Effect of Transportation on the Decline of City Commercial Center in Competition with Large Sub Urban Shopping Center

The influence of large sub urban shopping center toward the decline of inner city commercial center has attracted many researchers. To prevent the decline of the city center due to urban sprawl, it is necessary to understand the influence of sub urban shopping mall development in competition with the city commercial center. This paper reports the investigation on the transportation effect on the decline of city commercial center in competition with large sub-urban shopping centers. A special case study was selected in Saga city in Japan where the city center has evident of declining. The data was gathered through an intensive questionnaires survey of the previous study. Statistical analysis of consumer behavior and a shopping location choice model were developed. It was found that one of the most important factors for shopping location choice is the availability of free parking lot in sub-urban shopping centers compare with the high paid parking in the city center.