For a while there was a debate on rec.arts.anime about the location of Colico, the town Kiki moved to. Scandinavia, Germany, and Italy were given among to possibilities. In "Protoculture Addicts" 19 (Sep/Oct 1992) Sylvain Rheault interviewed Miyazaki and asked him about this:
Miyazaki-san explained that he gathers things he likes and puts them together in his movies. For example, the city of Colico in MAJO NO TAKKYUBIN (Kiki's Delivery Service) is a rag tag combination of Scandinavian and Italian cities as well as parts of San Francisco. What matters is the emotion.
It was also reported in rec.arts.anime that Miyazaki has said that Kiki takes place in an alternate Europe in the 50s where World War II never occurred. This would explain the ecletic mix of 30s, 40s, and 50s styles. (And if you count Tombo's human powered airplane, then you can include the 80s.)
Just like Totoro and Laputa, Kiki was dubbed into English by Carl Macek and shown on JAL trans-Pacific flights. It has also been shown at a few anime cons and reports from those indicate that people thought it was even a better dub than Totoro. After the success of the video release in 1994 of Totoro, it was hoped that the Kiki dub would be released soon afterwards. We're still waiting........
Marc Hairston, August 1995