Intra-Urban Manufacturing Land Use Patterns: An Examination of Greensboro, North Carolina

INTRA-URBAN MANUFACTURING LAND USE PATTERNS: AN EXAMINATION OF GREENSBORO, NORTH CAROLINA* Norman W. Schul and Charles R. Hayes* The volume of literature concerned with intra-Urban manufacturing loca­ tion is impressive. Allan R. Pred’s landmark paper: “The Intrametropolitan Location of American Manufacturing,” (2) lists the more pertinent works in the field and summarizes his own analysis of intrametropolitan industrial locational patterns. The list of contributions to the field need not, therefore, be repeated in this study. Pred’s work, and most of the studies preceding his, focused on the industrial patterns of the metropolis—the metropolitan areas containing populations in excess of two million. Greensboro, North Carolina, is a smaller city of 131,711 persons. (2) Greensboro is examined in an attempt to learn more about intra­ urban manufacturing in cities of its size. It is not suggested that Greensboro is “typical” of similar-sized manufacturing cities in the United States. But neither is Greensboro particularly “untypical.” It is a “southern textile cen­ ter,” and as such probably shares more features with other textile manufac­ turing cities in the southern Piedmont than with similar-sized centers else­ where. Nevertheless, it is hoped that this study will suggest topics for research in other smaller manufacturing cities across the United States. Data for this analysis were collected by surveying managerial personnel representatives of the Greensboro manufactural complex. (3) INTRA-URBAN MANUFACTURING LOCATION. Land used for manu­ facturing within the planning boundary (4) of Greensboro is indicated on Figure 1. It is evident from an examination of Figure 1 that manufacturing land use in Greensboro is railroad oriented. This distribution of manufactural land use extends outward from the center of the city, along the rail lines, in a radial pattern. However, the manufacturing land use pattern is intermittent rather than continuous in its alignment along the railroad network. This railmanufacturing association is not surprising since 39 per cent of Greensboro’s manufacturing plants ship or receive a portion of their product by rail. Based on a ratio of employees to product, 42 per cent of Greensboro’s raw materials and manufactured products are either received or shipped by rail. Lumber, electrical machinery, chemicals, paper, stone, clay and glass, non-electrical machinery, and fabricated metal products firms are the heavy users of the railroad. Rubber and plastics, food, printing and publishing, textiles, miscellaneous manufactures, apparel, primary metals and tobacco fTh is study is based, in part, on a planning report, The Greensboro Manufacturing Pattern, Planning Department, City of Greensboro, N.C., July 1966, 15 pp. *Dr. Schul is associate professor of geography at the University of North Carolina at Char­ lotte, Mr. Hayes is instructor of geography at the University of North Carolina at Greens­ boro. The paper was accepted for publication in March 1968. 40 T h e S o u t h e a s t e r n G e o g r a p h e r manufacturers use rail transport sparingly or not at all. It would, therefore, seem reasonable to expect that the industrial types indicated to be heavy users of railroad transportation would have a tendency to seek building sites adjacent to railroads. As might be anticipated, factories oriented toward national markets tend to be heavier users of railroad transportation than are those oriented toward regional or local markets. This factor by itself, however, does not determine intra-urban manufacturing location. Naturally, nationally oriented plants tend to seek rail sites but so do most Greensboro manufacturers. It is probable that entrepreneurs initially sought rail sites and, in turn, were “locked in” by zoning. Greensboro’s first zoning regulations became law in 1925. A zoning/land use map published two years later indicates that manufacturing was, in the main, established along rail lines by 1927. It there­ fore seems likely that the manufactural pattern became established by 1925, MANUFACTURING LAND USE Figure 1 V ol. VIII, 1968 41 and subsequent factory locations were essentially directed by zoning regula­ tions. The linear pattern of manufacturing land use radiating outward from the city’s center along the rail lines would seem to suggest that Greensboro’s manufacturing growth has been outward from the city center. This is appar...