An agent-based model of residential patterns and social structure in urban areas

Abstract

The standard Urban Economics model (Alonso, Muth, Mills) describes analytically an equilibrium of household location in urban areas. We build an agent-based model able to reach this equilibrium in a dynamic way. This allows us to simulate the development of a city by a combination of heterogeneous agents (based on income and preferences for the amenities), transport time cost and amenities locations. We explore the conditions under which non-trivial residential patterns and urban social structure can be obtained.

Keywords

• social segregation
• travel time
• location choice
• agent-based model