Clustering of the urban field as a precondition for sustainable population growth in peripheral areas: The case of Israel

Analysis of the development of urban communities suggests that sustainable population growth is based on a settlement's ability to attract and retain residents, rather than on natural causes (birth-death rates). In the special case of small, peripheral urban communities, sustained growth was found to be related to the location of the settlement, and in particular to the spatial characteristics of a cluster of urban settlements of which it may be a part. An index of clustering was defined, which allows an analysis of the combined effect on population growth of spatial isolation and distance from major metropolitan centers of the country. Although the present analysis was restricted to urban settlements in Israel, the mode of analysis and its applications for planning policy may be applicable to regional and urban physical planning elsewhere.