Communications Substitutes for Intra-Urban Travel

Advanced forms of telecommunications may affect urban development patterns and urban travel demands by substituting for interoffice business trips, thereby encouraging a dispersal of future office employment expected to occur in central business districts. Commonly accepted forecasts of extensive CBD employment growth create the need for high capacity, radially oriented, rapid transit systems and should this growth not occur, such systems could be economic liabilities. This possibility plus potential reductions in work travel suggest the need for further study of this unexplored area. A model is suggested to investigate the likely impact of better communications on office location behavior and is related to what little research now exists on substitution and office location theory.