Retail Outlets and City Centrality: Perspectives from a Sub-Saharan African City

Article history Received: 1 November 2019 Accepted: 12 November 2019 Published Online: 30 November 2019 Sub-Saharan African cities are uniquely characterized by retail competition influencing outlet location. This work focused on revealing retail outlet location in Uyo and its relationship with distances from the Central Business Districts. Distance was measured along the six major arterial roads that link the city to the central business districts by the use of Google Map Distance Calculator and itouch maps [7] technology. Six arteries were divided into four distinct spaces in kilometers namely 0-1km, 1-2km, 2-3km, 3-4km. Retail Outlets were grouped into ten classes. Data was analysed using distance in kilometers from the Central Business District as variable Y1. The independent variables X1, X2, X3, X4, X5 and X6 were the six major arteries represented by the location of each specific retail outlet group. Utilising SPSS version 20 software the results reflected centre a 47.9 percent variation in retail outlets location with correlation coefficient (R) of 69.2 % revealing a strong relationship between the distances from the Central Business Districts and the location of retail outlets located across the six major arteries. H1 was accepted which states a significant relationship in the location of retail outlets as distance increase from the city centre across the linkages. This confirms a strong intensity of location of retail outlets in the city centre with a gradual decline as distance increase from the centre. Although there was an increase in intensity of retail outlets in junctions away from the Central Business Districts according to multiple nuclei concept. It is recommended that urban expansion through growth poles. Aim: To access the relationship between retail outlets location and distance from central business district in a Uyo. Research Questions: This work provided answers to the following questions: 1. Where are these retail outlets located in the city space? 2. What is the relationship between Retail outlets and the distance from the City Centre? Objectives: 1. To explain the distribution of location of retail outlets in city space. 2. To reveal the relationship between Retail Outlets and distance from the City Centre. Hypothesis: There is no significant relationship between the distance from the central business district and the location of retail outlets.