Distribution and production in the Philadelphia Area

Bibliographic data

Monograph

Identifikator:: 1828226742

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-217445

Document type:: Monograph

Title:: Distribution and production in the Philadelphia Area

Place of publication:: Philadelphia, Pa.

Publisher:: Philadelphia Business Progress Association

Year of publication:: 1930

Scope:: 13 Seiten

Digitisation:: 2022

Collection:: Economics Books

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Chapter

Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: The Philadelphia Metropolitan Area

Collection:: Economics Books

boundary lines of each of these factors were then superimposed on a large master map and the final metropolitan area line determined substantially as a composite of all these individual factor lines. To facilitate the compilation of statistics the true metropolitan area line was adjusted to conform to the nearest existing township lines. ee rerere—— Summary In this area live 2,934,920 per- of Data sons having an annual spend- for Aden able income totalling $2,550, 000,000. In it there are 7,218 industrial establishments em- oloying 348,300 wage earners, who are paid an- wally $466,250,000, and who produce annually manufactures valued at $2,591,000,000. Retail sales in the area total annually $1,054,992,000. There are 548 separate and distinct communities »f Pennsylvania and New Jersey that lie within the Philadelphia Metropolitan Area. Roughly the area is bounded by the following points which lie within its limits: In Pennsylvania—Marcus Hook, West Chester, Paoli, Valley Forge, Hatfield, Lansdale, Hatboro, Langhorne and Bristol; in New Jersey— Burlington, Mt. Holly, Berlin, Glassboro and Gibbs- own. The productivity and the volume of business done within this area are apparent when statistics for the area are reduced to percentages. By this it is shown that while the district as defined embraces only forty-one one-thousandths of one percent of the total area of the United States, the district em- braces two percent of the entire population of the country, four percent of the country’s industrial establishments, and produces four percent of the total value of all manufactured products made in America. While the city of Philadelphia proper, with its sstimated 1929 population of 2,069,400, comprises nearly ten percent of the metropolitan area, the Metropolitan Area is growing at a rate nearly one and one-half times as fast as the entire United States. The area has increased mearly twenty per- cent since 1920, as compared with a fourteen per- sent increase for the country at large. me mn Movement Philadelphia’s population has, of of Ss in rsaiing grams te . original center, followed the Population railroad and highway routes outward. The boundary lines of the Metropolitan Area include the farthest points of the “built-up” district. In accordance with the practice of the United States Census Bureau, the population line of the Philadelphia Metropolitan Area, as shown on the map on Page 5, was drawn where population density tapered to 150 persons per square mile. Establishment of this line also took into account towns, highway and railroad routes, and other land- marks affecting the density and grouping of popula- tion. An air photograph of the entire area was closely studied in determining the boundary line of the “built-up” area. This photograph clearly shows the tapering off of concentrated building construction. error {Jarre Commuting Commuting was another im- as a portant factor in determining Fact the Philadelphia Metropolitan or Area. The commuting line on the Metropolitan Area map in- dicates perhaps as well as any other factor the relation between the urban and the suburban area. While people commute daily to Philadelphia from such distant points as Atlantic City, Princeton and Reading, and in numbers from Trenton and Wil- mington, the bulk of the commuting comes from points within the “built-up” area line. To establish the Philadelphia Commuting area, forty-five-minute commuting time and twenty-five ent one-way commuting fare were selected as de- termining the effective limits of the great bulk of commuting. Time-tables were consulted to deter- mine number and time of trains at convenient com- muting hours. Estimates were also obtained from the leading transportation companies of traffic in all directions from Philadelphia. These companies included Pennsylvania Railroad, Reading Company, Phila- delphia and Western Railway, Philadelphia and West Chester Traction Company, and the Public Service Co-ordinated Transport. The result of these studies is represented by the commuting area line on the accompanying map. Retail Philadelphia’s department Sales stores form the backbone of its Volume retail shopping facilities. These and other stores in the area enjoy a steady trade from an area bounded by Baltimore, Harrisburg, Allen- town, Princeton and Atlantic City. The metropolitan shopping area is defined as that territory whose population shops in the central city. The area is determined under the standards of the United States Census Bureau by the daily free delivery of department stores in their own trucks. Such stores are chosen as representative of general retail trade because of the large volume of their business and because they deal in all three classes of retail consumption—necessities, luxuries and convenience goods. A line on the accompanying Metropolitan Area map shows the extent of the territory in which two or more Philadelphia department stores make free daily delivery in their own trucks. This metropoli- tan shopping area goes as far as Wilmington, rd 2 A

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