ABSTRACT
One of the outcomes of the methodological shift in geography resulting from the quantitative revolution was the need to unravel the web of interrelationships that exist between spatial patterns and processes. Simulation modelling recognises the inability of analysts to know and specify all the relationships and hence develop a series of approximating techniques towards finding solutions. The central feature of simulation modelling is that it signifies the scientific approach to the understanding of the system of interest. The systems approach provides with tools for the analysis of urban systems, which is particularly concerned with events in both spatial and temporal dimensions. A way of classifying simulation models is through their structural complexity, expressed in the number of variables, their interrelationships and their levels of unpredictability. The utility of urban models can be justified as follows: there is a pedagogic role as a model is a useful teaching device, especially of the mechanisms of the urban spatial structure.
