Influence Of Industrial Development On Urban Spatial Evolution: The Case Of Xintang Town

Maximum economic benefit is the primary goal of urbanization development, which hasbeen the case in most of towns in China for a long time. Due to this reason, economicdevelopment is the key element that shapes the town. Industrial development has largeinfluence on the economic development, and therefore shapes the town directly. The marketeconomic system in China has gradually deepened, allowing some developed areas todecentralize. These towns, or even administrative unit such as villages are endowed with theright of autonomous investment, which greatly enriches types of industry, spurs new industrialorganization forms, and adjusts spatial distribution of industry. That’s why there are some bigadjustment on urban function, scale, structure, spatial forms and layout of land use.Despite this, current research about the influence of industrial development on urbanspace is inadequate. Most scholars have differing views from economics, geography or urbanplanning; some focus on location selection and spatial agglomeration of industry, while othersemphasize the features and mechanism of urban spatial evolution. Very few scholars havetried to find out the influence that industry has on urban space. And, most focus on therespective features of industrial development and urban space, but not the connection betweenthese two. The internal influence mechanism and features are not very clear.Lying on the edge of Guangzhou, Xintang Town is a typical town steered byindustrialization, which to a degree reflects the general rules and process of the industrial andeconomical development in the suburb of developed areas in China. This can be seen through:rural enterprise’s development, the appearance of textile and clothing specialized blocks andheavy industry such as motor and motorcycle. Meanwhile, it also reveals developmentfeatures of specialized town in developed areas and the trans-conformation tendency ofspecialized town into industrial park.This paper starts from the angle of economic geography and urban planning, illustratingthe influence that industrial development has on urban space based on the case of Xintangtown. By introducing the transitional idea of industrial spatial organization, this paper is tofurther look into the influence mechanism that industrial development has upon urban spatialevolution and deeply probe into the features of influence that industrial development has onon urban function, scale, structure, spatial forms and layout of land use, etc. This paper canserve as a reference to areas with similar experience, and try to build a framework and basicidea about the influence study of this category.