In this paper we take up Sumida ward of Tokyo Metropolitan City as a typical inner city of japan and develop an analysis of the economic activity, or the location activity in particular, of industrial firms and obtain some basic information for the urban renewal of this type of area.

The analysis is based on the data obtained by a sample survey conducted in 1984. An analysis is developed to clarify the factors which cause the mixed land use and dense location of industries by using the data of trading activities of individual firms.

The concept of trading time distance is originally introduced to analyze the trading activities by measuring the required trip time to each cor-respondent firm. This concept can clarify the regional or spatial structure of trades between the firms. Factors which are related with the trading time distance are identified by the AIC analysis of the dependence between the items of the survey data using the CATDAP program package for the analysis of categorical data.

The analysis shows that for firms in Sumida ward the shortness of trading time distances is essentially related to their industrial activities. It is concluded that the agglomeration of the firms in this area is caused by the desire for the shortness of the trading time distances of each firms and that it is necessary to take into account this aspect of the regional structure in developing an urban renovation plan of this type of area.

^*1Chief Researcher
Urban Development Division,
Urban Planning Department