Rural agglomeration as a new form of spatial development of the rural-urban partnership (on the example of the Kaliningrad Region)

Abstract

Russian publications on the development of rural areas have increasingly used the term “rural agglomeration”. However, interpretations of this term and its relationship with more traditional geographical notions “territorial socio-economic system” and “rural-urban continuum” are still unclear. Moreover, rural agglomerations can be considered as local settlement systems identified by the activity method. Thus, practical application of the term causes difficulties due to the lack of clear quantitative and qualitative criteria for identifying rural agglomerations. On the example of the Kaliningrad Region, the authors developed and tested a methodology for identifying rural agglomerations based on the parameter of time accessibility, which also contributed to the theoretical clarification of the concept. The authors argue that in the economic-geographical perspective, rural agglomeration can be defined as a local rural-urban setlement system, in which the city is its core and rural settlements - its elements; intensive inter-village connections are spatially reflected in the transport infrastructure facilities. Rural agglomerations are normative systems identified with the activity approach, namely the isochronous method (20-minute interval from the center along public roads). Thus, the authors identified 8 rural agglomerations in the Kaliningrad Region with an average population of 12.7 thousand people, an average number of 40 settlements and a core in the form of a small city with an average population of 5.7 thousand people.