ABSTRACT
Recent decades have seen very significant and profound changes to cities. While the changes have been both physical and non-physical in nature, the latter have recently been considered even more important than the former (Boyle, Thomas and Wield, 2000). There are many reasons for these developments and the relationships between them vary according to different contexts, so attempts to define them in a general way are often not very useful. Nevertheless, we can try to highlight some common features with reference to developed countries, although differences do exist between particular cases. A first element is the increasing phenomenon of urbanisation, involving a physical enlargement of cities as well as an improvement in living conditions from every perspective. The arrival of refugees and immigrants from poor countries is at present a main contributory factor in urbanisation, bringing significant socio-cultural changes. A second element can be related to infrastructure networks in cities. They are always of great importance for a city's development and they now face two major needs: to be complemented by near non-physical flows (Internet) and to be improved by means of information technologies (IT). A third element can be identified with the general concept of quality of life, which is rapidly changing over time due to primary needs being met for most people in a city and the increasing potentials being offered by technology.
