This thesis describes the change in the pattern of service centres in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia at various periods during a century of European occupance. The study of settlement evolution in this region involves an examination of hierarchical change as indicated by variations in postal revenue. The attempt to focus both in time and space is one of the inherent difficulties in any dynamic study of the urban hierarchy, for it presents a basic problem in establishing an adequate and readily available index of centrality. Tertiary revenue would provide the best index, but it is neither available for the smaller centres nor through time. These disadvantages are not apparent in postal revenue which closely correlates with tertiary revenue. It is inferred that postal revenue reflects the tertiary activity of the great majority of service centres in British Columbia. Since the end of the nineteenth century the North American post office, with its low condition of entry, has been an essential part of all except some of the lowest order centres. Postal revenue data is available,throughout Canada, from Confederation onwards, but it presents some problems of utilization as dollar values change through time. The suggested method of expressing the revenue for each given year as a percentage of that for an areal unit is illustrated by its application to the Lower Mainland. However, while the Lower Mainland can be thought of as a physical entity, it must be considered as being part of a larger functional region which changes both functionally and areally. The province has been taken as the continuing functional unit. The idea would seem to be supported by the graphic analysis. The whole period, from 1858 to 1961, has been broken down into five eras, in each of which a common means of transport has predominated. The first era up to 1880 covers the years of initial exploitation and settlement of the region by Europeans, a period when water transport predominated. The second era (1881-1900) is a period of transition from water to rail: the first trans-continental railway merely duplicated the existing water facilities, but its construction encouraged a rapid expansion of settlement even before it actually opened. The turn of the century heralded a decade of feverish rail-way construction, culminating with the opening of the second trans-continental railway in 1915. The railway era ends with the close of hostilities in 1918, and the following era embraces the inter-war years, a period of transition from rail to road. The final era commences in 1940 for, although the steam railway and electric interurban assumed a new lease of life during the war, it was merely a temporary resurgence and road transport was soon predominant. The wartime incentive spurred a tremendous growth of the regional economy, a growth which has continued, somewhat sporadically, up to the present. Throughout the century, settlement change reflects the changes in the economy and transport facilities in the Lower Mainland. The economy of the region has passed from primary exploitation to that of a metropolitan complex with a growing secondary component. The Vancouver area has formed a distinct economic unit within the regions since the arrival of the railway in 1886. The growing functional concentration on the city led to the attainment of metropolitan status by the end of the first decade of the twentieth century. This attainment was expressed in the physical as well as the functional growth of the city: by 1910 it possessed over 30% of the provincial population and greater than 40% of the tertiary activity, more than double the proportions of a decade earlier. The interaction between the metropolis and the smaller centres, with the metropolis playing the dominant role, has given rise to the present urban hierarchy. The settlement pattern has varied from discrete and independent settlements, during the phase of primary exploitation, to a metropolitan-dominated complex. The discrete pattern changed to an increasingly depends hierarchy following the growth of Vancouver and New Westminster as market and distribution centres. The growth of these centres linked them into a common metropolitan area, while the external expansion of this area has resulted in the functional and physical domination of most of the region by the metropolis: a trend that has resulted in the supplanting of the central place hierarchy by an inter-urban complex. / Arts, Faculty of / Geography, Department of / Graduate

The thesis is a study of the urban development of Central Vancouver Island, an area which lacks economic homogeneity. Throughout the period of settlement, agriculture has been second in importance to coal mining and later to the forest industry. Much of the settlement in the region has been as a result of the utilization of three natural resources - coal, forest and land suitable for cultivation. Access to a means of transport was the early factor limiting expansion of settlement, in particular access to the coast and steamers from Victoria. As transport facilities on land improved, occupation of inland areas took place. The first urban settlement in the region was associated with coal mining in the Nanaimo area, and later farther north at the Cumberland-Union mines. The second phase of urban growth occurred from 1900-1930, a period characterized by decreasing profits from -coal mining and greater importance of forest industries. This phase is marked by the growth of Duncan and Gourtenay as service centres for their respective agricultural hinterlands and by changes in the location of mining centres. A rapid increase of population occurred as a result of advances in the forest industry, and of concurrent increase in the service industries, between 1931 and 1961. This third phase of settlement is characterized by an improved and expanded highway system which greatly facilitated the growth of a hierarchy of urban centres, both service and industrial, along with the expansion of the settled area of the Island. A statistical analysis of the population and number of central functions and functional units present in the urban centres of Central Vancouver Island was carried out. Comparison of the results obtained with those published for a similar study in South West Iowa, indicates that most of the relationships present in the latter agricultural region are also present in Central Vancouver Island, but to a less marked degree because of the presence of a larger number of industrial centres. Another conclusion.is that the study of trade centres through this period illustrates the fact that those centres which are of a high order in a hierarchy tend to increase more rapidly than lower order centres. Five centres, Nanaimo, Duncan, Courtenay, the Albernis and Ladysmith, were selected for detailed study of their changing functions and morphology. This revealed the importance of transport facilities, wharfs, railways and highways, which have resulted in industrial expansions and, in some cases, increase of service functions. The central and port location of Nanaimo has led to its growth as the major wholesale distribution point for the area and it is as the tributary area to Nanaimo that the region attains unity. Despite the variety of economic backgrounds to which the urban centres owe their existence, and the early growth of settlement in widely separated locations, the development of a network of communications has allowed the evolution of a hierarchy of urban places within the region. / Arts, Faculty of / Geography, Department of / Graduate

This thesis is part of a larger continuous study which deals with the concept of "Life Style" as a force mapping segments of the urban society into reasonably distinct areas within a metropolitan district. This paper then uses the concept of the "Life Style" as a starting point. The life style chosen here for study is connected with those people who select to live in the dense residential environments associated with the urban core. By examining such an area, its context within the metropolis is found, and the elements constituting it and their interconnections are identified. From the form giving forces generated by this information, a residential system is developed that reflects and reinforces the life style of the population under study. The system is evolved in a “model' abstract area that exhibits characteristics and constraints common to many metropoli, and later applied to a real situation in a particular city to test the efficacy of the system under typical conditions. For the sake of the thesis, I have called the model "Intropolis". It is suggested that new skills and new methods will need to be devised to describe the specific segments of the metropolitan area. To describe Intropolis I have asked a number of questions. The necessary information to answer these questions has been found from census data, from our own observations, and from a sample attitude test undertaken in the West End of Vancouver. The questions are as follows: 1. Who are the people that congregate in a specific area and what are their characteristics and attitudes? Here I have described families in the model area, the households, and the attitudes of members of the household to each other. I was also concerned with household economics and its influence on choices; the sources of family income and the kind of work that procured it seemed to have an influence on values and choices made. 2. How is time used? Observation of activities and their position in space and time becomes as important to the environmental designers as the more normal census data. 3. What are the important forms and tools of communication between people? The urban area is often defined as a system of contacts, and it is suggested that the pattern of place and space may influence the nature of contacts, and vice versa that the nature of the contacts will influence the needs of space. New forms of communication have been a great influence on urban form. I found that these tools must however not be taken for granted as they are not equally available to all groups within the community. After completing the description of the model area, information was perceived as a form giving force from which some of the factors which determine the character of the area can be deduced. These are described in the second part of the thesis. They include a) A basic movement system b) A system of relationships of housing to institutions such as schools, hospitals, churches, public and social services, and commercial and business needs. c) A system of contacts and separations within the area, including open and enclosed spaces. d) A range of choice and a range of densities of housing types. The thesis concludes by integrating these forces into a diagrammatic whole on the model area. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Architecture and Landscape Architecture (SALA), School of / Graduate

Residential-agricultural land use conflict in the rural-urban fringe of metropolitan areas is commonly mentioned as a planning problem. The initial intent of this research was to correlate types of conflict and local planning responses in order to identify effective approaches to the management of such problems. The anticipated method would have combined theory which addresses the cause and characteristics of residential-agricultural conflict along with data from Vancouver suburbs having substantial agricultural activity and planning departments respected for their professional qualities. However, the investigation showed that the academic literature and the accessible data would not support such research. On the other hand, consultations with local planners and a review of available documentation in the municipalities of Richmond, Delta and Surrey, British Columbia, showed that residential-agricultural land use conflict is treated as a planning problem and is a source of complaints to municipal officials. Three kinds of conclusions resulted from this research. The first and second are appropriate to the underdeveloped state of the academic literature, while the first and third relate to professional practice in the absence of applicable scientific knowledge. The first is a description of the characteristics which are perceived as constituting a planning problem and a governmental response. Secondly, there are recommendations for development of data to support future research. Municipal governments in the three communities have no comprehensive monitoring system or set of cross-referenced records of complaints associated with land use conflicts. Instead, conflicts are received, identified and acted on by a variety of departments in the local government. From the descriptive material a tentative typology is offered to guide data collection and classification. Thirdly, there are suggestions which may be useful to planners who must rely on non-systematic methods to identify conflict situations appropriate for a planning response and to develop that response. The summaries of problems and responses reported are used to develop a tentative critique of present conceptualizations of appropriate planning measures. It is observed that planners have used only a few of the possible responses to rural-urban conflict. In particular, it is clear that for a wide range of conflict types there has been a reliance on land buffers to separate potentially conflicting activities. Alternative and supplementary approaches which may improve the management of typical conflict situations are suggested. These approaches focus on preventing the development of conflict through increasing the mutual understanding of the conflicting parties' points-of-view. Examples include public involvement in problem identification and resolution, as well as programs to facilitate communication between the government, farmers and non-farm residents. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Community and Regional Planning (SCARP), School of / Graduate

A great deal of planning literature in the last decade has been devoted to growth management and the concept of land use and transportation interactions. "New" approaches to planning, such as Transit Oriented Development (TOD) and Neo-Traditional Neighbourhood Design, are products of this evaluation of current development practices. The influence of housing affordability and accessibility, although intuitively related to the growth management problems of urban sprawl and automobile dependence, has often been overlooked. The purpose of this research is to bridge important gaps in our understanding of how residential land use and transportation infrastructure investments are shaping unsustainable growth and travel patterns in the GVRD, which is the main problem being addressed. The research objectives related to this problem are the correlation of observed trends in growth, housing and travel indicators, the determination of the importance of price and accessibility factors in household location decisions, and the analysis of the role that land use and transportation decisions have played in influencing housing costs and accessibility. To provide a context for understanding the scope of the problem and the relationships between the research results and proposed recommendations, the applicable literature, theory, and policies in the areas of growth management, land use, transportation and housing are given. Supporting research results include: a survey of senior stakeholders in the region on land use, transportation and housing issues; a synthesis of significant socioeconomic, growth, transportation and housing data; a summary of surveys outlining preferences for residential location and housing type; and an analysis of Place of Work data crosstabulated against Place of Residence and socioeconomic variables. The results show a strong dependency between location decisions and the cost and accessibility of housing, particularly for the critical group of younger households with children. Policy recommendations, based on the research and covering land use, transportation, housing, governance and education, are proposed to address the main sustainability problems studied. The recommendations focus on promoting affordable, higher density communities, with a choice of transportation modes, as an attractive alternative to lower density, automobile-dependent suburbs.

A great deal of planning literature in the last decade has been devoted to growth management and the concept of land use and transportation interactions. "New" approaches to planning, such as Transit Oriented Development (TOD) and Neo-Traditional Neighbourhood Design, are products of this evaluation of current development practices. The influence of housing affordability and accessibility, although intuitively related to the growth management problems of urban sprawl and automobile dependence, has often been overlooked. The purpose of this research is to bridge important gaps in our understanding of how residential land use and transportation infrastructure investments are shaping unsustainable growth and travel patterns in the GVRD, which is the main problem being addressed. The research objectives related to this problem are the correlation of observed trends in growth, housing and travel indicators, the determination of the importance of price and accessibility factors in household location decisions, and the analysis of the role that land use and transportation decisions have played in influencing housing costs and accessibility. To provide a context for understanding the scope of the problem and the relationships between the research results and proposed recommendations, the applicable literature, theory, and policies in the areas of growth management, land use, transportation and housing are given. Supporting research results include: a survey of senior stakeholders in the region on land use, transportation and housing issues; a synthesis of significant socioeconomic, growth, transportation and housing data; a summary of surveys outlining preferences for residential location and housing type; and an analysis of Place of Work data crosstabulated against Place of Residence and socioeconomic variables. The results show a strong dependency between location decisions and the cost and accessibility of housing, particularly for the critical group of younger households with children. Policy recommendations, based on the research and covering land use, transportation, housing, governance and education, are proposed to address the main sustainability problems studied. The recommendations focus on promoting affordable, higher density communities, with a choice of transportation modes, as an attractive alternative to lower density, automobile-dependent suburbs. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Community and Regional Planning (SCARP), School of / Graduate