Comparer des méthodes

	Suitability Analysis	Central Place Analysis
Domaine	Urban Studies	Human Geography
Famille	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
Année d'origine	1969	1933
Auteur d'origine	Ian L. McHarg	Walter Christaller
Type	Spatial multi-criteria mapping of land suitability for a given use	Theory and analytic framework for the size, number, and spacing of settlements
Source fondatrice	McHarg, I. L. (1969). Design with Nature. Natural History Press. ISBN: 9780471114604	Christaller, W. (1966). Central Places in Southern Germany (C. W. Baskin, Trans.). Prentice-Hall. (Original work published 1933). ISBN: 9780131226302
Alias	Land Suitability Mapping, Overlay Suitability Analysis, Weighted Overlay Analysis, Suitability Modelling	Central Place Theory, Christaller Central Place Model, Settlement Hierarchy Analysis, Central Place Hierarchy
Apparentées	4	4
Résumé	Suitability analysis maps how well each parcel of land supports a proposed use — housing, conservation, a highway, a landfill — by combining the relevant physical, ecological and accessibility factors into a single composite score. In the tradition established by Ian McHarg's 1969 Design with Nature, each factor is captured as a map layer, reclassified onto a common suitability scale, and overlaid so that places good on many factors stand out from places that are not. The result is a suitability surface that makes the trade-offs in a land-use decision explicit, transparent and defensible.	Central place analysis is the study of the size, number, and spacing of settlements as service centres, grounded in Walter Christaller's central place theory of 1933. It explains why settlements form an orderly hierarchy — many small villages, fewer towns, a handful of cities — and why higher-order centres are spaced farther apart and offer more specialized goods, deriving the famous nested pattern of hexagonal market areas from two economic concepts: the range and the threshold of a good.