中文摘要：

本文首先对都市区、城市群概念、标准进行界定,并将城市群建立在都市区基础上,从而为城市群的认定划分提供了具体的指标依据;进而用近两次人口普查和2011年区域经济统计年鉴数据,对社会经济意义上的长江中游地区湖北、湖南、江西、安徽四省进行实证研究。结果表明,2010年长江中游地区共有都市区22个,比2000年新增2个;长江中游城市群由四省内部相对独立的四个小城市群,沿东北-西南和西北-东南十字形轴向组合而成。最后根据长江中游城市群大分散、小集中的特点和区位价值的提升等提出四点发展建议。

英文摘要：

At first, the article defined the concept of metropolitan areas and urban agglomeration, emphasized that the urban agglomeration are based on metropolitan areas. Furthermore, using the nearly two censuses and the region-al economic statistical yearbook of 2011 in china, carried out empirical re-search in Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi and Anhui four provinces of the middle reaches of the Yangtze River.The results show that there are 22 metropolitan areas in 2010, and 20 metropolitan areas in 2000. The urban agglomeration in the Middle Reaches of the Yangtze River consists of four small urban agglomerations, it is a cross axial along the northeast southwest and northwest southeast, it is scattered overall and concentrated locally. Finally, we put forward four sug-gestions to develop the urban agglomeration in the Middle Reaches of the Yangtze River.