Transferring cities

A few months ago, I came across an interesting discussion in social media centering on the proposal to "build up" Clark (area) in order to "decongest" Metro Manila. The idea is to build a new urban center in Clark by transferring "certain functions" there from the capital, notably some, if not all, government services. It's not something new - a number of cities in the world belong to, or were originally planned after, that concept. Unfortunately, not one succeeded.

This kind of proposal always arises in exasperation over acute congestion levels of cities all over the world. It is also closely related to economic disparities between capital cities and the "other cities" of a country. It is very seldom for a country to have cities which are comparable to each other in terms of population and economic activity, and most of those who have are often developed countries. For third world ones, you always have a very huge capital city and a lot of many small ones most often unknown to the outside world.

There's an urban planning measure for this - urban primacy index. The capital is usually the "primate city," - the largest city in a country, disproportionately larger than any others. The primacy index is the ratio of its population to the second (most populous) city, or, in other jurisdictions, it is computed as the ratio of the capital's population to the sum of the next four cities combined. Regardless of the index use, the bigger the number, the more top heavy the country is of its capital over the rest of the country. And the more "imperial" the capital becomes.

Every time we talk of development we always talk about "dispersal" of economic activities. Unfortunately, the advantages of mass production and bulk efficiency always favor concentration in bigger cities especially the capital. And so even in our country, the GDP values are always lopsided to NCR, Region 3 and Region 4(a). The insistence towards a federal form of government is prompted by this basic natural disproportion. The movement suggest establishing major economic centers in the federal "states" whatever form they maybe.

But the "transferring cities" discussion talks about another thing - "transferring population," which I believe do not address the problem but will instead aggravate it. There's a reason why Clark area was selected - it is near enough to metro Manila as to become even a part of it. And the solution is wrongly premised on the idea that congestion is caused by the huge population. The congestion Manila is experiencing right now is transport congestion, one which can readily be addressed by improving mobility and accessibility.

Will a transfer of population to Clark improve the situation? Definitely not. How many families will even consider transferring, regardless of whether the transportation services between cities are improved or not? People will compute and that will aggravate congestion levels! Not only will it add additional trips, it will generate new ones. It will explode it into one bigger mess.

We can look at other cities similarly conceptualized. Brasilia is Brazil's federal capital and 4th most populous city. Planned in the 1950's, it didn't affect the natural expansion of Rio de Janeiro and 2 other bigger cities. Canberra, which is Australia's capital, and planned at the turn of the last century as it's seat of government has a population 1/10th of Sydney. In Japan, Tsukuba is a city planned for special purposes previously for government functions but later it became a science and university city. And many more. The latest addition to the list is Naypiedaw - the capital of Myanmar, after the government transferred there from Yangon (Rangoon) in 2006. Transferring capitals or government centers didn't seem to get the excitement it presumed.

So do we want to transfer government functions to Clark? It will not solve Metro Manila's traffic congestion - it will worsen it! The key to address congestion is to improve urban efficiency from within, not transfer the city somewhere else.