence of agglomeration economies, but also

suggest that these are moderated by the inhospitability of the suburban environment to pedestrians. On the other hand, the appearance of generalised dispersion suggests that the advantages (largely involving the facility of face-to-face contact) accruing to economic activities that locate close to one another in space are now diminishing (which is also partly in keeping with Filion et al.s (2000) observations). Gordon and Richardson (1996) observe that, just when urban researchers have begun to devote considerable attention to polycentricity, urban form has perhaps moved beyond this phenomenon. Dear and Flusty (2001), building upon this type of observation, suggest that such scattering can be theorised as keno capitalisman increasingly random and chaotic organisation (or disorganisation) of urban space under the inuence of global capital and mobile communication technologies. Thus, the polycentric versus scatteration issue is very important from both practical and theoretical perspectives. This latter observation by Gordon and Richardson (1996), in turn, raises another issue. Are polycentricity and scatteration simply successive stages in the evolution of the intrametropolitan geography of employment or, rather, do these two seemingly contradictory processes operate simultaneously within a given metropolitan context? If the latter is the case, as suggested by Charney (2005) for Toronto, not only would the two processes be more correctly viewed as complementary rather than contradictory, but also, and more fundamentally, it would appear that the intrametropolitan geography of employment is much more complex than either the polycentric or scatteration approaches, individually, appears to recognise. This issue forms a central theme of our empirical analysis.

Data and Methodology Data The data used in this analysis are 1996 and 2001 census data by place of work covering the census metropolitan areas (CMAs) of

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RICHARD SHEARMUR ET AL.

Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver. The primary spatial unit of analysis is the enumeration area (EA), of which there are 4733 in Montreal, 5598 in Toronto and 2645 in Vancouver. Enumeration areas are the basic building-blocks of census tracts, the unit of analysis that we have used in our previous studies. They are compact spatial units, usuallyin urbanised areascomprising a few blocks at most, and their boundaries follow visible features such as streets and rivers when possible: the number of dwellings in an EA generally varies between a maximum of 650 in CMAs to a minimum of 125 in rural areas. These data have been chosen because most previous work on intrametropolitan employment location has been conducted using larger units, often census tracts or transport analysis zones: EAs provide a much ner level of spatial discrimination and one of the primary aims of this article is to explore the extent to which these ne-grained data add to our understanding of intrametropolitan employment location and growth. However, the EA place of work data are problematic for two reasons. On the one hand, the 2001 spatial classication is no longer EAs, but dissemination areas (DAs) roughly equivalent, but different, units. Although Statistics Canada recoded the 2001 data to the 1996 EA boundaries using 2001 block faces, when a boundary between two EAs intersected a block face employment was arbitrarily assigned to one or other EA. Because of the uncertainty surrounding which EA the employment is actually in, we have merged EAs in each of these cases, reducing the number of spatial units available, as indicated below. On the other hand, even after these merges, a few suspicious cases remainedabout 50 or so in each CMA where contiguous EAs had very similar (but opposite in sign) employment changes. In some cases, this is due to employment geocoding inconsistencies by Statistics Canada between 1996 and 2001, and highlights the fact that employment location at such a ne scale is actually somewhat uncertain. For example, depending on the exact location

assigned to people working at the University of Quebec in downtown Montreal, their workplace could conceivably be in any of two or three EAs. In our data, the whole university appears to have shifted from one EA to another between 1996 and 2001, presumably because the EA to which it has been assigned has changed. It is this type of error that we have sought to correct: all contiguous EAs where employment gain/loss of over 500 jobs is noted (and where the ratio of gain to loss is between 0.5 and 1.5) are merged. In this way, straightforward shifts between EAs are smoothed, but areas where some actual job gain or loss has occurred will still appear. It should be emphasised that, after discussions with Statistics Canada and analysis of the data, we do not think that these coding errors are too widespread, although their exact extent is unknown. After these various manipulations, 3732 EAs are available for analysis in Montreal, 4658 in Toronto and 2034 in Vancouver. The basic uncertainty surrounding the exact location of employment at the EA level must be borne in mind throughout this analysis. Having said that, however, we are condent that most of the errors introduced by Statistics Canadas geocoding inconsistencies have been corrected and that the shifts, growth and decline observed in the subsequent analysis are by and large real and not an artefact of the coding. Methodology Our study proceeds in two stages. In the rst stage, we build upon our previous work and identify employment zones in the three cities. We conceptualise the city as consisting of a CBD and of a number of othersuburban employment zones. Such a conceptualisation rests upon two basic and well documented theoretical understandings of city form. On the one hand, the monocentric city as observed by Burgess (1925), and as modelled by Alonso (1964), has long served as a starting-point for understanding the geography of metropolitan areas. On the other hand, the idea of a polycentric city, rst formalised by Harris and

INTRAMETROPOLITAN EMPLOYMENT STRUCTURE

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Ullman (1945/1970), has become a key way of understanding late 20th century cities (Yeates, 1998). These two complementary building blocks form the basis of our classication of employment zones and from them it is possible to assess whether it is the CBD or suburban centres that are tending to grow faster. Processes of scatteration and edgeless cities can also be studied within this framework, since they are dened relative to the CBD and to suburban centres: thus, by conceptualising the city as polycentric, we also identify areas outside employment centres to which jobs may be dispersing. In addition to this basic conceptualisation, we also draw upon the coreframe structure described by Horwood and Boyce (1959). They suggest that employment concentrations in cities consist of a densely developed core, surrounded by a more diffuse employment zone which they call a frame. Each of our major employment zones is thus divided into a core and a frame, or fringe. We also identify some secondary and isolated employment zones that do not meet our denition of major employment zone but that meet the criteria necessary for inclusion in the frame. Our city thus imagined is illustrated in Figure 1. In order to operationalise these concepts, certain classication criteria have been determined. To be classied as an employment zone (core or frame), an EA must meet two criteria. First, the ratio of employment to resident workers (the E/R ratio) must be superior to one. Thus, an employment zone is a zone that tends to attract workers from the outside. Secondly, total employment must be greater than 500 workers. This criterion is included in order to clarify our observations and to limit our analysis to areas with a signicant number of jobs. All attempts to identify employment zones establish certain thresholds (whether these thresholds be deviations from a density gradient, job density levels, etc.) and the necessity for such thresholds has been discussed in Coffey and Shearmur (2001a). The number 500 has been chosen as a threshold in this study for two reasons: rst, a threshold in this vicinity enables a clear majority of jobs to be captured

in all three cities (between 71 and 77 per cent of them); secondly, given the area in which we are searching for a cut-off, 500 is close to the optimum, in all three cities, in terms of jobs per EA.1 Given such criteria, employment zones capture over 70 per cent of all jobs in each CMA whilst including 10 12 per cent of EAs (Table 1). To distinguish the core from the frame, and to identify secondary and isolated employment zones, employment zones are classied into six types, illustrated in Figure 1 1a. CBD core: EAs in the CBD with over 5000 jobs. 1b. CBD fringe: EAs with between 500 and 5000 jobs contiguous, or linked, to the CBD core. 2a. Major zone core: EAs outside the CBD with over 5000 jobs. 2b. Major zone fringe: EAs with 500 to 5000 jobs, contiguous, or linked, to a major zone core. 3. Secondary employment zones: groups of contiguous EAs, each with between 500 and 5000 jobs. 4. Isolated zones: single EAs with between 500 and 5000 jobs. The remaining zones are non-employment zones, coded 9 in Figure 1. The CBD and major zone cores are sets of contiguous EAs, or individual EAs, that meet the 1a or 2a criteria. Fringe zones are directly, or indirectly via other fringe EAs, contiguous to a core. In order, where necessary, to separate the CBD fringe from the fringes of other major zones, cuts have been made at EAs with between 500 and 2500 jobs (the EA where the cut occurs becoming part of the CBD fringe, the EA beyond becoming part of the major zone fringe). The threshold of 5000 corresponds to a break in the size distribution of EAs in all three cities. In Montreal, there is a clear break between EAs with fewer than 5000 jobs (the highest being 4615) and those with more (the lowest being 5145 jobs). In Toronto, a break occurs between 5205 and

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RICHARD SHEARMUR ET AL.

Figure 1. Classication system for enumeration areas (EAs) in Montreal. Toronto and Vancouver.

INTRAMETROPOLITAN EMPLOYMENT STRUCTURE

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Table 1. Number of EAs and number of jobs classied as employment zones, 2001 EAs City Montreal Toronto Vancouver Number 448 474 245 Percentage of total 12 10 12 Number 1 133 800 1 769 845 620 780 Jobs Percentage of total 73 77 71

5540 jobs, and in Vancouver between 5265 and 5615. In order to use the same threshold in each cityand to be as inclusive as possiblethe 5000 threshold is retained. In all cities, no break of a similar size occurs before reaching 6000 jobs and none occurs below 5000 jobs. Employment growth and decline are analysed relative to these six types of employment zone. The basic question we seek to address in the rst part of the analysis is the extent to which employment has tended to grow in these employment zones, or has tended to disperse throughout the CMA. The choice of the term employment zone to describe areas of the CMA where employment (and hence economic activity) tends to locate is deliberate and is a departure from terms such as employment pole (Coffey and Shearmur, 2001a, 2001b), employment centre (Bogart and Ferry, 1999; Freestone and Murphy, 1998), nuclei (Dieleman and Faludi, 1998), edge city (Garreau, 1991) and suburban downtown (Stanback, 1991; Gad and Matthew, 2000)all of which tend to emphasise agglomeration. It is also a departure from terms such as scatteration (Gordon and Richardson, 1996), edgeless city (Lang, 2003) and exopolis (Soja, 1992) that tend to imply sprawl in one form or another. Indeed, the rst part of our analysis leads us to question whether it is possible to state clearly whether dispersion or polarisation of employment is occurring. This leads us, in the second stage of our analysis, to take a closer look at the actual shape of employment zones in Montreal. In doing so, we reconceptualise the classication introduced above (a classication that closely mirrors that in our previous worksee Figure 1). Without calling into question the denition of employment zones,

we nevertheless propose some new ways to qualify and understand them. Growth, Agglomeration and Dispersal of Employment If the dispersal of employment is dened as employment growth outside employment zones, then in all three CMAs there has been moderate dispersal between 1996 and 2001 (Table 2). When employment zones are dened at the beginning of the period (using 1996 data), above-average growth is observed in non-employment zones in all three cities. Similarly, isolated zones tend to decline and secondary zones and major zone fringes grow more slowly than the CMA as a whole. In all cities, the CBD fringe and the core major zones grow faster than the CMA. Despite growing in all cities, only in Toronto does the core CBD outperform the CMA as a whole. Notwithstanding these clear results, the numbers in Table 2 hint at an interesting phenomenon, that of employment decline in isolated zones (some of which change their status to non-employment zones) and the growth of employment in non-employment zones (some of which change their status to different types of employment zones). Indeed, the fact that there have been changes in the composition of employment zones is evident from Table 3, which is identical to Table 2 except that the denition of employment zones and non-employment zones is accomplished using 2001, rather than 1996, data, then carried backwards to 1996. According to this tablein which employment zones are dened at the end of the periodthere has been agglomeration of employment in and around all types of employment zones

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Table 2. Employment and growth (19962001) of employment zones as of 1996 Montreal Percentage of total jobs 1996 CBD core CBD fringe Major zones, core Major zones, fringe Secondary zones Isolated zones Non-employment zones Total employment 1a 1b 2a 2b 3 4 9 CMA 12.1 6.3 19.6 13.1 13.0 4.6 31.3 1 436 735 2001 11.9 6.8 20.5 12.6 12.2 3.7 32.4 1 600 515 Percentage growth 1996 2001 9.4 20.0 16.2 7.2 5.2 2 11.7 15.2 11.4 Toronto Percentage of total jobs 1996 12.1 3.7 33.0 14.3 9.0 2.5 25.4 2 005 225 2001 12.5 3.7 34.4 13.9 7.7 1.9 25.8 2 334 150 Percentage growth 1996 2001 20.0 18.0 21.3 13.1 0.1 2 10.2 18.4 16.4 Vancouver
RICHARD SHEARMUR ET AL.

Percentage of total jobs 1996 7.7 4.5 18.7 16.9 14.8 5.1 32.2 817 375 2001 7.3 4.8 19.6 16.9 14.5 4.3 32.5 890 530

Percentage growth 1996 2001 3.4 16.3 13.8 9.4 6.7 2 9.2 10.1 8.9

INTRAMETROPOLITAN EMPLOYMENT STRUCTURE

Table 3. Employment and growth (19962001) of employment zones dened as of 2001 Montreal Percentage of total jobs 1996 CBD core CBD fringe Major zones, core Major zones, fringe Secondary zones Isolated zones Non-employment zones Total employment 1a 1b 2a 2b 3 4 9 CMA 12.5 7.3 20.4 14.3 8.1 4.2 33.3 1 436 735 2001 12.6 8.2 21.6 15.4 8.6 4.6 29.2 1 600 515 Percentage growth 19962001 12.5 24.3 17.7 20.2 18.6 19.9 2 2.3 11.4 Toronto Percentage of total jobs 1996 13.3 4.2 33.9 13.7 4.5 2.0 28.4 2 005 225 2001 13.7 4.6 36.7 13.7 4.6 2.5 24.2 2 334 150 Percentage growth 19962001 19.8 29.7 25.7 16.3 20.6 44.8 2 0.9 16.4 Vancouver Percentage of total jobs 1996 7.1 4.9 23.9 14.1 13.4 2.5 34.1 817 375 2001 6.8 5.4 26.7 14.4 13.9 2.5 30.3 890 530 Percentage growth 19962001 4.2 21.2 21.6 11.2 13.3 9.1 2 3.3 8.9

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(except for the Vancouver CBD) and a marked relative (absolute in the cases of Montreal and Vancouver) decline in employment outside employment zones. It can of course be argued that dispersal should be assessed relative to employment zones at the beginning of the period, and hence some dispersal has occurred (Table 2). However, although this is the case, Table 3 shows that this dispersal has not been haphazard: it has been sufciently focused to create new employment zones. It is therefore useful to go beyond these net employment gures and investigate the changes in employment zones between 1996 and 2001. Table 4 presents the transition matrices for the EAs of each CMA between the different categories of employment zone illustrated in Figure 1. The rst item to note is the stability at the core of major employment zones and of the CBD. In Montreal and Toronto, the 1996 CBD core is included in the 2001 core, and in Vancouver, only one constituent of the core has transitioned to the CBD fringe. In Montreal and Vancouver, the 1996 major zone cores are all included in the 2001 cores and, in Toronto, only 2 of the 56 constituents of major zone cores have transitioned out, one towards the CBD core, one towards the major zone fringe. Thus, the basic architecture of employment distribution in the three CMAs has not been fundamentally altered over the ve-year period. This is not altogether surprising, although all CMAs, particularly Montreal and Toronto, witnessed very rapid employment growth over the period. Growth of 11 16 per cent over 5 years is rapid andin view of the hypotheses of scatteration, job dispersal and keno capitalismmore change could have been expected. There has been some limited change in the composition of the CBD and major zone fringes; however, a key element in this change is the large number of non-employment zones that have transitioned towards these fringe areas. In other words, many of the fast-growing non-employment zones those towards which employment has dispersedare in fact very close to core

employment zones. This growth, far from being dispersed, is in fact on the edges of core employment areas. Similarly, a large (but lesser) number of CBD and major zone fringe constituents have transitioned towards non-employment zone status. It is primarily these numerous transitions to and from the fringes of the CMAs principal employment zones that account for the differences between Tables 2 and 3. In Table 2, the declining EAs are included as part of employment zonesthis gives the impression that between 1996 and 2001 employment has moved away from employment zones. In Table 3, the growing EAs are included as part of employment zonesthis gives the impression that between 1996 and 2001 employment has moved towards employment zones. A key question is whether these transitions are just picking up data noiseStatistics Canada misclassicationsor are revealing a very dynamic process of job loss and gain at the edges of major employment zones and the CBD. Although it is not possible to provide a denitive answer to this question, certain elements lead us to believe that, although the dynamic process may be somewhat overstated in our data, a real process is being picked up. First, when EAs that transition in and out of employment zone status are mapped concurrently, few are neighbours. In other words, it cannot be said that there has been a straightforward transfer of jobs between neighbouring EAs leading to an apparent dynamic process (but in fact reecting the misallocation of jobs in either 1996 or 2001). Secondly, the data have been screened and prepared with this problem in mind; although we have most probably not picked up all of the misallocated jobs, we have systematically smoothed out any sizeable apparent error. Thirdly, growth and decline are not just observed in EAs that change status: Table 5 (to which we will return) shows that growth and decline are apparent in EAs of all status, including stable core zones. Thus the process appears to be widespread and universal, not just conned to EAs with small employment totals at the edges of the fringe. Finally, and most importantly, this dynamic

Table 4. Transitions between types of employment zone, 1996 2001

Montreal Type 1996 1a 1a 1b 1b 1b 1b 2a 2a 2a 2b 2b 2b 2b 2b 3 3 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 4 9 9 9 9 9 9 All CMA Type 2001 1a 1b 9 1a 1b 2b 1a 2a 2b 9 2a 2b 3 4 9 1b 2a 2b 3 4 9 1b 2b 3 4 9 1b 2a 2b 3 4 Employment n 6 0 7 1 50 1 0 25 0 29 2 109 4 2 24 8 1 22 73 8 16 1 3 8 28 3 208 19 0 28 27 22 1996 174 525 4 915 4 580 80 015 720 281 835 24 040 6 875 150 335 3 100 3 525 18 605 17 175 4 500 40 825 95 160 9 975 14 580 1 070 3 245 7 060 40 460 415 690 6 780 2001 190 975 2 160 10 435 94 960 705 327 520 Growth Absolute Percentage 16 450 22 755 5 855 14 945 215 45 685 9.4 256.1 127.8 18.7 22.1 16.2 257.2 78.9 14.3 10.8 0.6 252.1 22.0 18.3 11.5 9.3 12.2 261.1 1.9 21.1 22.2 2 1.1 5.8 100.4 154.7 103.1 166.8 11.4 n 14 0 7 2 43 0 2 54 1 41 7 128 9 2 33 11 4 19 53 5 18 0 5 4 23 4085 18 1 33 18 18 Employment 1996 243 255 5 335 8 220 60 220 14 780 640 205 6 105 36 570 23 125 216 320 9 835 1 870 29 880 17 360 16 940 37 430 71 720 7 035 17 045 3 720 2 785 26 660 2001 291 945 1 620 12 595 72 820 Toronto Growth Absolute Percentage 48 690 23 715 4 375 12 600 20.0 269.6 53.2 20.9 22.2 22.3 224.3 235.1 87.3 12.4 37.2 27.5 246.6 26.7 35.5 8.4 9.0 26.2 267.4 19.4 18.0 19.2 7.7 221.7 1628.0 136.6 145.0 279.3 16.4 n 2 1 6 0 19 0 Vancouver Employment 1996 58085 5065 3920 33065 2001 60540 4745 2100 40900 Growth Absolute Percentage 2455 2320 21820 7835 4.2 26.3 246.4
INTRAMETROPOLITAN EMPLOYMENT STRUCTURE

23.7

10 290 213 750 12 300 5 425 171 860 21 525 3 435 335 3 545 20 8 920 20 960 5 325 45 520 103 985 11 195 5 675 1 090 3 210 8 630 40 025 439 670 13 585 29 685 3 785 825 4 695 8 825 1 220 28 905 20 235 1 570 2 435 23 980 6 805 15 275 10 830 11 290 163 780

14 450 2330 782 785 142 580 4 620 21 485 23 735 212 835 43 315 20 190 243 230 26 910 13 490 3 655 1 730 2140 15 955 213 925 16 205 21 155 22 960 6 020 40 560 3 130 78 195 6 475 6 600 2435 5 565 211 480 4 440 3 285 31 775 720 500 5 115 36 815 13 425 6 105 15 665 7 895 13 560 328 925

0 16 153080 174180 0 16 14935 8925 7 30320 47900 53 92595 94015 0 0 10 0 3 7 63 0 11 1 2 7 15 6835 11915 12460 89945 9080 870 3185 11685 17100 5045 15460 13405 95380 3355 1105 3010 13590 17020

21100 26010 17580 1420

13.8 240.2 58.0 1.5

21790 3545 945 5435 25725 235 2175 1905 2 80 6120 675 10725 7175 1925 73 155

226.2 29.8 7.6 6.0 263.1 27.0 25.5 16.3 2 0.5 2.5 97.1 146.2 91.9 60.3 8.9

9 875 25 150 10 500 21 330 6 770 18 060 1 436 735 1 600 515

480 615 517 430 6 055 19 480 375 6 480 11 465 27 130 5 445 13 340 4 855 18 415 2 005 225 2 334 150

1746 244205 250325 2 695 1370 0 17 7335 18060 22 7805 14980 8 3195 5120 817 375 890 530

1723

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process is commensurate with a theoretical understanding of the dynamic processes at play: there is a good reason for these numerous cases of growth and decline, which we will outline below. Indeed, many, if not most, studies of intrametropolitan employment distribution, including our own, have demonstrated that general patterns of employment location are quite stable over time. However, such stability has usually been observed at the census tract (CT) or transport analysis zone (TAZ) level. Analysis at this scale hides the type of micro variation that shows up when enumeration areas are studied. To verify this, we have analysed our data at the CT level. Whether employment zones are dened as of 1996 or 2001, similar conclusions are drawn in both cases: employment is tending to grow in employment zones and there is no evidence of generalised dispersal.2 However, at the ne scale of analysis rendered possible by the use of enumeration areas, a hitherto little noticed phenomenon has been brought to light. In urban areas there seems to be a constant churning of growth and decline, which has perhaps not been noticed because analysts tend to look at net employment growth over sizeable areas. Our results at a ner scale are similar to those obtained by researchers who have analysed employment growth in small and medium-sized companies (SMEs): they have often pointed out that, even if SMEs tend to generate employment, this net result is the outcome of numerous start ups and numerous failures (Davis et al., 1996). Similarly, even if employment is tending to grow in and around employment zones, our results show that this is the result, particularly at the fringes where smaller concentrations of employment are found, of a process of growth and decay. In practice, this process may be linked to establishments moving as they grow or decline, to developers building premises or converting spaces to different uses, etc.in sum, to the every-day functioning of a commercial property market. Thus, in micro areas, a high level of instability is apparent. However, more broadly, the basic employment structures (core EAs, the

general position of new employment zones relative to core areas) of a metropolitan area remain stable; if these structures varyand they quite clearly dothey do so over the longer term and in an ordered way, in accordance with the accessibility, employment and infrastructure needs of employers and employees. The very rapid rates of growth and decline that are observed for enumeration areas moving into or out of employment zone status (Table 4) result from the smaller size of EAs that make the transition. By denition, they are uctuating around 500 jobs,3 which means that the departure of a medium-sized establishment of, say, 200 250 jobs (or the arrival of one) can lead to rates of growth or decline of 40 50 per cent. This type of churning, of growth and decline, although most evident at the fringes of core zones, is in fact happening within all types of employment zone, and across the entire intrametropolitan space-economy. Table 5 analyses only those EAs that have not changed status between 1996 and 2001, identifying, for each EA type, those EAs where employment has grown and those where employment has declined. For every type of EA, whether CBD core, major core or non-employment zone, there are cases of both growth and decline. Thus, even if, at a higher scale (say at the census tract level), one can safely say that certain areas have grown (for example, the CBD) and others have declined (for example, non-employment zones), at a ner scale of analysis it is impossible to be so categorical; one can only say that certain types of EA have, on balance and in a net sense, grown or declined. In the next section, we analyse a map of Montreal in order to reach a better understanding of the geography of employment zones. So far, the analysis has been conducted in the abstract space depicted in Figure 1. By observing the real space of Montreal in the light of this analysis of growth and decline, we can achieve a better understanding of the nature of employment zones. Turning now to the secondary and isolated employment zones, an interesting phenomenon is the move of many secondary

Table 5. Growth and decline amongst EAs that do not change status, 19962001
Montreal Employment Type 1a 1a 1b 1b 2a 2a 2b 2b 3 3 4 4 9 9 Total Decline Grow Decline Grow Decline Grow Decline Grow Decline Grow Decline Grow n 1996 2001 Growth Absolute Percentage 28 395 24 845 25 065 20 010 2495 46 180 26 110 27 635 26 350 15 175 24 540 4 105 223 18 220 37 22 18 212 28 215 28 223 19 241 66 n Employment 1996 2001 Toronto Growth Absolute 2575 49 265 22 615 15 215 21 870 144 450 211 250 38 160 23 700 10 175 2335 5 450 Percentage 22 23 219 33 24 24 213 29 214 23 27 25 242 69 n 1 1 5 14 Employment 1996 12 210 458 75 740 5 256 60 2001 12 060 48 480 6 925 33 975 Vancouver
INTRAMETROPOLITAN EMPLOYMENT STRUCTURE

Growth Absolute Percentage 2150 2 605 2480 8 315 21 095 22 195 28 990 10 410 25 095 10 530 21 905 1 825 21 6 26 32 24 18 213 45 212 22 221 23 236 52

2 36 010 27 615 4 138 515 163 360 15 35 25 280 54 735 20 215 74 745

2 29 970 29 395 12 213 285 262 550 12 31 13 915 46 305 11 300 61 520

3 24 465 23 970 22 257 370 303 550 37 50 890 44 780 72 99 445 127 080 29 44 13 15 41 080 54 080 19 365 21 095 34 730 69 255 14 825 25 200

5 45 785 43 915 49 594 420 738 870 49 86 075 74 825 79 130 245 168 405 23 30 6 17 27 395 44 325 4 850 21 810 23 695 54 500 4 515 27 260

4 29 060 27 965 12 124 020 146 215 31 69 425 60 435 22 23 170 33 580 31 32 7 8 41 055 48 890 9 070 8 030 35 960 59 420 7 165 9 855

Decline 1 205 234 055 138 905 295 150 Grow 2 003 181 635 300 765 119 130 3 499

1 375 266 095 155 460 2110 635 2 710 214 520 361 970 147 450 4 400

682 137 210 87 450 249 760 1 064 106 995 162 875 55 880 1 914

1725

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enumeration areas to major fringe status (Table 4). Far fewer EAs make the reverse transition from major fringe to secondary or isolated status. Two processes, both illustrating a certain type of concentration of employment, lead to this. On the one hand, in the three CMAs, geographical links are being created between secondary zones and major zones, thereby annexing the secondary zones to the major ones:4 some of the EAs transitioning from non-employment to employment status are located in such a way as to bridge the gap between the geographically isolated and the major zones. On the other hand, employment in some EAs within secondary zones has risen to over 5000, thereby transforming the secondary zone into a major zone with its own fringe. The Geography of Montreal Employment Zones We have, so far, analysed data that have been classied, rather abstractly, according to the conceptual model in Figure 1, itself derived from previous theorisation and studies of employment location. We now turn to the actual geography of employment zones in Montreal, a city we have chosen as an example because it is one that we are familiar with. Figure 2 shows core EAs in a dark tone; non-core, secondary and isolated zones are in a lighter shade. Rather than analyse the map as whole, we will comment upon certain key features. Key Features Edgeless cities. A cursory glance at the map does not reveal any edgeless cities (areas where employment has located in a series of isolated buildings along highways). This does not mean that they do not exist in Montreal, nor that they lie outside our employment zones. Indeed, there are two suburban employment zones (Mirabel and Varennes) which cover large areas. Both have highways passing through them and for neither do we have any information on the precise location of jobs within the large area. In Varennes in particular, we note that there is a low

number of jobs per kilometre of highway5 and we know that the area is largely agricultural with a few buildings scattered along the highway. Although such an analysis is in no way rigorous, it suggests that further exploration is needed in order to assess whether either of these apparently very diffuse suburban poles meets the criteria suggested by Lang (2003) for edgeless cities. By combining detailed origin-destination survey data with indicators such as jobs per km of road, we eventually hope to be able to qualify more rigorously the nature of employment location within these suburban employment zones. Linear zones. The vocabulary of poles, centres, edge cities implies a compact, nodal type of development. Very few of the zones identied on the map are of a compact shape. The Varennes zone follows highway 30, and the intersection of highways 30 and 20 appears to be the intersection of two linear zones, each following one of the highways. Highway 40, which crosses Montreal island from south-west to north-east, has four major zones and numerous secondary and isolated zones strung along it. To some extent, dividing employment along highway 40 into discrete employment zones is articial, since the entire length of the highway is an employment zone. Only our local knowledge, and the fact that certain minor breaks do appear, has enabled us to separate out the various different types of employment zone along this road. Also evident on this map are two smaller linear zones. The south-east to north-west St Laurent axis, which is the historical backbone of Montreals spaceeconomy, emerges clearly on the map and emerges more clearly still when the E/R criterion is relaxed (St Laurent is a road characterised by high employment and residential density). In the southern suburbs, the Taschereau boulevard zone clearly emerges; this is a major suburban shopping strip, with big box stores facing onto the road and residences immediately behind. Here, too, the proximity of retail employment and suburban housing attenuates, but does not obliterate, this linear zone. Finally, highway 15, which heads

INTRAMETROPOLITAN EMPLOYMENT STRUCTURE

1727

Figure 2. Montreal employment zones, 2001.

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RICHARD SHEARMUR ET AL.

north-west from highway 40, joins four major zones together along a distance of about 30 km. Whilst each of these zones is separate, fringe EAs and certain secondary zones make this entire stretch of highway another major employment axis. Links between major zones. Going south-west from the CBD, a series of fringe EAs link the CBD with another major zone, the Angrignon retail zone. From there, some more fringe EAs link Angrignon with Ville St Laurent/ Dorval. North-east from this major zone, a small non-core EA links it with the Marche Central, itself very nearly linked to Anjou (along highway 40) and Laval (along highway 15). South-east from Marche Central, the St Laurent linear zone links back towards the CBD. Thus, a series of major zonesemployment centres that also emerge when census tracts are used and that would be well recognised by most Montrealersare linked together by secondary zones usually stretching along highways or major arteries. These links emerge even more clearly if certain employment zone criteria are relaxed or if other criteria are used (such as jobs per km of road). This suggests an alternative way of conceptualising the distribution of employment in intrametropolitan space, one that draws upon the concepts of employment poles or centres, but also upon economically important physical links between these centres. It is no longer just the edge cities and suburban centres that are important, but also the spaces in between. Indeed, in the previous section, our analysis suggests that between 1996 and 2001 these links have been developing and consolidating. This concept can be distinguished from edgeless cities by the fact that the physical linking of employment centres is a key component of it. Employment centres and their fringes. Notwithstanding the possible existence of edgeless city phenomena and the relatedalthough distincturban forms of linear zones and links between employment centres, Figure 2 also underscores the fact that there are a small number of well dened

core employment zones in Montreal around which the rest of employment zones are organised. These core zones existed in 1996 and have not changed signicantly (at least when analysed at the census tract level) since 1981. Whether from the perspective of geography (Figure 2), or from the perspective of analysing the employment status of EAs (Tables 4 and 5), it is clear that a small number of core EAs structure the remaining employment zones. These remaining zones, whilst often linking core zones to each other, also follow highways and principal arteries. Figures 3 and 4, which represent Toronto and Vancouver respectively, display similar general patterns. We have chosen not to comment on these maps in detail, bearing in mind our more limited knowledge of these cities: naming employment zones with any degree of accuracy requires such knowledge. However, possible edgeless cities, denite linear zones, links between major zones and stable employment core zones are all identiable in these cities. Measurement Error6 So far in this analysis, we have treated our data as if they were error-free except for the errors in geographical coding that we have to a large extent corrected by aggregating census sub-divisions where necessary. However, Statistics Canada (2003) estimates that, for a count of 500 (our cut-off point for employment zones), there is a standard error of 45. In other words, there exists an irreducible uncertainty not only with regard to the precise extent of employment zones, but alsoand perhaps more importantly in the context of this analysiswith regard to the qualication of transitions between employment zone and non-employment zone status. In Table 4, we document these transitions and conclude that there is considerable instability at the fringe of employment zones. This instability may be due to the chaotic nature of urban spatial processes at such a ne scale (and we believe that this is so), but some may also be attributable to measurement error.

INTRAMETROPOLITAN EMPLOYMENT STRUCTURE

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Figure 3. Toronto employment zones, 2001.

1730
RICHARD SHEARMUR ET AL.

Figure 4. Vancouver employment zones, 2001.

INTRAMETROPOLITAN EMPLOYMENT STRUCTURE

1731

Table 6. Transitions from and to employment zone status, 1996 2001 Type Montreal changes Certain Certain Certain Uncertain Uncertain Uncertain Uncertain Do not know Toronto changes Certain Certain Certain Uncertain Uncertain Uncertain Uncertain Do not know Vancouver changes Certain Certain Certain Uncertain Uncertain Uncertain Uncertain Do not know
a

Change EZ96 and EZ01 EZ96 to Not01 Not96 to EZ01 DNK to EZ01 DNK to not01 EZ96 to DNK Not96 to DNK do_not_know EZ96 and EZ01 EZ96 to Not01 Not96 to EZ01 DNK to EZ01 DNK to not01 EZ96 to DNK Not96 to DNK do_not_know EZ96 and EZ01 EZ96 to Not01 Not96 to EZ01 DNK to EZ01 DNK to not01 EZ96 to DNK Not96 to DNK do_not_know

n 329 48 54 31 38 21 53 17 369 57 56 23 42 21 40 13 181 27 30 13 24 10 22 8

E in 1996 909 375 44 755 15 875 16 495 19 045 16 935 15 505 8 400 1 395 785 53 480 16 230 11 040 25 300 24 195 13 625 7 700 510 030 25 230 10 175 6 420 12 795 7 710 11 145 3 995

E in 2001 1 038 595 16 220 50 035 25 195 12 230 12 455 26 570 8 380 1 672 830 24 345 63 260 17 960 16 195 16 420 21 325 8 140 571895 12 925 24 545 10 350 7 435 5 485 16 070 4 190

Growth 129 220 228 535 34 160 8 700 26 815 24 480 11 065 220 277 045 229 135 47 030 6 920 29 105 27 775 7 700 440 61 865 212 305 14 370 3 930 25 360 22 225 4 925 195

Sum by typea

191 915

31 060 2 20

353 210

31 500 440

88 540

16 440 195

This column contains the sum of absolute values by level of certainty. Note: Population: all SDs where ER . 0.938 and E . 455 in 1996 or where ER . 0.938 and E . 455 in 2001. Key: DNK: Do not know. Probability that the SD is an employment zone , 84.2 per cent. EZxx: Probability that SD is an employment zone in year XX  84.2 per cent. Notxx: Probability that SD is not an employment zone in year XX  84.2 per cent.

In Table 6, each transition to and from employment zone status has been classied according to its level of certainty.7 For each year1996 and 2001each EA is either certainly an employment zone, certainly not an employment zone, or its classication is not known. From these three classications, eight possible types of transition are possible (the ninth one, from certainly not an employment zone to certainly not an employment zone is omitted since we are not analysing EAs which have no chance of being an employment zone in either year). The table thus derived gives an idea of the maximum possible uncertainty attributable to measurement error (given our denition of certainty). It is a maximum for two reasons: rst, each

transition is considered independently. However, as the number of transitions considered rises, errors in one direction will tend to be compensated by errors in the other. Secondly, we have not attempted to estimate the way in which measurement errors for the ER ratio and measurement errors for E combine: since these two errors are not completely independent, we are in fact slightly overestimating the probability of uncertainty for each individual transition. Figures 2 4 indicate, for 2001, the EAs which are in the uncertain category. Bearing this in mind, Table 6 and Figures 24 show that, although measurement error certainly increases the noisiness in our results, it most probably does not fundamentally affect their general thrust. Very few uncertain EAs

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are geographically isolated from certain EAs: in other words, uncertainty is mainly conned to the fringes of employment zones. Furthermore, the scope of measurement error is limited. In each city, a vast majority of jobs qualied as being in employment zones are in certain zones: in Montreal in 2001, for instance, 1 113 825 jobs are in certain employment zones, and 47 405 are in zones qualied as uncertain. This can be compared with the gure of 1 133 800 jobs in employment zones (see Table 1) if no account is taken of measurement error. Measurement error has greater impact if transitions are considered: between 1996 and 2001, from 8 per cent (in Toronto) to 16 per cent (in Vancouver) of jobs involved in transitions8 are involved in uncertain transitions. As can be seen from Table 6, however, these uncertain transitions tend to cancel each other out: the net number of jobs (and the net number of EAs) involved in uncertain transitions is small. If only the certain transitions are considered, Table 6 reveals that in each city a large proportion of EAs in employment zones remain stable, and there is also considerable churningfairly large numbers of EAs gain or lose employment zone status over the period. These conclusions are the same as those reached when errors were not considered. It is not feasible, in this article, to apply this approach to the entire analysis in the preceding sections. However, by considering the probable impact of measurement error on our results, two conclusions can be drawn. First, notwithstanding our use of the word certain in order to simplify our exposition, there is no absolute certainty involved in the identication of employment zones. Employment zones can more accurately be dened as elds of probabilitywith extremely high probability of employment zone status for the cores and decreasing probability of employment zone status as either ER, E or both get closer to the cut-off points. Secondly, whilst introducing a level of uncertainty, and the necessity of thinking in probabilistic terms, the consideration of measurement error does not fundamentally alter our

aggregate conclusions at the metropolitan level. The processes we describe in the previous section, and their geography, remain observable (although less clearly) even after accounting for measurement error.

Discussion and Conclusion Some Conceptual and Measurement Considerations In beginning the research for this paper, our intention was to document in greater detail the evolution of the metropolitan spaceeconomy in Canadian cities. We expected our principal contributions to follow from the increased level of detail permitted by analysis at the enumeration area scale. Our empirical results do provide some insights into evolving metropolitan form and its complexity, and these will be discussed in the following section. More unexpectedly, our analysis highlights some important conceptual considerations linked to measurement and scale of analysis. In interpreting our results, two types of uncertainty have been considered. The rst is uncertainty at the fringes of employment zones as EAs enter and leave employment zone status in a chaotic manner. From one period to the next, and abstracting from any measurement error, it is impossible to foresee which EAs will undergo a change in status. Despite this small area chaos, there is great stability in overall metropolitan structure. Thus, the metropolitan space economy can be understood as a chaotic system (Prigogine, 1994; Manson, 2001).9 Such systems can be studied from two perspectives (Prigogine, 1994, p. 9): rst, from the perspective of individual members; and, secondly, from the perspective of the system as a whole. In our analysis, individual members are the EAs and their trajectories over time are not predictable: one cannot ascertain, at the beginning of a period, whether a given EA will grow or decline over the next period and whether it will have employment zone status or not. At most, one could assign a probability to each possible trajectory. The system

INTRAMETROPOLITAN EMPLOYMENT STRUCTURE

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as a whole is the metropolitan area: at this scale, there is great stability, notwithstanding the unpredictable trajectories of each individual EA. Although change does occur at this scale, it occurs along broadly predictable lines in an ordered fashion. The second type of uncertainty revealed in our study is that attributable to measurement error. Although measurement error should come as no surprise, fewif anystudies of the metropolitan space-economy have discussed its effect on results. This can be attributed to the broader scale of analysis in most other studies: at the census tract level, for instance, the effect of measurement error can be overlooked.10 The consequence of measurement error is that it is impossible to know with certainty whether a particular EA has experienced growth or decline, and whetherat a given point in timeit is an employment zone or not. Such measurement error is fundamentally different from uncertainty due to chaotic processes: even errorfree observation would reveal instability over time at the fringes of employment zones (as suggested by the certain results in Table 6). Measurement error means that even for a given year our data do not enable us to be sure of the exact number of jobs in a particular EA. Our experience in analysing these data is reminiscent of Heisenbergs uncertainty principle: the closer we have come to our object of analysis (ultimately, we would like to analyse the point pattern distribution of jobs), the less certain we are of our measure of employment. Conversely, as we take steps back and distance ourselves from our object of analysis (by aggregating observations over wider areas), the more condence we have in our measure of employment. Thus, the uncertainty principle as applied to our analysis would be: the more precise the measurement of location, the less precise the measurement of the phenomenon being analysed. These two conceptual considerations are not new: many analysts have used chaos theory to model urban growth (see, for instance, Allen and Sanglier, 1978; Makse et al., 1998) and the idea that measurement

error exists is fundamental to all statistical analysis. However, the fact that these considerations arise in a straightforward piece of descriptive empirical work has some wider theoretical considerations, to which we will now turn. Empirical Results and Theory There has been some debate in recent years over whether employment has been polynucleating (Garreau, 1991) or dispersing (Gordon and Richardson, 1996), and over whether the development of metropolitan areas is chaotic (Dear and Flusty, 2001) or ordered (Shearmur and Charron, 2004). Our results seem to suggest that all of these processes are occurring at the same time and in the same places11 and generalise Charneys (2005) whose analysis of Torontos ofce market leads her to conclude that clustering and dispersal can occur simultaneously within suburbs. This does not mean, however, that there are no regular processes at work and that no conclusions can be drawn about what is occurring in Canadas three largest cities. It shows, in keeping with chaos theory, that different processes occur at different scales and that the choice of scale and of object of analysis will bring to the fore one or another of the apparently contradictory trends mentioned above. Polynucleation is occurring in Canadas three largest cities: if the 2001 employment zones are analysed, it is clear that employment grows fastest in employment centres. Furthermore, despite apparent dispersal when one analyses the 1996 employment zones, the enumeration areas towards which employment has dispersed are predominantly contiguous to the fringes of existing employment zones. Finally, at the scale of census tracts, there is a tendency (albeit a relatively modest one) for employment to grow faster in employment zones, irrespective of the year chosen for dening the zones. Dispersal is also occurring: strictly speaking, dispersal should be measured taking the initial year as a base. It is undeniable that employment has been growing in areas

1734

RICHARD SHEARMUR ET AL.

outside the 1996 employment zonesand this could be called dispersal. However, there is little evidence of scattering, as this implies that the dispersal is widespread across the metropolitan area. Although some employment growth is occurring away from 1996 employment zones (in Table 4, it can be seen that a number of rapidly growing 1996 non-employment zones have become isolated employment zones in 2001), most of the 1996 non-employment zones that change status do so by joining a secondary zone or the fringes of the CBD and major zones. However, to the extent that edgeless cities are also a form of dispersal, then maybe some of the suburban employment zones we have identied should qualify as dispersed. Given the large size of some of these employment zones (and the large size of the EAs they gather), it is quite possible that dispersal could be occurring within areas we have identied as employment zones. Further studywith alternative data sourceswill be necessary to investigate this. At the enumeration area scale (that of a few city blocks), employment growth is chaotic and the churning of employment between different EAs somewhat resembles the haphazard location decisions posited by keno capitalism (Dear and Flusty, 2001). Even amongst the stable core EAs of each of the three CBDs, some EAs have declined and others have grown over the 19962001 period. At the unstable fringes of the CBD and major zones, numerous EAs have declined and lost their employment zone status, whilst others have emerged as economic locations. It is therefore not possible to assert, for instance that, because an EA is part of a major employment zone core (the type of zone that consistently grows the fastest across the 19962001 periodTables 2 and 3), then it will necessarily have beneted from employment growth (Table 5). At this scale, and given this evidence, Dear and Flustys (2001) contention that there are no organising principles to intraurban economic development appears to be justied. Casual observation of each of these three CMAs, and case studies of small areas, will reveal only chaoswith some city blocks growing, others declining. Their

contention that there are no structures and processes operating at a wider urban scale is not, however, supported. Indeed, it is only by drawing back from the enumeration area scale, by looking at patterns beyond the city block using means other than casual observation, that coherent patterns and processes emerge. Taking a wider view, clear structures can be seen. Montreal, for instance, is organised around a small number of core employment zones, which are on the whole stable despite many micro-level uctuations. These employment zones are surrounded by non-core zones which are organised according to two related principles. First, they link major zones: secondary, isolated and non-core employment zones are located in such a way that they form links (which are sometimes continuous, sometimes interrupted by nonemployment zones) between core zones. Secondly, many of these non-core zones constitute linear zones, following major highways and arteries. These processes and concepts are somewhat removed from our initial conceptualisation of metropolitan areas in Figure 1. Although Figure 1 remains a useful way of thinking about a metropolitan spaceeconomy, our results qualify and rene our understanding of the way non-core employment zones are organised, as illustrated in Figure 5. In this paper, little attention has been paid to the differences between Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver or to their particularities. Rather, the similarities between them have been used to highlight some key aspects of employment location and growth within metropolitan areas. A key nding is that, even in a context of rapid growth (the late 1990s), there are pockets of growth and decline across the whole CMA, even within the (ostensibly) fastest-growing zones. This churning is particularly evident around the fringes of core employment zones and makes difcult any simple answer to the question: has employment dispersed or nucleated? Although both processes occur simultaneously, our data do not support the idea that employment has scattered; if it has to some extent dispersed, it has done so

INTRAMETROPOLITAN EMPLOYMENT STRUCTURE

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Figure 5. The metropolitan space-economy: some additional concepts.

1736

RICHARD SHEARMUR ET AL.

following highways, consolidating links between core zones and on the fringes of these core zones. Finally, a key to making sense of these complex phenomena is not to lose sight of the scale at which processes occur and can be observed; regularities are observed at the scale of the metropolitan area. Census tracts are large enough to absorb most of the churning effect. On the other hand, enumeration areas allow more subtle spatial forms to be observed, but also introduce a lot of noise into the analysis. This noise is partly due to the day-to-day workings of property markets and rms within the city and partly due to measurement error: it is impossible to differentiate completely between these two sources of noise and there is therefore an irreducible level of uncertainty. Thus, although we can present no overarching resultswe have not resolved the scattering versus polarisation argument, and we are not yet able to investigate fully the edgeless city phenomenonwe have shown that many apparently contradictory trends can be observed in a city without these trends being either contradictory or unstructured. Notes
1. As one increases the threshold in steps of 100 between 100 and 1000, the largest increase in jobs per EA occurs between 400 and 500 in Montreal, between 500 and 600 in Vancouver and between 600 and 700 in Toronto. The lowest of the three optima has been retained, that for Montreal. These results are available upon request. Theoretically, a transition could also be due to changes in population (that may lead to changes in the ER ratio). The number of EAs that change status because of changes in population or changes in the ER ratio is negligible. Such annexing is, of course, a product of our methodology which relies on chains of contiguity (or lack of it) to distinguish the fringes from secondary and isolated zones. We will return to this in the next section. Results available on request. We are grateful to an anonymous referee who raised this point. One-tail tests are used. Certainty is dened as being at least one standard error above (or

8.

9. 10.

11.

below) the cut-off point for both the ER and the employment criterion, giving a onetailed probability of error of 15.6 per cent for each criterion. Uncertainty is dened as being within one standard error of the cut-off point. The standard error for the ER ratio is calculated using the estimation formula given in US Census (n.d.), and is estimated to be 0.062. The percentages are the ratio of absolute number of jobs involved in uncertain transitions to all jobs involved in a certain or uncertain transition. These numbers are in the Sum by type column of Table 6. Both these sources provide good overviews of chaos and complexity theory. Although it is not completely negligible the standard error in Canadian census data for a count of 5000 being 160 (Statistics Canada, 2003). tart and Forgues (1995, p. 19) make a Thie very similar observation concerning organisations. They write that many authors have stressed the existence of continuous processes of convergence and divergence, stability and instability, evolution and revolution in every organisation.

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