ABSTRACT
A fundamental concern of urban geography is how well residents are served by the city and how variations in well-being can be effectively monitored and evaluated. Traditional indicators of deprivation or service delivery are typically based on single areas and on published data, and are thus subsequently limited. The central aim of this book has been to examine the changing role of urban models with respect to both the need to re-address measures of urban well-being and the perceived need to make model outputs more in tune with key planning problems of the day. In particular, it has been argued that, whilst there has been substantial progress with a wide range of theoretical problems in urban modelling, modellers have not paid enough attention to the usefulness of their model outputs in terms of indicators which offer new insights into the workings of the city or region. Too often in the past modellers have focused on the direct use of model predictions for planning without fully exploring the rich information base created from both data input into models and the outputs of model simulations. The concluding comments which follow offer some thoughts on a possible research agenda to develop further the ideas put forward in this collection.
