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In Australia most manufacturing firms are force to make at least two kinds of location decisions, one involving the merits of the six capital cities, and the other based on variables operating inside the metropolitan areas. This paper is concerned with the behavior of the individual manufacturing firm when making the letter decision; empirical data have been obtained from three case study areas in Sydney. There is purposeful economic behavior by firms in locating, the most important influences being closeness to product market and the cost of land. The spatial effect is an arrangement of manufacturers strongly oriented to the CBD and to centrally located transport terminals. In a theoretical context, the neglect of rent considerations is a serious weakness in traditional manufacturing locating theory. The growing ability of firms to substitute among production factors also has important locational effects.

Over wide areas of the earth the railroad has been a decisive instrument in the creation of many of the most important patterns of human geography. Railroads are clearly phenomena of prime geographical interest, yet if it is true that "each means of transport has its own technological characteristics and its spatial layout, or network," it is equally true that their understanding of the inherent geographical implications of these characteristics and networks is far from satisfactory. The following paper attempts to add a further dimension to this common quest by focusing upon the comparative genetic character of two railroad networks.

The article presents the authors's views on an article on laterite by T. Langford-Smith and G.H. Dury. They states that their interpretation of the article was based upon their discussion of the so-called Barrier and Cobar Peneplains. They apologizes if they gave the impression that Dury and Langford-Smith ascribe all pediplains to erosion under dry conditions, but they also states that if Dury and Langford-Smith did write that pedimentation is now active in a part of Australia which even the most starry-eyed politician would hesitate to call humid.

The article presents the author's views on the misrepresentation of an article on laterite by T.R. Patron and M.A.J. Williams. He states that it is not quite accurate to say that they regard the formation of silcrete as unrelated to that of laterite. He further states that they have been quoted as suggesting that Australian pediplains developed under semiarid conditions, whereas this is precisely opposite of their statement. The author also states that in view of the results he is now obtaining and publishing, he feels that he should be embarrassed to be credited with the proposition that pediments are exclusively dry-climate landforms.

Among Australia's many spectacular and important mining camps Broken Hill stands foremost. Since its discovery a half century ago that center has produced minerals worth more than two-thirds of a billion dollars. As a source of lead and zinc it ranks among the world's outstanding producers. Although years of mining are still in prospect at Broken Hill the zenith of production took place as long ago as 1913, and the ultimate near-extinction of the community is inevitable, for non-mining activities of the district cannot justify the continuance of an urban center approaching present size.

An air mass frequency model is constructed to facilitate the formulation of a genetic classification of climate. The model uses Venn diagrams to distinguish three basic climatic regimes, each determined by the relative dominance of air masses: the dominant regimes, where a single air mass dominates all year; the seasonal regimes, determined by seasonally dominant air masses; and the compound regimes, with no dominant air mass. Different climates within each regime are distinguished by actual air mass types. Monthly air mass dominance is determined from actual station surface data for application of the model to world climates. This is completed by analysis of monthly data plotted on modified climographs and by the construction of a monthly air mass identification chart. The proposed system is illustrated by Australian data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Trees of the genus Eucalyptus from Australia were spread widely and numerously through California after the 1850's. Several factors favored their spread, notably the production of limber and fuel, often with unrealistic hopes of financial gain. Planting for windbreaks and decorative purposes was also commonplace. An important and overlooked additional reason for the rapid dissembation of eucalypts in California. especially in the 1870's and 1880's, was the belief that trees of this genus, particularly Eucalyptus globulus or blue gum, could prevent or diminish the serious malaria problem that beset portions of the state. That certain forms of vegetation, especially trees, represented sanitary influences was an ancient notion and it survived even the germ theory of disease. The supposed method whereby eucalypts achieved their healthful influence was through the trees' imagined capacity to absorb or neutralize the noxious gases that were believed to cause malaria. This erroneous and antique miasmatic etiology of malaria, together with belief in eucalypt prophylaxis, was demolished in the late nineteenth century when it was revealed that the disease was caused by blood parasites transmitted by the bites of anopheline mosquitoes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One hundred fifty-four towns with at least one commercial service and twenty inhabitants each are dispersed irregularly through Gippsland, Australia. A general relationship of their services S to population P is log S = 0.699 log P—0.367. The spatial pattern of residuals from this relationship is apparently made up of purely local elements. The fitting of low-order, partial trend-surfaces to the residuals establishes the presence of a weak but significant regional trend in their distribution. There are only minor differences between the map of residuals from regression and that of the deviations from the regional trend of those residuals. The explanation of the spatial character of the residuals, therefore, can remain in this case primarily in terms of local factors. The regional trend nevertheless needs explanation in terms of regionally 0perative factors that have not yet been established but which would not be suggested by more conventional methods of mapping residuals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]