About Urban Mega Regions : Knowns and Unknowns

Mega urban regions are not a passing
phenomenon. They are likely to persist and to enlarge their
economic footprints because they benefit from the advantages
of market scale, agglomeration economies, location, and the
increasing concentration of talented workers. Metropolitan
regions which are polycentric, relatively well managed, and
have invested heavily in transport infrastructure are able
to contain some of the problems attendant upon a
concentration of people and industry. Moreover, with energy
and water resources becoming relatively scarce and many
countries anxious to preserve arable land for farming, the
economic advantages of densely populated urban areas are on
the rise because they have a lower resource utilization
quotient. During the next 15 years, mega urban economies
could coalesce in three Southeast Asian locations: Bangkok,
Jakarta, and the Singapore-Iskander Development Region (IDR,
South Johor). The Bangkok and Jakarta (Jabotabek)
metropolitan regions have passed the threshold at least in
terms of population size but they have yet to approach the
industrial diversity, dynamism, and growth rates of a
Shanghai or a Shenzhen-Hong Kong region. Singapore, if
coupled with IDR, has the potential but it is still far from
being an integrated urban region. This paper examines the
gains from closer economic integration and the issues to be
settled before it could occur. The paper notes that a
tightening of localized economic links between two sovereign
nations through the formation of an urban region would
involve a readiness to make long-term political commitments
based on a widely perceived sense of substantial spillovers
and equitably shared benefits. Delineating these benefits
convincingly will be essential to winning political support
and a precondition for a successful economic flowering.