Flight from Blight and Metropolitan Suburbanization Revisited

Patterns of metropolitan suburbanization were analyzed for 51 large metropolitan areas. Migration data indicate that suburban population growth attributed to in-migration from outside the metropolitan area is substantially greater, on average, than that attributed to city-to-suburb migration. Distinguishing between these sources of suburban population growth, significant associations were found between metropolitan suburbanization and central-city hardship conditions. The results support the notion of a complementary relationship between central cities and suburbs and argue for more aggressive intervention in support of central cities and greater cooperation between central cities and suburbs in matters of regional development policies.