Exploring the Urban Strength of Small Towns in Romania

Small towns have long been overshadowed, but in recent years, there is a growing recognition of their territorial role, both on the research agenda and on the European Union level, simultaneously with an increasing awareness of their heterogeneity. In spite of this, studies focused on small towns in...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inSocial indicators research Vol. 152; no. 3; pp. 843 - 875
Main Authors Stoica, Ilinca-Valentina, Tulla, Antoni F., Zamfir, Daniela, Petrișor, Alexandru-Ionuț
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Dordrecht Springer Netherlands 01.12.2020
Springer Nature B.V
Subjects
Differentiation
Geographic information systems
Heterogeneity
Human Geography
Indexes
Individualized Instruction
Infrastructure
Land use
Microeconomics
Municipalities
Original Research
Principal components analysis
Public Health
Quality of Life Research
Remote sensing
Social Sciences
Socioeconomic factors
Sociology
Towns
Urban areas
Romania
Urban strength
Political will
Hierarchy
Small towns
Romania
Urban status
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Summary:Small towns have long been overshadowed, but in recent years, there is a growing recognition of their territorial role, both on the research agenda and on the European Union level, simultaneously with an increasing awareness of their heterogeneity. In spite of this, studies focused on small towns in Eastern Europe are few in relation to the large numbers in the area and the role of this paper is to contribute at filling in this gap. In Romania, there are 225 small towns (under 20,000 inhabitants), which constitute 70% of the entire urban system. In order to measure their urban characteristics, a multi-dimensional (composite) index was developed, called Index of Urban Strength. For the index, 22 relevant indicators were selected and grouped in three dimensions under the form of secondary indexes (demographic, socio-economic, infrastructure and land-use). Then, a Principal Component Analysis (PCA) integrated with Geographic Information System (GIS) method was applied for each dimension, and the influential variables were identified. Finally, the index was computed allowing the assignment of different levels of urban strength (very low, low, medium and high) to Romanian small towns. The paper provides new insights related to the uneven development of small towns, allowing for comparative analyses and advocating the need to develop specific policies for each of the identified categories. The results indicate a spatial differentiation at the macro-region level, with the small towns with very low or low index of urban strength more prevalent in the East and South of the country than in the Centre and the West.
ISSN:0303-8300
1573-0921
DOI:10.1007/s11205-020-02465-x