Spatial self-identification of communes in urban region as an important perspective for shaping a metropolitan area

Motives: The main manifestation of suburbanisation, which is crucial process shaping settlement system in Poland, are suburbs, whose spatial expansion and qualitative characteristics lead to the formation of new functional and spatial structures between the central city and its surroundings. In this sense, the process of suburbanisation is closely related to metropolisation, i.e. the growing importance in the economy of large urban regions or, more broadly, urbanised systems.Aim: The purpose of this study is to trace the spatial policy of the communes making up the Bydgoszcz–Toruń Metropolitan Area (BTMA) concerning entries in their strategic and planning documents indicating the degree of metropolitan links.Results: It was shown that these records would determine further actions affecting the advancement of the metropolisation process in urban region of Kujawsko-Pomorskie Voivodeship. Against the strategic and planning documents background, the vision for the creation of the Bydgoszcz–Toruń Metropolitan Area, present in the narrative of the two major cities, is quite different. It seems it will complicate the metropolisation process in the region.