The city centre: its future role and significance

This chapter sets out why this book’s focus on the city centre matters in contemporary society and why we believe that considering its future form and function is of importance. Traditional notions of the city centre providing a concentration of economic, social and cultural activities as the ‘beating heart’ of the urban area and beyond, are being challenged and replaced in different ways globally. Much more complex and diverse sets of relationships between the city centre and its environs are being created and in turn this is redefining city’s identity. There is a need to refocus attention on the city centre in light of these transformative pressures and to understand how continuity and change are being intertwined in the making its future. This chapter considers the centre in flux, and discusses how this dynamism has to be harnessed as the downtown responds to wider economic, social, political and environmental processes.