Uneven growth rate of urbanization in Iran

Parastoo Esmaeili, University of Tehran
Ali Hesari, University of Tehran

As Iran has more under populated cities and less over populated cities, one of the urbanization problems in Iran is macro urbanization. More than ¼ of urban population are settled in Tehran. Tehran itself has population of 2000 urban points. Distribution of population in urban areas is depending on economical, social and cultural laws. This article evaluates population and rank distribution of cities of Iran in 2 last decades and brings up problems of macro urbanization. According to Lorenz distribution in 1986, 50 percent of cities in Iran had less than 10 percent of urban population as 50 percent had more than 90 percent of urban population. Gini Coefficient is high level of curve divided by 50 and the below level of the curve is between 0 and 0/5. This coefficient from 0/60 in 1956 reached to 0/74 in 1986, it means population distribution is profitable for big cities and centralization is also steady.