Bogota's urban population primacy on a metropolitan scale: deepening, widening and spillover of metropolization relations

Abstract

The basic metropolization relations occur due to changes in the habitual place of residence of people from the nucleus and the municipalities in its immediate area of influence, which give rise to interactions that result in positive migratory balances for the municipalities surrounding the nucleus. The housing and labor markets transgress the municipal jurisdictional limits, causing daily interactions or commutations within the metropolitan area. As these metropolization relations intensify, population primacy, understood as the relative participation of the population of the nucleus in the national urban system as a whole, declines, but that of the metropolitan area becomes stronger. During the 2005-2018 intercensal period, the municipalities involved in the metropolization process with Bogota contributed 49.4% of the population growth of the area, while the metropolitan core contributed the remaining 50.6%. The metropolitan relations with Bogotá that have deepened the most are those of Mosquera and Soacha, but the process is widening in 10 other municipalities and is expected to spill over to another 19 in the coming years. This article is concerned with identifying and characterizing these relationships.

Keyword: Population primacy; metropolization; metropolitan region