Spatial Characteristics of Regional Wildfire Frequencies in Intermountain West Grass-Dominated Communities

Understanding the environmental factors that influence spatial patterns of rangeland wildfires facilitates both fire and land management decisions. I used discriminant analysis to examine ignition frequency of lightning-initiated fires in grass-dominated communities in the Intermountain West between 1980 and 1994, then mapped regional fire frequencies to illustrate spatial patterns. Two canonical discriminant functions effectively separate groups of high, medium, and low ignition frequencies, based on climate conditions and fuel characteristics. Regions of highest frequency tend to have large elevational differences, more mesic climates, and less annual grass cover. Spatial patterns of ignition frequencies tend to reflect local topography, with higher frequencies west of 119° W. Expansion of exotic annual grasses throughout the region may be reducing differences in ignition frequency between regions of highest and lowest frequency.     

基于矢量网格的城市土地利用邻里模式研究

城市土地利用的空间分布特征一直是城市地理和城市规划领域关注的重点问题,对城市土地利用空间模式的研究有助于理解城市系统的运行状态。在分析现有城市空间结构和城市土地利用模式的基础上,从两个方面对现有基于富集因子的分析方法提出改进,一是采用矢量网格以减少分析的误差,二是采用斜网格和曼哈顿距离来对空间临近关系进行界定。采用这一方法对深圳市2015年6类城市土地利用数据进行分析,得到邻里尺度上各类用地之间富集度随距离变化的3种模式。模式I中,同类用地间的富集度在短距离内较大,且其值随着距离的增加而减小并趋于0,表明同类用地间在较短距离内相互吸引,而吸引力随着距离增加而减弱。在不同类型用地间的模式II和模式III中,富集度在较短距离内为负值,但是在模式II中,富集度随着距离的增加而逐渐增加并趋于0,表明不同用地间短距离内相互排斥,且排斥作用随着距离增加而减弱;而在模式III中,富集度则随着距离增加而快速上升到正值,然后逐渐下降并趋于0,表明不同类型用地在较短距离内相互排斥,但随着距离增加很快变为相互吸引,最后吸引力随着距离增加慢慢减弱。结果表明,相对于基于栅格网的分析方法,基于矢量斜网格的分析方法能够显著降低分析误差。     

城市土地利用变化中邻域相互作用的特征——日本三大都市圈的比较研究

Local spatial interaction between neighborhood land-use categories (i.e. neighborhood interaction) is an important factor which affects urban land-use change patterns. Therefore,it is a key component in cellular automata (CA)-based urban geosimulation models towards the simulation and forecast of urban land-use changes. Purpose of this paper is to interpret the similarities and differences of the characteristics of neighborhood interaction in urban land-use changes of different metropolitan areas in Japan for providing empirical materials to understand the mechanism of urban land-use changes and construct urban geosimulation models. Characteristics of neighborhood interaction in urban land-use changes of three metropolitan areas in Japan,i.e. Tokyo,Osaka,and Nagoya,were compared using such aids as the neighborhood interaction model and similarity measure function. As a result,urban land-use in the three metropolitan areas was found to have had similar structure and patterns during the study period. Characteristics of neighborhood interaction in urban land-use changes are quite different from land-use categories,meaning that the mechanism of urban land-use changes comparatively differs among land-use categories. Characteristics of neighborhood interaction reveal the effect of spatial autocorrelation in the spatial process of urban land-use changes in the three metropolitan areas,which correspond with the characteristics of agglomeration of urban land-use allocation in Japan. Neighborhood interaction amidst urban land-use changes between the three metropolitan areas generally showed similar characteristics. The regressed neighborhood interaction coefficients in the models may represent the general characteristics of neighborhood effect on urban land-use changes in the cities of Japan. The results provide very significant materials for exploring the mechanism of urban land-use changes and the construction of universal urban geosimulation models which may be applied to any city in Japan.     

Characteristics of neighborhood interaction in urban land-use changes: A comparative study between three metropolitan areas of Japan

Local spatial interaction between neighborhood land-use categories (i.e. neighborhood interaction) is an important factor which affects urban land-use change patterns. Therefore, it is a key component in cellular automata (CA)-based urban geosimulation models towards the simulation and forecast of urban land-use changes. Purpose of this paper is to interpret the similarities and differences of the characteristics of neighborhood interaction in urban land-use changes of different metropolitan areas in Japan for providing empirical materials to understand the mechanism of urban land-use changes and construct urban geosimulation models. Characteristics of neighborhood interaction in urban land-use changes of three metropolitan areas in Japan, i.e. Tokyo, Osaka, and Nagoya, were compared using such aids as the neighborhood interaction model and similarity measure function. As a result, urban land-use in the three metropolitan areas was found to have had similar structure and patterns during the study period. Characteristics of neighborhood interaction in urban land-use changes are quite different from land-use categories, meaning that the mechanism of urban land-use changes comparatively differs among land-use categories. Characteristics of neighborhood interaction reveal the effect of spatial autocorrelation in the spatial process of urban land-use changes in the three metropolitan areas, which correspond with the characteristics of agglomeration of urban land-use allocation in Japan. Neighborhood interaction amidst urban land-use changes between the three metropolitan areas generally showed similar characteristics. The regressed neighborhood interaction coefficients in the models may represent the general characteristics of neighborhood effect on urban land-use changes in the cities of Japan. The results provide very significant materials for exploring the mechanism of urban land-use changes and the construction of universal urban geosimulation models which may be applied to any city in Japan.     

Spatial autocorrelation and data uncertainty in the American Community Survey: a critique

ABSTRACT

We argue that the use of American Community Survey (ACS) data in spatial autocorrelation statistics without considering error margins is critically problematic. Public health and geographical research has been slow to recognize high data uncertainty of ACS estimates, even though ACS data are widely accepted data sources in neighborhood health studies and health policies. Detecting spatial autocorrelation patterns of health indicators on ACS data can be distorted to the point that scholars may have difficulty in perceiving the true pattern. We examine the statistical properties of spatial autocorrelation statistics of areal incidence rates based on ACS data. In a case study of teen birth rates in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, in 2010, Global and Local Moran’s I statistics estimated on 5-year ACS estimates (2006–2010) are compared to ground truth rate estimates on actual counts of births certificate records and decennial-census data (2010). Detected spatial autocorrelation patterns are found to be significantly different between the two data sources so that actual spatial structures are misrepresented. We warn of the possibility of misjudgment of the reality and of policy failure and argue for new spatially explicit methods that mitigate the biasedness of statistical estimations imposed by the uncertainty of ACS data.     

A land-use mix allocation model considering adjacency,intensity, and proximity

ABSTRACT

Land-Use Mix (LUM) refers to the strategy of integrating complementary functions within a building or area. While LUM has become a dominant approach in urban planning, its actual benefits and vision for spatial planning remain unclear. To clarify this issue, this study discerns the spatial features of land-use patterns depending on the compatibilities among land-use categories. Accordingly, this study introduces three LUM measures – adjacency, intensity, and proximity – to identify differences in the spatial distribution of land-use categories. Based on these measures, a land-use allocation model is developed to specify spatial patterns satisfying the given compatibilities. This model is tested by applying the concept of the neighborhood unit on a case study of normative land-use patterns subject to specified compatibilities. The results describe spatial features of four compatibility sets, including a set exhibiting a compatibility conflict between the same land-use pair and LUM measures when, for example, a given land-use pair is compatible in terms of intensity but incompatible in terms of proximity. Understanding the spatial features of a normative land-use pattern that satisfies various possible compatibilities will facilitate the incorporation of the LUM approach into local planning guidance and zoning ordinances.     

中国省际人口迁移的多边效应机制分析

区际人口迁移不仅与迁出地和目的地的要素特征以及距离有关,而且还受到周边迁移流的影响.基于网络自相关理论,利用"六普"省际人口迁移数据和相关统计资料,在重力模型的基础上考虑迁移流之间可能存在的几种空间依赖形式,构建中国省际迁移流的空间OD模型,初步揭示区域经济社会等因素及其空间溢出效应对省际人口迁移的影响,并就区域要素变化对整个省际人口迁移系统产生的"连锁反应"进行了模拟.结果表明:① 中国省际迁移流之间存在显著的网络自相关效应.目的地和迁出地的自相关效应皆为正,导致迁入和迁出流的空间效仿行为;迁出地和目的地周边则出现负的自相关效应,导致迁移流的空间竞争行为;② 区域经济社会等因素通过网络空间关系对周边地区产生的多边溢出效应导致迁移流在空间上集聚.其中,距离衰减效应位居各要素之首,其溢出效应进一步加剧距离的摩擦作用;对目的地而言,区域工资水平和迁移存量超过GDP的影响并产生正的溢出效应,促进周边地区吸引更多的外来人口;对迁出地而言,人口规模和迁移存量产生正的溢出效应,推动周边地区人口外迁;③ 区域要素变化潜在地对整个省际人口迁移系统产生一系列"连锁反应",震荡中心及其周边区域的迁移流波动较大.江苏省GDP增长5%的模拟结果表明,江苏迁往全国其他省份的人口数量都有不同程度地减少,而其他省份入迁人口均有所增加.相对而言,江苏周边省份的迁入或迁出流受到的波动较大,偏远省份波及较小,这是传统的重力模型所无法解释的.     

XXIII INTERNATIONAL GEOGRAPHICAL CONGRESS,U.S.S.R.

Edward Jarvis in 1850 first demonstrated that admission rates to mental hospitals decrease with increasing residential distance, a relationship known today as “Jarvis's Law.” His original data are presented, mapped, and examined by regression analysis to better understand spatial and temporal patterns of mid-19th century mental hospital utilization. Distance substantially affected admission rates to a radius of about 60 miles from the institution in Massachusetts; and there was strong distance decay in the other states examined. For all twelve states, there was a positive association between age of the hospitals and admission rates, which also decreased with increasing residential distance.     

A Review of “Politics and Practice in Economic Geography”

Abstract

This study examines the spatial distribution and enforcement of air polluting facilities in the state of New Jersey, as listed in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Aerometric Information Retrieval System. Results show that air-polluting facilities tend to concentrate near minority neighborhoods, although this relationship is partially explained by factors of population density, manufacturing employment, and land use. Other results suggest that facilities in areas with a relatively high percentage of minority population tend to have a weaker record of environmental enforcement as compared to other facilities. Of the socioeconomic variables considered, employment in manufacturing appears to be the most strongly related to environmental enforcement.     

UK-based terrorists' antecedent behavior: A spatial and temporal analysis

Background and purposeTerrorism is a real and present danger. The build-up to an attack includes planning, travel, and reconnaissance which necessarily require the offender to move through their environment. Whilst research has examined patterns of terrorist attack locations, with a few exceptions (e.g. Rossmo & Harries, 2011), it has not examined the spatial behavior of the terrorists themselves. In this paper, we investigate whether the spatial mobility patterns of terrorists resemble those of criminals (and the wider population) and if these change in the run up to their attacks.MethodUsing mobile phone data records for the ringleaders of four different UK-based terrorist plots in the months leading up to their attacks, we examine the frequency with which terrorists visit different locations, how far they travel from key anchor points such as their home, the distance between sequential cell-site hits and how their range of movement varies as the planned time to attack approaches.ConclusionsLike the wider population (and criminals), the sample of terrorists examined exhibited predictable patterns of spatial behavior. Most movements were close to their home location or safe house, and they visited a relatively small number of locations most of the time. Disaggregating these patterns over time provided mixed evidence regarding the way in which their spatial activity changed as the time to the planned attack approached. The findings are interpreted in terms of how they inform criminological understanding of the spatial behavior of terrorists, and the implications for law enforcement.     

“Is there any time left for walking?” Physical activity implications of suburban commuting in the Barcelona metropolitan region

ABSTRACT

The present study delves into the explanatory factors of the walking patterns of residents in metropolitan regions, who tend to be pressed for time when travelling to their daily destinations or activities. We particularly focus on the effects of the commuting distance on the amount of walking that can be achieved, which has health, socioeconomic and environmental implications. This study confirms the potential benefits of using smartphone tracking data to examine walking patterns. To enable this, a smartphone tracking application was developed to obtain accurate mobility data from a group of adults (n = 93) residing in the Barcelona Metropolitan Region (Spain) and have to commute to a suburban university campus that can only be reached by using motorized transport modes. The results highlight the commuting distance and employment status as strong determinants of the amount of walking time achieved by this study group. Moreover, it was determined that among transit users, the commuting distance of male commuters was negatively associated with walking when compared with female transit users, whereas explanatory factors for private transport users bore insignificant results. Smartphone devices proved their potential as an effective and useful source of data in transportation and health research.     

An empirical study on the intra-urban goods movement patterns using logistics big data

ABSTRACT

Movement patterns of intra-urban goods/things and the ways they differ from human mobility and traffic flow patterns have seldom been explored due to data access and methodological limitations, especially from systemic and long timescale perspectives. However, urban logistics big data are increasingly available, enabling unprecedented spatial and temporal resolutions to this issue. This research proposes an analytical framework for exploring intra-urban goods movement patterns by integrating spatial analysis, network analysis and spatial interaction analysis. Using daily urban logistics big data (over 10 million orders) provided by the largest online logistics company in Hong Kong (GoGoVan) from 2014 to 2016, we analyzed two spatial characteristics (displacement and direction) of urban goods movement. Results showed that the distribution of goods displaceFower law or exponential distribution of human mobility trends. The origin–destination flows of goods were used to build a spatially embedded network, revealing that Hong Kong became increasingly connected through intra-urban freight movement. Finally, spatial interaction characteristics were revealed using a fitting gravity model. Distance lacked substantial influence on the spatial interaction of goods movement. These findings have policy implications to intra-urban logistics and urban transport planning.     

Toward a Geography of the Negro in the City

Abstract

The geography of Black America represents a legitimate and a distinctive sub-field of the discipline. While research time and attention is being focused increasingly on Black America much remains to be done to incorporate its study into introductory courses at both the secondary and college levels. Since many existing geography courses are inadequately structured to accommodate a meaningful analysis of Black America, it will be necessary to restructure them so that they become relevant not only to Black America but to emerging world-wide cultural patterns as well. The most logical and efficacious framework for such courses is one focused on the geography of cities. Courses dealing with urban topics can be devised so that major concepts of city structure can be presented as concomitants to topics dealing with the role and the contribution of the Negro in the city.     

Using landscape characteristics to define an adjusted distance metric for improving kriging interpolations

Interpolation of point measurements using geostatistical techniques such as kriging can be used to estimate values at non-sampled locations in space. Traditional geostatistics are based on the spatial autocorrelation concept that nearby things are more related than distant things. In this study, additional information was used to modify the traditional Euclidean concept of distance into an adjusted distance metric that incorporates similarity in terms of quantifiable landscape characteristics such as topography or land use. This new approach was tested by interpolating soil moisture content, pH and carbon-to-nitrogen (C:N) ratio measured in both the mineral and the organic soil layers at a field site in central Sweden. Semivariograms were created using both the traditional distance metrics and the proposed adjusted distance metrics to carry out ordinary kriging (OK) interpolations between sampling points. In addition, kriging with external drift (KED) was used to interpolate soil properties to evaluate the ability of the adjusted distance metric to incorporate secondary data into interpolations. The new adjusted distance metric typically lowered the nugget associated with the semivariogram, thereby better representing small-scale variability in the measured data compared to semivariograms based on the traditional distance metric. The pattern of the resulting kriging interpolations using KED and OK based on the adjusted distance metric were similar because they represented secondary data and, thus, enhanced small-scale variability compared to traditional distance OK. This created interpolations that agreed better with what is expected for the real-world spatial variation of the measured properties. Based on cross-validation error, OK interpolations using the adjusted distance metric better fit observed data than either OK interpolations using traditional distance or KED.     

Great Powers and Geopolitical Change

Abstract

Most traditional segregation measures, such as the index of dissimilarity D, fail to distinguish spatial patterns effectively. Previously proposed spatial measures modifying D suffer from several shortcomings. This article describes a general spatial segregation index based upon the concept of composite population counts, which are derived from grouping people in neighboring areas together to account implicitly for spatial interaction of groups across unit boundaries. The suggested spatial index can overcome the disadvantages of previous indices and can assess the spatial extent of the segregated clusters. The results offer a more comprehensive depiction of spatial segregation of a region.

     

Neighborhood-scale urban form,travel behavior,and CO2 emissions in Beijing: implications for low-carbon urban planning

With an increasing awareness of global climate change, the effect of urban spatial organization, at both city and neighborhood scales, on urban CO₂ emission reduction has attracted much scholarly and practical attention. Using Beijing as a case study, this article examines the extent to which neighborhood-scale urban form may contribute to reduction of travel-related CO₂ emissions in the context of rapid urbanization and spatial transformation. We derive complete travel-activity records of 1,048 residents from an activity diary survey conducted in 2007. Analysis using structural equation models finds that residents living in a neighborhood with higher land use mix, public transit accessibility, and more pedestrian-friendly street design tend to travel in a “low-carbon” manner and emit less CO₂ in daily travel, even controlling for residential and travel preferences. This article offers empirical evidence that sheds light on debates about policy measures to facilitate China’s transition toward sustainable and low-carbon urban development.     

Fitzgerald: A Return to the Neighborhood and Its Contemporary Structural and Geographical Contexts

William Bunge's Fitzgerald: Portrait of a Revolution, initially published in 1971, is an enthralling verbal and visual account of the historical and geographical development of a one-square-mile neighborhood in Detroit. The original analysis of the Fitzgerald neighborhood was based on intensive field-based research conducted in a theoretical context of race and racism. The research reported here maintains that context but updates Fitzgerald's account of the neighborhood's built environment through a spatial analysis that uses parcel-by-parcel data generated in Google Earth and Google Street View instead of data collected in the field. Current spatial patterns of deterioration in the built environment are similar to those described in Fitzgerald, but positive sites are also apparent and often colocated with negative ones.     

Spatio-temporal analysis of crime by developing a method to detect critical distances for the Knox test

The present study examined and compared spatio–temporal interaction of the theft of car parts, shop burglary and motorcycle theft in the central business district (CBD) of the city of Zanjan in Iran. The Knox test was selected to detect spatio–temporal interaction. This test has been criticized as being subjective because the selection of critical distances is arbitrary; thus, a method is proposed to detect critical distances in the Knox test using the mean distance, natural breaks classification of nearest neighbour (NN) distance and Ripley’s k function. Results show obvious differences between the spatio-temporal clusters of the three sets of crimes. They also indicate that changing the spatial cut-offs within a cluster creates different temporal patterns. Of the three criteria for determining critical distances, NN classification based on natural breaks showed more interactions than the other methods.