This paper examines the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic and its related economic, fiscal, social and political fallout on cities and metropolitan regions. We assess the effect of the pandemic on urban economic geography at the intra- and inter-regional geographic scales in the context of four main forces: the social scarring instilled by the pandemic; the lockdown as a forced experiment; the need to secure the urban built environment against future risks; and changes in the urban form and system. At the macrogeographic scale, we argue the pandemic is unlikely to significantly alter the winner-take-all economic geography and spatial inequality of the global city system. At the microgeographic scale, however, we suggest that it may bring about a series of short-term and some longer-running social changes in the structure and morphology of cities, suburbs and metropolitan regions. The durability and extent of these changes will depend on the timeline and length of the pandemic.

本文研究了 COVID-19 大流行及其对城市和大都市区的相关经济、财政、社会和政治影响。我们在四个主要力量的背景下评估了大流行对区域内和区域间地理尺度上的城市经济地理的影响：大流行带来的社会创伤；作为强制实验的封锁；需要确保城市建成环境免受未来风险的影响；以及城市形态和系统的变化。在宏观地理尺度上，我们认为大流行不太可能显着改变全球城市系统的赢家通吃的经济地理和空间不平等。然而，在微观地理尺度上，我们认为它可能会在城市的结构和形态方面带来一系列短期和一些长期的社会变化，郊区和大都市区。这些变化的持久性和程度将取决于大流行的时间线和长度。