Earticle

Metropolitanization has been explained by several conceptual constructs such as functional connectivity between urban center and fringe areas or urbanization of fringe areas. The phenoemenon can be made of all constructs or just one of them and this mechanism may differ by region. Although this difference may reveal the unique characteristics of Korean metropolitanization, there is little reasearch to address it. Based on the Korean official data, this study analyzes the regional variation of metropolitanization for four Korean large cities: Daejeon, Gwangju, Daegu and Busan-Ulsan. The major findings are as follows. First, urbanization constructs may be overestimated, because its change has not been closely related with other constructs. Second, the pattern of functional connectivity has a great regional variation. Some regions show strong connectivity for commuting and population, and other regions have a well-developed industrial network. Third, the relationship between connectivity and centrality also differs by region. This may be resulted from different economic and industrial strucure. As for the cause of this regional variation, there should be more research in the future.