Central business district
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Midtown Manhattan, one of the central business districts of New York City
Canary Wharf, one of two business districts in London
Levent business district in Istanbul, Turkey
São Paulo's Central Business District, Brazil
A central business district (CBD, also called a central activities district) is the commercial and often geographic heart of a city.[citation needed] In the United States this part of a city is commonly referred to as "downtown" or "city center".[citation needed] "City centre" is commonly used in Canada, Ireland and the United Kingdom.
Contents
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1 Overview
2 Variations
2.1 Argentina
2.2 Brazil
2.3 Canada
2.4 Germany
2.5 India
2.6 Pakistan
2.7 Peru
2.8 Poland
2.9 South Africa
2.10 France
2.11 United Kingdom and the Commonwealths
2.12 United States
3 Land value variations in a CBD
4 Secondary Central business district
5 See also
6 References
[edit] Overview
Puerto Madero, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Santa Fe, CBD in Mexico City
Sydney central business district
Xinyi Planned Area in Taipei at night
Ayala Avenue, the central business district in the Philippines
The term CBD or Central Business District is the central district of a city, usually typified by a concentration of retail and office buildings.[1]
The term city place is similar to CBD in that both serve the same purpose for the city, and both are marked by a higher-than-usual urban density as well as often having the tallest buildings in a city. City centre differs from downtown in that the latter can be geographically located anywhere in a city, while a city centre is generally located near the geographic heart of the city. London arguably has three city centres, the City of London, the medieval City of Westminster and the transformed Docklands area. Mexico City also has more than one city centre: Centro Histórico, the colonial; Paseo de la Reforma - Polanco (Mexico) the mid-late 20th century CBD, and Santa Fe, the new CBD. In Taipei, Taiwan, the area around its main railway station is regarded as the historic city centre while the Xinyi Planned Area located to the east of the said railway station is the current CBD of Taipei and not only is it considered the financial district of Taipei, but it is arguably the premier shopping area in Taipei and Taipei's most modern cosmopolitan district. Taipei 101, Taipei's tallest building and currently the world's second tallest habitable skyscraper, is located in Xinyi Planned Area.
The shape and type of a CBD or downtown almost always closely reflect the city's history. Cities with maximum building height restrictions often have a separate historic section quite apart from the financial and administrative district. In cities that grew up suddenly and more recently, such as those in the western half of North America, a single central area will often contain all the tallest buildings. It has been said that downtowns (as understood in North America) are therefore a separate phenomenon.[2]
Central business districts usually have very small resident populations. For example, the population of the City of London declined from over 200,000 in the year 1700 to less than 10,000 today. In some instances, however (and particularly in large Australian and Canadian cities), CBD populations are increasing as younger professional and business workers move into city centre apartments. Central Business District is the central district of any town or major city.
The central business district of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
[edit] Variations
[edit] Argentina
Puerto Madero, Buenos Aires CBD
The Buenos Aires central business district (CBD and also referred to as the City Porteña), is the main commercial centre of Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina. The actual area was the point of first European settlement. Its north-south axis runs from Monserrat in the north to Retiro railway station in the south. Its east-west axis runs from Buenos Aires Ecological Reserve and Puerto Madero.
The district is the financial, commercial, and cultural hub of Argentina. Its port is one of the busiest in South America; navigable rivers by way of the Río de la Plata connect the port to north-east Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay. As a result it serves as the distribution hub for a vast area of the south-eastern region of the South American continent. Tax collection related to the port has caused many political problems in the past. Measured in GDP, the economy of Buenos Aires was the 13th largest economy among the world's cities in 2005 at US$245 billion in purchasing power parity, which, based on the population of that year, translates into US$19,500 per capita. The Buenos Aires Human Development Index (0.923 in 1998) is likewise high by international standards.
The city's services sector is diversified and well-developed by international standards and accounts for 78% of its economy (compared to 58% for all of Argentina's); advertising, in particular, plays a prominent role in the export of services at home and abroad. Manufacturing is, nevertheless, still prominent in the city's economy (17%) and, concentrated mainly in the southside, it benefits as much from high local purchasing power and a large local supply of skilled labor as it does from its relationship to massive agriculture and industry just outside the city limits themselves.
[edit] Brazil
Partial view of the financial center of Rio de Janeiro, the second largest in the country
The Sao Paulo central business district is the Avenida Paulista, in the region close to the city centre, which is also a financial centre, but has the same influence of decades ago. However, there are other central outside the geographical core, as the districts of Santo Amaro and Itaim Bibi, more precisely the regions of Juscelino Kubitschek, Luís Carlos Berrini and Faria Lima avenues, in southwest-central city, which are characterised by intense vertical, and the presence of luxury hotels and multinational companies.
The biggest financial centre in Brazil and one of the biggest "financial" centres in the world, Sao Paulo's economy is going through a deep transformation. Once a city with a strong industrial character, São Paulo's economy has become increasingly based on the tertiary sector, focusing on services and businesses for the country. Although being the most important financial centre of the country, Sao Paulo also presents a high degree of informality in its economy.
Rio de Janeiro downtown remains the heart of the city's business community, and the second largest in South America. Some of the largest companies in Brazil have their head offices here, including Petrobras, Eletrobrás and Vale (formerly Companhia Vale do Rio Doce), three of the largest Brazilian corporations.
[edit] Canada
The central business district of Toronto, called Downtown
In Canada, "city centre" is used, more or less, as a synonym for "downtown". Some cities, such as Toronto, regard as many as four business districts as being central, whereas in Quebec, being a French-majority region, usually bide by Francophone terms, and is usually named 'centre-ville'. Montreal's historic core, Old Montreal, is no longer the financial district, which is now Do
