History and urban economics

This article reviews recent literature using insights from history to answer central questions in urban economics. area of research has seen rapid growth the past decade, thanks new technologies that have made available increasingly rich data stretching far back time. The focus is review innovative methods exploit historical information and discuss applications these provide into (i) long run cities or regional economies (ii) spatial organization economic activities within cities. also surveys growing outside economics uses urbanization as a proxy for growth, discusses differences between how historians economists think about relationship considers views might be reconciled. • drastic increase quality richness over decade so an important force behind large rapidly set papers we do not expect this trend stop. Rich are brought closer contact with theory. Historical settings played key role our understanding some core questions, such nature agglomeration congestion forces long-run impact infrastructure investments. Urban been largely successful integrating techniques their work.