Key Urban and Economic Concepts in Spain
Accessibility
The ease or difficulty of reaching a place from other locations. It depends on distance, infrastructure, and transport services.
Fee
An official fee for goods crossing a country’s border. In Spain, there are no tariffs on products from other European Union members, but a common tariff applies to goods from third countries.
Metropolitan Area
A large urbanized area comprising a major city and several nearby towns with significant economic and social relations, requiring joint planning and coordination of services. In Spain, this began in the early 20th century in Madrid, Barcelona, and Bilbao. Today, almost all major cities have established metropolitan areas.
Suburb
A neighborhood outside a city’s walls. In medieval Spanish cities, suburbs housed lower social and economic groups.
Highway
A high-capacity road with separate roadways for traffic (usually with at least two lanes in each direction) and no intersections. A motorway is similar but may have level crossings.
AVE (Spanish High-Speed Train)
A public high-speed train network capable of reaching 250 kilometers per hour. Since 1992, the network has expanded significantly, with four lines fully operational (Madrid-Seville/Malaga, Madrid-Barcelona, Madrid-Valladolid, and Madrid-Valencia) and others planned. It is currently the second-largest high-speed network in the world, after China, with over 2,600 km in service.
Trade Balance
The difference between the value of exports and imports. In Spain, it traditionally shows a deficit.
Balance of Payments
A document recording a country’s economic transactions with the rest of the world during a period, noting income and expenditure for each operation, resulting in a positive or negative balance.
Population Census
An individualized count of the population at a given time. It collects demographic, economic, and social data for statistical purposes. The information is published digitally. Spain conducts a census every ten years (since 1981, ending in 1).
Historical Center
The pre-industrial part of a city, from its origins to the industrial age. Usually walled, with an irregular layout (though some are regular), tightly woven, single-family buildings, and mixed land use (residential, commercial, craft). Throughout history, the layout has been remodeled, with plot densification, vertical integration, and functional outsourcing of buildings.
Slums
A habitat typical of large urban centers attracting immigration, characterized by shantytowns built on illegal land, self-constructed, with serious deficiencies in foundations, materials, and basic services (water, electricity, sanitation).
Garden City
A planning model that emerged in Spain in the second half of the 19th century, influenced by naturalistic ideas and Howard’s garden city concept. These were not entire cities but neighborhoods of houses with gardens, isolated, detached, or paired. Initially, they were affordable, low-quality workers’ homes (under the Cheap Houses legislation). Later, larger, better-quality models were built on city outskirts for the middle class.
City
An urban concentration of more than 10,000 inhabitants. Economic activity focuses on the secondary and tertiary sectors.
Foreign Trade
Trade in products and services between a country and the rest of the world. The sale of domestic products abroad is called exports, and the purchase of foreign products is called imports.
Internal Trade
The exchange of goods and services within a country’s borders. Its location depends on good transportation and communication systems and a broad consumer market.
Conurbation
A continuous urban area formed by the parallel growth of two or more cities that merge. Each city in the metropolitan area maintains its administrative independence. A traffic line often connects them (e.g., Malaga and Marbella).
Natural Increase
The difference between birth and mortality rates. It can be positive or negative. In Spain, it is currently close to zero due to low birth and mortality rates.
Total Growth (Real Growth)
The sum of natural increase and net migration.
Population Density
The ratio of the population to the area it occupies. It is expressed in inhabitants per square kilometer. Spain’s average density is 81.2 inhabitants/km2, though some regions (peninsular periphery, Madrid, islands, Ceuta, and Melilla) have higher values, and the interior of the peninsula has lower values.
Informal Economy
Economic activity conducted through legal channels but not recorded in tax records or national accounts (no statistics).
Ecotourism
A new type of tourism focused on studying ecosystems. It aims to be an alternative to traditional sun-and-beach tourism, contributing to tourism development in non-traditional areas, mitigating seasonality, and promoting public interest in environmental knowledge and conservation.