城市群是区域思想影响下,随城市集聚发展,城市的功能影响范围超过行政边界,城市区域协作出现并逐步加强而产生的一种人类聚居形式。国内外城市群相关研究指出,城市群是区域不均衡发展的结果,是人口、经济集聚发展的高级形态之一。通过综述国内外城市群相关研究进展,本研究指出,国内城市群研究应统一概念,明确边界,尽可能获取准确的城市群统计数据,进而探究其本质特征。在深入研究产业、人口等因素对城市群的作用机制之外,还应考虑个人、经济组织和政府的影响,正视城市群集聚发展存在的问题,寻求城市群可持续发展的途径。

Urban agglomeration is one of the forms of human settlement which comes with the agglomeration of city development,when the affect area of city function is beyond its traditional administrative boundary,and the collaboration between the cities emerges and is gradually strengthened. The research on urban agglomeration could be traced back to Howard's "city cluster" in the early 20th century. Although the term of urban agglomeration is still under discussion,the foreign academic accepts it basically,and looks it as a new form of human settlement. The domestic research on urban agglomeration began in 1980s. The definition of urban agglomeration which is still vague refers to such as "megalopolis","metropolitan area" abroad. Compared to the more cautious attitude of foreign researchers,the domestic research does not go into the definition of the concept of urban agglomeration,and also lacks the reflection on the relationship between the urban agglomeration and the existing terms. The existing domestic researches mainly focus on the macro and qualitative description. Meanwhile,there are many different terms about urban agglomeration emerged,and the research scope on urban agglomeration is uncertain,and the relevant statistics is the lack. Under this condition,this study points out that the domestic research on urban agglomeration ought to unify the definition of the term,and strengthen the empirical research based on the analysis of statistics data of the urban agglomeration. On this basis,the essential characteristics of china's urban agglomeration and its mechanism of creation ought to be explored. Apart from the economic and population,it is also necessary to consider the effect from the individual,organizations,local and national governments on urban agglomeration. The researches should reflect the background of the time,face the problems during the development of urban agglomeration,and look for the ways to promote its sustainable development.