Empirical central place studies provide evidence concerning all the sides of the central place system, including the size and intervals of central places, locational patterns and groups of retail activities, consumers' behaviors, systems of trade areas, and their interdependencies. The aim of this paper is to analyze some of these aspects in Ichinomiya urban area in Aichi Prefecture as a case study. Ichinomiya urban area, which is to the north-west of Nagoya, has a population of nearly 500, 000 and an area of 222 square kilometers. This area can be devided into three parts: one is the traditional textile industry, another is cultivated by the sidework farmers, and the third was recently urbanized with housing and industrial location.
As the result of our examinations of the relations among the attributions of 175 central places which were the upper half of all the central places in the study area, we found the empirical equations as follows among the population (P), the number of central functions (CF), and the establishments of the retail and the service activities (E) in the central places:
logP=0.0171CF+2.6790 ……(1)
logP=0.7960logE+2.0115 ……(2)
logE=0.0232CF+0.8827 ……(3)
The coefficient of correlation in equation (1) and (2) is more than 0.85. We applied residual analysis to these, for the dependent variable (i.e. the population) could be explained further by other independent variables. The analysis showed us that the central places which has much more population than we had expected from the equations located in the area of the textile industry, in the recent formed residential section of the east and the south, and around the higher order central places. From this result we think that the other independent variables are industrial activities and the accessibility to a large city or a high level central place.
We observed no regular relationship like Christaller's model, between the level of central places and the locational combinations of central functions. But the ratio of possession of central functions, except some public ones, rises in proportion to the level of central place. The ratio of possession does not change equally in accordance with the level of central place, so that we classified the functions into five patterns of change. Although the order of central places cannot be classified with the ratio of functional possession, it could be divided into six hierarchies on the diagram which indicates the correlation between the number of central functions and establishments. Each rank has 1, 3, 5, 12, 154, and 175 central places.
As the theory tells, the higher the level of central place, the further is the distance between two closest places on the same level. The relationship between the level of central places indicated by the number of central function and the distance from a place to Ichinomiya, the highest level in this area, is similar to that of the theoretical case in K=3. But there are some regional deviations with the distribution of places. Many places belonging to the third or fourth level are in north-west sector which has a larger population than other sectors. The market area of the main city Ichinomiya indicated by consumers' behaviors for shopping goods covers the whole study area. In the east region, however, Kochino, which has strengthened the retail functions with the increase of the population around it, has powerful influence, and Inazawa and Iwakura, both near Nagoya, are influenced by retail activities of Nagoya.
The spatial arrangement of the demand for the retails and the services has changed in proportion to the increase of the population promoted by the industrial and residential developments, and the share of retail activities has risen in the east and the south regions in the past ten years.

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The Spatial Relations between the “Go” Area in Edo Period and Local Government Areas in Meiji Era can be adjusted in the western parts of Tottori Prefecture. These are as follows:
1. Of Local Government Areas in Meiji Era, the “Shoku” Area …… a kind of local government area in earlier Meiji Era …… and the “Rengo-Kocho-Yakuba” Area …… the union of some villages …… were formed by following the “Go” Area or by expanding it. and “Meiji-Gyosei-Son” …… an administrative village in Meiji Era …… was formed through educing from the “Go” Area.
2. In the reorganization of an administrative area in Meiji Era, the way of division partly had relation to the natural border, and partly based on a kind of administrative area in Edo Period as the “Oshoya” Area …… a sort of union of villages which had been managed by a headman.
3. As a result above, the Spatial Relations between the two areas is not clear enough in a certain part in which the border of the “Go” Area had been ignored through the Edo Period. (For example, as the lower parts of the Hino River and so on.)
4. Local Government Administrative System in Meiji Era had resulted from trial and error for intending to strenhthen the ruling system of the nation. Then the “Go” Area played an important part concerning the Spatial Relations between the zone of life as a substancial area and the administrative area as a formal one.
5. In the process of the Spatial Relations, at first, the “Go” Area had relation to the “Shoku” Area, and next, the reform was effected into the “Rengo-Kocho-Yakuba” Area. And finally, it was divided into the “MeijiGyosei-Son”. Namely we can trace the simple course: the “Go” Area …… the “Rengo-Kocho-Yakuba” Area …… the “Meiji-Gyosei-Son”.
In general, it may be said that the “Go” Area in Edo Period had developed by inheritting a historical area since the Middle Age. Coincidently, however, there are some areas which have overlapped with tho former ones even in the administrative area organized in 1955. Therefore the historical area has remained alive through the long time. But this paper is a report only in a spatial aspect. So the function of the “Go” Area must be made clear, and at the same time we must know the signification of an administrative area to prove this problem more completely. This functional aspect is left as the next subject to study.

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