2014-10-14 Planning & Organisation Committee Agenda - Pages 51 - 117

PLANNING & ORGANISATION COMMITTEE MEETING AGENDA   14 OCTOBER 2014




                                                     Page 105 of 117

PLANNING & ORGANISATION COMMITTEE MEETING AGENDA                                                  14 OCTOBER 2014

                                                                                                   ATTACHMENT 4

            A discussion paper examining the use of a ‘population gravity model’ to assess the strength of
            community and commercial linkages between the Eumundi/Doonan/Verrierdale/Weyba Downs (EDV)
            areas and other Sunshine Coast Centres seen as relevant to their possible amalgamation with Noosa
            Shire.

            Background:    For some 50 years social scientists have used a modified version of Isaac Newton's Law of
            Gravitation known as a ‘population gravity model’ to predict movement of people, information, and
            commodities between cities and even continents. The concept considers the population size of two places
            and their distance apart. Generally, larger places attract people, ideas, and commodities more than smaller
            places. Further, as a consequence of sheer convenience, the closer together places are, the greater the
            attraction/interaction. The ‘population gravity model‘ incorporates these two features.

            The relative strength of a bond between two places is determined by                -            -
            multiplying the population of city (1) by the population of city (2) and then
            dividing the product by the distance between the two cities squared. So the         distance?
            equation a standard Population Gravity Model is...... population (1)
            multiplied by population (2)] divided by distance squared (see Fig. 1).

            Gravity models can be used to anticipate the
            traffic between two places, journey to work,         Chart 1 - Strength of population gravity model linkage to Brisbane (as LGA's)
            number of telephone calls, transportation of
            goods and other types of movement              450000000
            between places. In each case I have used the   400000000
            functional distance (driving distance)         350000000
            between communities instead of the actual
            point to point distance. As an example in      Son000000
            South East Queensland, if we compare the       250000000
            bond between the Local Government areas        200000000
            of Brisbane, Ipswich, Logan, Moreton Bay,       -
            Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast, we first        * 9200000
            multiply their 2011 (ABS Census figures)       100000000
            populations and then we divide that number     50000000                    a          7
            by the distance squared. Chart 1 illustrates        0                                               |
            how the equation allocated the various                   Logan    Moreton Bay Ipswich Gold Coast Sunshine Coast
            degrees of strength in the movement of
            people, information and goods/services
            between each community. Experience and
            anecdotal evidence suggests the way the               Chart 2 - Commuting to Brisbane to work
            equation allocates relationships is                                     (2011)
            reasonably accurate.                          20000
            Journey to work (JTW) figures (see Chart 2)   15000
            were examined to test the conclusions of the
            population gravity model data. As the JTW     10000
            figures do not include trips (i.e. linkages) for 5000
            socialising, recreation and entertainment,                                           WS
            they will not be a precise match. However,        0                                            ewewer
            the Gold & Sunshine Coast figures do clearly           Ipswich   Logan-    Moreton  GoldCoast  Sunshine
            illustrate how scale, distance and quality of                   Beaudesert = Bay                Coast
            transport infrastructure affects linkage
            between locations.

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