Nonpositively curved 2-complexes with isolated flats. (Q1882816)

This investigation introduces and studies the class of nonpositively curved 2-complexes with the `Isolated Flats Property'. Roughly speaking, a CAT(0) space has the isolated flats property if its isometrically embedded flat Euclidean subspaces diverge from each other in all directions, in the sense that their corresponding boundary spheres at infinity are disjoint. It is shown that several important properties of Gromov-hyperbolic spaces hold ``relative to flats'' in nonpositively curved 2-complexes with the isolated flats property. Also introduced is the `Relatively Thin Triangle Property' which states roughly that the fat part of a geodesic triangle lies near the single flat. Further, it is introduced and considered the `Relative Fellow Traveler Property' which states that pairs of quasigeodesics with common endpoints fellow travel relative to flats, in a suitable sense. The main result is: Theorem 1.1. Let \(X\) be a proper, cocompact piecewise Euclidean CAT(0) 2-complex. The following are equivalent: (1) \(X\) has isolated flats property. (2) \(X\) has relatively thin triangle property. (3) \(X\) has relative fellow traveler property.