Once you know absolute and relative location, you can ask why a settlement started at one spot and why it grew. Geographers split the answer into two parts: site and situation.
Key idea
Site is the physical character of the place itself: its landforms, water supply, soil, climate and harbor. Situation is the place's location relative to other places: trade routes, neighbors, resources and markets nearby.
Why it works
Early settlers chose sites for what the land offered on the spot: a hill that was easy to defend, an island in a river, fresh water, a sheltered harbor. But a good site alone rarely makes a big city. Cities grow large when their situation connects them to many other places, so goods, people and ideas pass through.
Worked examples
Worked example: Paris
Paris began on an island in the Seine River. Its region later became the hub of France's roads and railways. Which fact is site and which is situation?
- An island in a river is a physical feature of the spot itself: it was easy to defend and to cross the river there. That is site.
- Being the hub of the country's roads and railways describes how Paris connects to other places. That is situation.
Answer: Island in the Seine: site. Hub of roads and railways: situation.
Worked example: New York City
Explain New York's growth using both ideas.
- Site: a deep, sheltered natural harbor at the mouth of the Hudson River.
- Situation: after the Erie Canal opened in 1825, the Hudson and the canal linked the harbor to the Great Lakes and the farms of the interior.
- A good site gave ships a safe place to dock; the situation gave them a huge region to trade with.
Answer: A fine harbor (site) plus a water route to the interior (situation).
Common mistake
Students often swap the two. A quick test: site is what you could see if you stood on the spot (the hill, the harbor, the river). Situation needs a bigger map, because it is about what lies around the spot: routes, neighbors and markets.
Situation can change. A port can lose ships to a new canal elsewhere, and a mountain town can boom when a ski resort or highway arrives. Its site stays nearly the same.