1952 40102204

Bus Services as an Index to Changing Urban Hinterlands: With Particular Reference to
Somerset
Author(s): F. H. W. Green
Source: The Town Planning Review, Vol. 22, No. 4 (Jan., 1952), pp. 345-356
Published by: Liverpool University Press
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/40102204
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BUS SERVICES AS AN INDEX TO
CHANGING URBAN HINTERLANDS
WITH PARTICULAR REFERENCE TO SOMERSET
by F. H. W. GREEN
of the most important questions in any town planning investiga
is to discover what functions the town fulfils for the area beyond
boundaries. Consideration of this matter should remind us that, alth
in any highly developed civilisation urban centres exist as focal point
territory, social regions of one sort or another are a much earlier and
fundamental development than the centres themselves. The tribal territo
of primitive communities such as can still be found today among the abor
of northern Australia are not so very different from the territories found
many bird and animal communities. Like the latter they have certai
points for different functions - the water holes for drinking, the hills as
out points and so on - but no permanent habitations. More advanced
of pastoralists may even trade with their neighbours without having any
other than periodical tented bazaars such as the suqs of North Africa.
These considerations should not be ignored by those who, with the con
in mind of a large East Anglian village, try, for example, to force the pa
nucleated settlement among the dispersed habitations of Celtic Wale
true nevertheless that in modern European civilisation, as in most other
developed cultures, it was early found that several communal or specialis
could conveniently be performed at one centre. The case of a perm
market growing up round a church or cathedral was as well known in m
times as the groupings of shops and places of entertainment near an imp
railway junction has been in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
A number of valuable studies have been made on classification of towns
according to the numbers and kinds of functions they perform ; one of the most
convenient to cite here is the work of A. E. Smailes. * But a good deal less has
been done in determining the sizes and shapes of the areas for which they serve
as the chief focal point for one purpose or another. A complete survey of a
whole country would take an enormous time, and involve elaborate questionnaires.
Such a survey for England and Wales has been started recently under the auspices
of the Geographical Association.2 In the meantime we have only surveys of
limited areas (some of them as yet unpublished) or surveys of hinterlands for
certain very specialised functions.
The need has been strongly felt for some sort of short cut which would
enable one to define the average spheres of influence of centres performing urban
1 A. E. Smailes, l The Urban Hierarchy of England and Wales/ Geography, 1944.
2 Geographical Association, Committee on Urban Spheres of Influence. Secretary, Mrs. R. Fox, Department
of Geography, University College, London.
346 CHANGING URBAN HINTERLANDS January
functions. One seeks a majority answer to the question l Where do

often go when you pay a visit to any other place than your neighbo
church, inn, or cross-road stores? ' The fact must not be overlook
certain more specialised purposes visits have from time to time to
other centres further afield. This introduces us to the idea of an ur
such as expounded in England by Dickinson* and by Smailes,2
version of which may be stated as follows : -
ist Order Centres . . Metropolitan Capital . . e.g. Londo
2nd ,, ,, . . Provincial ,, . . ,, Bristol
3rd ,, ,, . . Major Regional Centre . . ,, Taunton
4th „ „ . . Regional Centre . . ,, Wells
5th ,, ,, . . ' Service Village ' . . ,, Any village with
shops.
While the need is also apparent for defining the spheres of influence of second
and third order centres, the question stated earlier in this paragraph implies
the need to define the hinterlands of fourth order centres.
There is no doubt that in the complicated and rapidly evolving economy
of the present day the boundaries of hinterlands will be subject to continual
change and that the status of centres will be rising and falling. Thus in seeking
a convenient index to centres and hinterlands, a flexible index is desirable.
A number of otherwise good indices, e.g. presence of banks, cinemas, branches
of multiple stores, etc., involve fixed capital expenditure, and their provision
in a new centre, or their removal from a decaying one, are subject to a time-lag.
Bus services have been demonstrated to be in the United Kingdom a good index
for providing a static picture*, and it is a purpose of this present article to show
that their flexibility may allow of their being used to show how a situation is
changing.
The method subsequently applied to the whole of the United Kingdom was
first evolved in the course of a survey of South- West England.* This method
must be briefly recapitulated. It involved in the first place an independent
assessment of what constituted a fourth order centre, the definition adopted
being that such a centre must have at least one regular scheduled stage carriage
route which served no place larger than itself. About 700 places in England and
Wales qualified in this way, and it is interesting to record that by using different
indices, A. E. Smailes counted about the same number, though the two lists
are not quite coincident, owing in part but not entirely to the time-lag mentioned
above. For each centre so defined, radial diagrams were drawn to show the bus
routes serving them. When these diagrams were superimposed, as in Fig. 1,
the drawing of the hinterland boundary became very simple. In a few cases,
involving a small town and a larger, it was found impracticable to separate the
1 R. E. Dickinson: City, Region, and Regionalism, Kcgan Paul Trench Trubner, 1947.
2 A. E. Smailes, op, dt.
3 F. H. W. Green, Motor Bus Centres in South- West England considered in relation to population and
shopping facilities. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 194* i Urban Hinterlands in England and
Wales, Geographical Journal, September 19^0.
19S2 F. H. W. GKEEN 347
Pig. 1 - The boundary between^the hinterl

a broken line.
area served by the smaller from that of the larger, and in such cases the smaller
towns were designated subsidiary centres. In Somerset for example there is an
area around Wellington which is almost equally tributary to that town and to
its larger neighbour Taunton. With the help of the Regional Traffic Com-
missioners for the Western and South-Eastern Regions who supplied details of
changes in bus services which had taken place since 1947, it has been found
possible to construct a map for southern England showing the position for the
winter of 1949-^0. A part of this map is reproduced as Fig. 3.
In comparing the maps for the two periods interest first centres on whether
any new places now qualified as bus centres and whether any had now dropped
from this status. Qualification as a centre depended as before on whether there
348 CHANGING URBAN HINTERLANDS January
Fig. 2- The importance of towns as bus centres in the Somerset area.
Al Axmlnstar Fl From* S6 Somarton

Bl BarnstapU Gl Glastonbury-Straat S7 South Patharton
"a
"aBft Rathni
bskii bskii Ml UAni»AH
noniton Cft (»ii*mtM»aa lklMA>*jkak
so SMirnuiistar lMawton
B3 Bridgwatar H2 Hull S9 Swindon
B4 Bridport II llminster Tl Taunton
B5 Bristol 12 Ispwich T2 Ttorton
B6 Bruton Kl King's Lynn T3 Torquay
B7 BumhanvHighbridfe LI Langport T4 Trowbrldg*
B8 Bury St. Edmunds L2 Lowwtoft T5 Truro
Cl Cambridge Ml rUrt Wl Wdb
C2 Ctrlbl* M2 Middlasbrough W2 Wellington
C3 Chard M3 Minahaad W3 WastolUupar-Mare
C4 Chippanham NI Norwich W4 Whitahavmi
C5 Qavadon PI Plymouth W5 Wincanton
C6 ColdMSt«r R| Radstock W6 Wivaliscomba
C7 Crawkwm* SI Salisbury W7 Workington
« Cullompton S2 Scarborough Yl Yarmouth
Df Doncattw- S3 Shafcasbury Y2 Yaovil
El EiwtMr S4 Shapton rialtot
E2 Exmouth SS Sharborne
i3Si F . H . W . G REE hi 349
Fig. 3 - Changes in urban hinterlands in Somerset,

services.
were any public stage carriage services which served no place of greater
significance than the centre itself. There is a degree of arbitrariness in this,
as in all definitions, and small changes in bus services may transfer a town from
one side of the qualifying line to the other. Some towns qualify by an easy
margin; for example, out of 93 buses (excluding duplicates) timed to reach
Frome on market day, $4. had passed through no place as large as Frome, and
14 had passed through no other place qualifying as a centre. At the other extreme
comes Bradford-on-Avon which qualifies solely by two buses on Tuesdays and
Fridays to and from Upper Y/raxall; all other buses to and from Bradford-on-
Avon, including those on the Wraxall road, serve places larger than
3^0 CHANGING URBAN HINTERLANDS January
Bradford-on-Avon, i.e. Bath and Trowbridge. Nevertheless, altho

slight change in services may thus alter the defined status of a town,
is significant. Bearing in mind, therefore, that the changes recorde
1947 and 1950 are comparatively minor, it is useful to see what
changed status by application of die criterion here adopted. It is of
interest to observe that within the two Traffic Regions concerned n
fallen in status, but that additional places now qualified as independ
and as subsidiary centres. It would not be unreasonable to draw a fir
inference from this that increased agricultural activity, and prosper
to other occupations, has been reflected in a revival of small rural c
corollary it could be inferred that improved transport does not s
towards concentration of urban function in a smaller number of large
had sometimes been assumed. The new places qualifying as centres are
(subsidiary centres in italics): -
CORNWALL BERKSHIRE
Lostwithiel (Bodmin) Sunningdale
DEVON Bracknell
Dawlish (Exeter) HAMPSHIRE
SOMERSET Kingsclere
?ruton SUSSEX
f™1" Storrington
tSCS HaiMam (Eastbourne)
Somerton SURREY
Wivdiscombe (Taunton) Crankigh (Guildford)
WILTSHIRE KENT
Mere New Romney
GLOUCESTERSHIRE
Chipping Sodbury (Bristol)
Except where new centres appeared on the map there were few changes in the
hinterland boundaries as previously delineated. Most new bus services merely
intensified the existing network.
Both on account of new centres and of boundary shifts, attention is drawn
particularly to Somerset, though it must be emphasized that Somerset is quite
exceptional in the amount of change recorded. It was felt worthwhile therefore
to make an analysis of the town and country relationships in that county. This
task has been particularly assisted by the as yet unpublished investigations
recently made by Dr. H. E. Bracey, of the Bristol University Reconstruction
Research Group. It had been remarked in a previous paper* that bus services
had been much more subject to change there and that the operators had clearly
found difficulty in discovering the route network best suited to the needs of
die community. BraceyV work reveals the reasons for this, and shows how
1 F. H. W. Green, Urban Hinterlands in England and Wales, op. dt.
I9J2 f. H. W. GREEK 3$!
marked a contrast there is between

The boundaries of the various fun
part roughly parallel with each
so much at variance that there
different purposes, people, partic
tend to look to different focal
operators1 difficulties, and why t
Somerset with a network of servi
Increasing economic activity wo
travel more in general, and it wou
to travel has turned the economic scale and enabled services to be started which
had not paid their way before. It remains to be seen whether this will be a
temporary or a permanent phenomenon.
It is possible to consider using bus services as an index for grading towns
into the different orders of significance referred to earlier in this paper. On
the accompanying table are plotted all towns in the Somerset area qualifying
as fourth order centres by the method described above, and in addition a number
of large towns in other parts of the country which are prima facie comparable
with the smaller number of centres in Somerset that belong to the second and
third orders of significance. The total number of buses per day is plotted against
the proportion of buses serving no place larger than the place itself.
On this graph it might be possible to draw a line which would separate
the majority of towns which acted as second and third order centres from those
which did not. The line which has been drawn is an attempt to do this. When
compared with the results of other methods of classifying towns (e.g. A. E.
Smailes, op. cit.) it suggests certain anomalies. All third order centres in
Somerset, Bristol, Taunton, Bath and Weston-super-Mare, which are classified
by Smailes as ' Minor Cities or Major Towns ' appear on the upper side of the
line. So also, however, does Yeovil, which on the basis of fixed facilities offered,
does not qualify for higher status, in Smailes' urban hierarchy, than ordinary
Town. It has however a close neighbour, Sherborne, which plays in large measure
a complementary role, and it could well be that taken together, these two towns
would fon%a ' Major Town.' Bridgwater also appears just above the line,
but it would need further investigation, to determine whether it could be
reassessed as a third order centre, or ' Major Town.' Trowbridge in Wiltshire
appears also above the line. It may be that the selection of Trowbridge for the
Wiltshire County Offices, may, with the contemporary increase in load govern-
ment activities, be encouraging larger numbers of ' occasional ' visits to the town
and stimulating its development towards third order status.
To summarise, Somerset as a whole lies within the sphere of influence of
the second order town of Bristol, an acknowledged Provincial Capital. Bristol
(unctions also as a third order centre for a part of north Somerset, Bath and
Weston-super-Mare competing with it in this capacity: over limited areas,
but about half of Somerset is within the third order hinterland of Taunton.
3P CHANGING URBAN HINTERLANDS January
A large part of the South-east of the county is, however, more

miles from any third order centre or ' Major Town, ' unless we
' twin/ towns of Yeovil and Sherborne as jointly fulfilling such a
Without attempting to define exactly the hinterlands of third
we may first consider those fourth order centres and hinterland
to be mainly within the ambit of Taunton, and, secondly, th
centres and hinterlands in other parts of Somerset.
Starting in the extreme west of the county, Minehead is situat
of topographical complexity, in which the major part of the popu
in a discontinuous coastal strip, the rest being disposed in Ex
Minehead, with about 150 shops has more than the average nu
per resident but less than the average number in relation to the c
delineated on the map. There are other traditional local centres w
shopping facilities. The chief of these is Watchet, which still has
status and possesses about fifty shops, though these serve mainly its o
The others are Williton and Dunster with about twenty shops ea
with about thirty. Through having first become the railway ter
the local motor bus centre, Minehead has drawn ahead of thes
must be remembered that though three new roads have been open
since 1947, bus services are still meagre in the Exmoor valleys, a
misleading to suggest that Minehead is unchallenged as a focus of
the whole of the hinterland shown on the map. New bus services
appeared in the area since 1947, have, however, not led to any al
shape of the area drawn.
A small part of Somerset in the neighbourhood of Dulverton
the hinterland of Tiverton (Devon), but over the central part
Somerset border country it is the Somerset town of Taunton wh
net across the border. Taunton, however, like Minehead, has less t
number of shops in relation to the population of the hinterland.
accounted for by the existence of two important subsidiary cent
only one, Wellington, qualified as a centre in the 1947 Surve
Wiveliscombe also qualified on the test adopted. It is smaller tha
and has only forty odd shops compared with Wellington's total o
hundred, but its increased post-war bus service reflects the gene
of revivification of this small rural centre. To increased agricult
may well be attributed the arrest of the former tendency to dec
Wellington and Wiveliscombe. Just across the Devon border
which Taunton, Exeter and Tiverton are to some degree in compe
which the small town of Cullompton seems to be holding its
settlements of Culmstock and Hemyock in the upper Culm valley
primarily towards Taunton, and a recent reorganisation of bus se
this orientation. To the north one would have been inclined t
Quantock Hills would make the boundary between the catch
Taunton and Bridgwater one of the most well-marked in Somers
19*2 Z7. H. W. GREEN 3^3
Bridgwater's hold in the west is not

introduction of a new bus service across the watershed from Taunton to
Minehead via Aisholt.
But one of the most interesting tendencies reflected by services introduced
within the last three years is that Langport and Ilminster now qualify as bus centres
occupying the former debateable zone between Taunton and Yeovil. Ilminster,
which has Urban District status, has nearly seventy shops, but Langport, the
headquarters of a Rural District, has not many more than forty.
Although Taunton's hinterland is largely the valley of the Tone it is seen
that it overlaps this vale in almost every direction except downstream towards
Bridgwater, which can in some sense be regarded as a twin to Taunton. It lies at
the lowest bridging point on the Parrett and to the west of it are the northern
foothills of the Quantocks. It is very close to the average in respect of numbers
of shops both per resident and per non-resident. The chief minor shopping
centre within its hinterland is North Petherton with only about twenty shops.
As has been mentioned, there is slight evidence of Taunton's influence creeping
over the top of the Quantocks, but otherwise the last three years show little
change.
Chard lies in the gap between the valleys of the rivers Isle and Axe, but
its influence overlaps the Devon boundary by a few miles. Like Bridgwater
its relationship of shops to population is (on the line of) average. There is
evidence that the revivification of Ilminster and Crewkerne has caused its
hinterland to shrink somewhat in the last three years. Crewkerne which in 1947
only just qualified as a bus centre has consolidated its position and appears to be
* invading ' the Dorset hill country west of Broadwindsor, though in the north
the map suggests it has lost ground to Ilminster. It had rather more shops than
the average in relation to its 1 947 hinterland, but the slight extension of its area
probably brings this ratio more into line with the normal. Its nearest large
neighbour is Yeovil rather than Taunton.
Yeovil is not easily considered apart from the neighbouring Dorset town
of Sherborne with which it exists in a partnership similar, on a small scale, to
those of Bristol-Bath and Gloucester-Cheltenham. It is rather less easy in this
case to separate the two hinterlands, but the line drawn between them on the
map is the line approximately dividing the areas where the influence of each
predominates. In respect of population in its hinterland Yeovil has rather less
than the average number of shops, but this is largely accounted for by the minor
shopping centres in such places as Martock, South Petherton and Ilchester with
about fifty, three dozen, and a dozen shops respectively; South Petherton
qualifies as a subsidiary centre. Langport and Ilminster have, as already stated,
qualified as centres in 1950, and so also has Somerton, a small place with some
forty shops but without Urban District status. The minor changes in boundary
lines in the North-east of Yeovil 's territory essentially reflect the fact that
Castle Cary, with forty shops, is on the verge of following Somerton's example.
Militating, however, against its becoming a centre is the closeness of Bruton
3J4 CHANGING URBAN HINTERLANDS January
and the development of Sparkford. The latter place has a smal

population, but. immediately adjoining the railway station are a la
and a bus garage, and cattle markets are held. The numbers j
Sparkford for daily work and for the markets could well lead to ur
ment there. The Somerset ' town ' of Milborne Port, with some tw
is within Sherborne's sphere of influence. It lies on the recent
through service of double-decker buses between Yeovil and Salisbu
had the apparent effect of giving Sherborne some territory at th
Wincanton, but this area near Henstridge and Templecombe is in a
of divided allegiance.
Wincanton is a small centre without urban status, but fairly wel
in its hinterland of some fifty square miles. It has rather less tha
number of shops in relation to the population in this hinterlan
periphery are not only Bfuton, which now qualifies as a centre it
Castle Cary and Zeals (Dorset). A new bus service has recently been
between Yeovil and Salisbury via Wincanton, thus putting the area
time in direct contact by road with a third order centre. Brut
forty shops now emerges as a small centre, owing to the instituti
two local bus services. Its hinterland is formed mainly at the expen
formerly attributed to Shepton Mallet. Removal of Bruton from t
of Shepton Mallet puts the latter town nearly on the line of average
to population served. The hinterland of Wells, lying at the foot of
has shown little sign of change, and its shops serve about the avera
persons. Glastonbury on the Isle of Avalon, and its close neighbour
joint hinterland which has its population concentrated on islands in
levels. Both have hinterlands of their own which could in fact be
separated, but Street is primarily an industrial town into which la
travel to work. It is likely that these people tend to do their shopp
The number of shops in these two towns in relation to population i
land appears to be unusually high. Changes since 1946-47 have been
of part of the south of the hinterland to Somerton. The alteration
is pf little significance, as it consists of part of uninhabited King
lying alongside the bus route from Glastonbury to Taunton.
Burnham-Highbridge Urban District, at the seaward end of the
levels, is something of a problem area. The hinterland appears earl
been 'invaded' by other, centres, particularly by Weston-sup
number of shops in the joint Urban District is very high in re
population served, though some of those in Burnham are of the ty
to seaside resorts. Moreover, Wedmore, a large village which is
1 metropolis ' of the Isle of Wedmore, contains nearly 30 shops, a
independent centre where the hinterlands of Weston, Glastonbury
bridge come together. The lack of alteration in bus routes in the la
bears out the impression that Burnham and Highbridge are now h
own, and prospering more than at any time since the close of the
19*2 F. H. W. GREEN 355
Dorset railway works in the twenti

mainly on the boundary zone betw
and Bristol.
Weston-super-Mare is an interest
dormitory for Bristol, it has nev
embracing the western end of th
includes the ' decaying * town of A
it extends as far as Cheddar (see
the average in relation to the popu
seaside resort function it can lay c
which has a pull extending some w
and Glastonbury, competitively wit
shows no change in its hinterlan
resort and a dormitory to Bristol,
topography of the immediate ne
independence. It has rather more t
is true of all seaside resorts.
The only changes in the hinterland of Frome are due to the emergence
of Radstock, Bruton and Mere as minor bus centres. Frome now lies almost on
the average in the ratio of shops to population served. Radstock (Urban District
of Midsomer Norton and Radstock) now qualifies as a centre, principally because
of buses to and from it which serve Paulton and Farington Gurney. It possesses
about i$o shops, which, however, mainly serve the needs of its own residents.
It is a specialised mining centre with a shortage of occupations for young women,
many of whom, therefore, travel to work as far afield as Bristol and Bath, and
tend to do some of their shopping in those places.
Bath, like its partner Bristol, is a town with a third order as well as fourth
order function. In both these functions Bristol tends to spread its tentacles
round it. Bath is a place with more than the average number of shops, but many
of them are of a specialised type, helping Bath to fulfil its functions as a specialist
resort and a third order centre. Bristol is an unusually interesting town in that
it is almost equally vigorous in its second order, third order, and fourth order
functions. Vestiges of pseudo-metropolitan functions can also be traced from the
days when it was a serious rival to London. It now has one of the largest fourth
order hinterlands in the country, almost equally divided between Gloucestershire
and Somerset. In Somerset its hinterland extends as far as Cheddar, which has
largely replaced the decayed town of Axbridge, and which now has about fifty
shops. Keynsham and Portishead, each with about eighty shops, are virtually
suburbs of Bristol. On the Gloucestershire side Thornbury with about sixty
shopS'Still preserves a semi-independent hinterland, but that of Bristol extends
beyond it as far as Berkeley, which although possessing about forty shops is
not a bus centre. But the only significant changes in the last three years are some
services centring on Chipping Sodbury, which now qualifies as a subsidiary centre.
Although there are only about forty shops in this old market town there has been
3C6 CHANGING URBAN HINTERLANDS
considerable industrial expansion followed by new shops at

is of particular interest in view of the suggestion that the New
might be applied to Chipping Sodbury.
The rise in status of six towns in Somerset, and nine in the
counties draws one to consider what other places one may expec
increasing or reasserting their urban functions. In Somerset o
drawn thus to investigate Castle Cary, Cheddar,Watchet (or W
Winsford and Dulverton, which are very similarly situated
which have qualified since 1947. Keynsham and Portishead,
have Urban District status, are probably too close to Bristol to f
than suburbs of the latter, and Milborne Port is tpo close to S
It would thus seem very well worth while to keep under rev
taking place in motor bus services, since tendencies are reveale
give Some basis for forecasting future developments.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This work has not been completed without the willing assistance of the staff in
Office of the Ministry of Town and Country Planning particularly, Mr. W. I. Carruth

1952 40102204

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Bus Services as an Index to Changing Urban Hinterlands: With Particular Reference to

functions. One seeks a majority answer to the question l Where do

Pig. 1 - The boundary between^the hinterl

Fig. 2- The importance of towns as bus centres in the Somerset area.

Al Axmlnstar Fl From* S6 Somarton

Fig. 3 - Changes in urban hinterlands in Somerset,

Bradford-on-Avon, i.e. Bath and Trowbridge. Nevertheless, altho

marked a contrast there is between

A large part of the South-east of the county is, however, more

Bridgwater's hold in the west is not

and the development of Sparkford. The latter place has a smal

Dorset railway works in the twenti

considerable industrial expansion followed by new shops at

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