The paper reports results of an effort to replace the simple notions of transportation and labor costs with other measures of friction of distance and place specific factors in industrial location theory. Friction of distance variables are defined in relation to (1) transport of goods, (2) movement of persons, and (3) transfer of ideas. Transport of goods, even when redefined so as to conform better to the concerns of modern industrial management, does not appear to play the overwhelming role assigned to it by classical location theory.