Defining and generating axial lines from street center lines for better understanding of urban morphologies

Axial lines are defined as the longest visibility lines for representing individual linear spaces in urban environments. The least set of axial lines that cover the free space of an urban environment or the space between buildings constitute what is often called an axial map. This is a fundamental tool in space syntax, a theory developed by Bill Hillier and his colleagues for characterizing the underlying urban morphologies. For a long time, generating axial lines with the help of some graphic software has been a tedious manual process that is criticized for being time consuming, subjective, or even arbitrary. In this article, we redefine axial lines as the least set of individual straight line segments mutually intersected along natural streets that are generated from street center lines using the Gestalt principle of good continuity. Based on this new definition, we develop an automatic solution for generating the newly defined axial lines from street center lines. We apply this solution to six typical street networks (three from North America and three from Europe) and generate a new set of axial lines for analyzing the urban morphologies. Through a comparison study between the new axial lines and the conventional or old axial lines and between the new axial lines and natural streets, we demonstrate with empirical evidence that the newly defined axial lines are a better alternative for capturing the underlying urban structure.     

城市复杂道路网的Stroke生成方法

传统连接stroke的方法在处理表达较为详细的城市道路网数据时,会产生双行道分离和环岛处截断等错误.为能够在城市复杂道路网中正确生成stroke,针对道路网中的双行道和道路交叉口模式提出一种新的stroke生成方法.该方法采用道路街区几何形态分析、基于连通关系的层次聚类等算法自动识别出道路网中的双行道和道路交叉口模式,并使用穷举stroke配对组合算法连接截断的stroke,从而保证stroke的连续性.以武汉市NAVIN-FOTM导航电子地图数据为例验证该方法的实用性,生成的stroke符合stroke感知归组原则中平滑连贯的要求.     

A linear tessellation model to identify spatial pattern in urban street networks

Street patterns reflect the distribution characteristics of a street network and affect the urban structure and human behavior. The recognition of street patterns has been a topic of interest for decades. In this study, a linear tessellation model is proposed to identify the spatial patterns in street networks. The street segments are broken into consecutive linear units with equal length. We define five focal operations using neighborhood analysis to extract the geometric and topological characteristics of each linear unit for the purpose of grid-pattern recognition. These are then classified by Support Vector Machine, and the result is optimized based on Gestalt principles. The experimental results demonstrate that our method is effective for mining grid patterns in a street network.     

Evolution of the commercial blocks in ancient Beijing city from the street network perspective

The synergistic relationship between urban functions and street networks has always been a focus in the field of urban research and practice. From the perspective of street networks, by adopting space syntax, this study analyzed the deep structural characteristics and potential evolution rules of commercial blocks attached to street networks in different periods, as well as the corresponding economic, political, and cultural characteristics of ancient Beijing city over the past 800 years. By combining these with changes in the street network, we further explained the function mechanism of layout and level adjustment in commercial blocks, and the influence of the street network on commercial blocks in the process of historical change. The main conclusions included the following: (1) The urban centripetal-centrifugal siphon effect: the layout form, topological structure, and traffic mode changes in the street network had corresponding guidance for the layout and hierarchical system of commercial blocks, while the centripetal development of the street network could guide the agglomeration effect of commercial blocks, although centrifugal development caused commercial blocks to display outward evacuation. (2) Stage transformation from mutation node to smooth development: the layout of commercial blocks came to depend on the ability to cross the commuting flow center, which originally relied on the accessibility of transportation nodes as local centers. Changes in traffic modes mainly affected the adjustment of the first-level commercial blocks, which easily led to overall layout mutation. Traffic levels have an obvious positive hierarchical relation with the second- and third-level commercial blocks. (3) The adaptation of traditional commercial blocks to the needs of a modern city: affected by the different emerging times and unevenness of the original commercial foundation, commercial blocks have formed various developmental models that meet the needs of modernization, and reach a balance between cultural continuity and functional adaptation.     

基于空间句法视角的民国以来北京老城街道网络演变

研究基于空间句法理论与方法,结合不同时期的数字化历史地图,从街道网络显型、“局部—整体”层级关系及运转效率等三方面探讨民国以来北京老城的街道网络演变进程。结果表明：① 政权更替是其演变的分水岭。民国时期,老城街道网络由封建隔离结构向现代通达结构转型,环环相扣、中轴对称式的整合、穿行核心格局同时被打破。1949年中华人民共和国成立后,街道网络的几何格网特征越发明显,“环形+大格网”式的核心运动骨架凸显,不同街道段的可达性与穿行频率则逐渐趋同。② 老城各子区域的可达性层级关系在百余年来持续变化,穿行频率层级关系则保持稳定,与其他区域相比,东城的可达性与穿行频率优势明显。③ 政权更替之际新结构的集中嵌入与随后规划建设的路径依赖使得老城全域的运转效率历经“下降→上升→下降→上升”的起伏演变过程。这一过程同样出现在东城、西城与外城,但更强的几何格网特征促使前者的两次上升幅度较大,运转效率也相对较高,而皇城的运转效率则随小规模封闭系统的日益开放呈阶梯式下降。概括来讲,研究不仅运用数字化手段系统梳理了北京老城的街道发展史,为如何更好地保护古都风貌,传承历史文脉提供了街道网络视角的逻辑支撑,对于空间句法的理论算法体系也进行了一定拓展。     

基于街景影像和手机信令数据的城市街道安全性研究

城市化进程加快导致街道安全性问题突出,已有研究利用城市视觉要素刻画街道安全感空间分布,忽略了街道真实安全性与安全感间的差异。该文利用街景影像和手机信令数据,结合K-means聚类算法与笛卡尔积运算模型减少“安全感知差异”,以长沙市主城区为研究案例,得到白天、夜晚及总体城市街道安全性分布:1)长沙市主城区安全感指数随圈层数增加呈波动递减趋势,主要原因是建筑视觉要素占比下降较快以及天空视觉要素占比逐步上升;2)长沙市主城区呈双圈层结构,白天高安全性、夜晚低安全性以及总体安全性最低的区域主要分布在主城区中心,具有明显的聚集现象。该研究通过对城市街道安全性和低安全性街道的分析提出街道优化建议,为城市规划提供参考。     

基于网络形态的街道空间环境与“两抢一盗”犯罪的关系研究——以HS市原DP区为例

城市街道网络是承载人们日常行为的空间载体,街道网络及其中人的日常行为共同构成了主要的街道网络空间环境,并影响着犯罪行为的发生。既有研究表明街道空间中多发“两抢一盗”侵财类案件,并且街道网络形态和日常行为主体与犯罪存在联系,但对这一问题的深入探究较少。本文基于HS市原DP区的派出所辖区单元,使用路网数据、人口统计数据、手机信令数据等相关资料,采用空间分析和统计分析方法,对街道网络的几何形态和拓扑形态、动态人口和静态人口等因素与犯罪分布的关系展开分析,尝试探索街道网络空间环境对“两抢一盗”犯罪的影响。结果表明,街道网络空间环境中影响盗窃和两抢犯罪的要素存在较大差异。“X形单元”式街道网络、路网密度、低速交通的路网渗透性、静态人口密度和动态人口密度均对盗窃犯罪产生重要影响,与两抢犯罪相关的仅有“T形单元”式街道网络、静态人口中的实际居住户籍人员和外来人员密度,街道网络形态没有表现出与两抢犯罪的显著相关。最后提出,由于街道网络的通达性和危险性往往并存,如何通过调控或改善整体的街道网络空间环境来尽可能减少犯罪风险,是未来规划建设安全的街道网络空间需要思考的话题。     

Spatial patterns of retail activity and street network structure in new and traditional Israeli cities

The association between spatial patterns of retail activity and the spatial configuration of street networks was examined by means of the space syntax methodology in eight Israeli cities that represent two city types, characterized by different planning approaches and urban growth: (i) new towns, which were established according to a comprehensive city plan and modern planning concepts of “tree-like” hierarchical street networks and “neighborhood units”; (ii) older cities, where street networks and the spatial patterns of retail activity were formed incrementally during their growth. Unlike in older cities, retail activity in new towns concentrates in relatively less-accessible and intermediate locations. This is indicated by a weak correlation between retail activity and the street network’s Integration and Choice centrality measures. The comparison between Israeli cities illustrates the influence of urban growth and planning approaches on the formation of retail activity and its interaction with the structure of the street network.     

Automatic change detection in lane-level road networks using GPS trajectories

Lane-level road network updating is crucial for urban traffic applications that use geographic information systems contributing to, for example, intelligent driving, route planning and traffic control. Researchers have developed various algorithms to update road networks using sensor data, such as high-definition images or GPS data; however, approaches that involve change detection for road networks at lane level using GPS data are less common. This paper presents a novel method for automatic change detection of lane-level road networks based on GPS trajectories of vehicles. The proposed method includes two steps: map matching at lane level and lane-level change recognition. To integrate the most up-to-date GPS data with a lane-level road network, this research uses a fuzzy logic road network matching method. The proposed map-matching method starts with a confirmation of candidate lane-level road segments that use error ellipses derived from the GPS data, and then computes the membership degree between GPS data and candidate lane-level segments. The GPS trajectory data is classified into successful or unsuccessful matches using a set of defuzzification rules. Any topological and geometrical changes to road networks are detected by analysing the two kinds of matching results and comparing their relationships with the original road network. Change detection results for road networks in Wuhan, China using collected GPS trajectories show that these methods can be successfully applied to detect lane-level road changes including added lanes, closed lanes and lane-changing and turning rules, while achieving a robust detection precision of above 80%.     

Computing the fewest-turn map directions based on the connectivity of natural roads

In this article, we introduce a novel approach to computing the fewest-turn map directions or routes based on the concept of natural roads. Natural roads are joined road segments that perceptually constitute good continuity. This approach relies on the connectivity of natural roads rather than that of road segments for computing routes or map directions. Because of this, the derived routes possess the fewest turns. However, what we intend to achieve are the routes that not only possess the fewest turns but are also as short as possible. This kind of map direction is more effective and favored by people because they bear less cognitive burden. Furthermore, the computation of the routes is more efficient because it is based on the graph encoding the connectivity of roads, which is substantially smaller than the graph of road segments. We experimented on eight urban street networks from North America and Europe to illustrate the above-stated advantages. The experimental results indicate that the fewest-turn routes possess fewer turns and shorter distances than the simplest paths and the routes provided by Google Maps. For example, the fewest-turn-and-shortest routes are on average 15% shorter than the routes suggested by Google Maps, whereas the number of turns is just half as much. This approach is a key technology behind FromToMap.org – a web mapping service using openstreetmap data.     

Exploring the relationship between street centrality and land use in Stockholm

This paper examines the relationship between different street centralities and land-use types in Stockholm. Major centrality measures of closeness, betweenness, and straightness are calculated at both global and local levels in both the primary and dual representations of the urban street network. Adaptive kernel density estimation is adopted to transform all unevenly distributed datasets to one continuous raster framework for further analysis. After computing statistical and spatial distribution of each centrality and land-use density map, we find that the density of each street centrality is highly correlated with one type of land use. Results imply that various centralities representing street properties from different aspects can capture the land development patterns of different land-use types by reflecting human activities, and are consequently important indicators to describe urban structure.     

“The Corner of Avenue A and Twenty-Third Street”: Geographies of Street Numbering in the United States

The designation of streets by number is one of the hallmarks of North American urbanism, yet very few studies have examined the geographies of street numbering in U.S. cities and towns. This article provides one of the first comprehensive, nationwide assessments of the spatial distribution of street numbering and lettering practices across the United States. Drawing on data collected from Google Maps, census records, state almanacs, and related sources, we analyze the proportion of incorporated places in all fifty U.S. states that have adopted some form of street numbering or lettering; the regional variation in the prevalence of alphanumerical systems of street designation and the relationships between the occurrence of street numbering, population size, and date of incorporation. In doing so, the broader aim of this study is to undertake the empirical groundwork needed to develop a more nuanced critical theory of the social production of calculable space.     

基于街景数据的建成环境与街道活力时空分析——以深圳福田区为例

建成环境对街道活力的影响是国内外城市研究的热点议题。然而,对于建成环境要素的测度与评估多偏重于二维建成环境指标,尚未充分挖掘三维建成环境指标。以深圳市福田区为例,采用街景数据、路网数据、POI数据及移动互联网位置服务数据,建立周末分时段模型,探讨商业街道和生活街道活力的时空间分布特征及建成环境对其产生的影响。结果表明：① 商业街道上居民全天活动的峰值时段为18:00~20:00,生活街道上居民全天活动的峰值时段为11:00~13:00。② 深圳市福田区街道活力总体呈现多中心结构,随时间变化显现出明显的空间差异。③ 不同的建成环境指标对街道活力的作用时段与影响程度存在差异。提高功能混合度有利于提升商业街道凌晨、上午和夜间的活力及生活街道午后和傍晚的活力;过宽的相对步行宽度对生活街道活力提升有抑制作用,更安全的步行环境对商业和生活街道夜间活力提升有促进作用;界面连续程度高的商业街道午后及夜间的活力更强,界面多样性丰富的生活街道白天活力更强。     

杭州商业街道空间布局形态关键要素对周边风环境的影响

利用基于计算流体力学（CFD）理论的数值模拟软件,在不影响街道连续性面貌的前提下,通过控制变量法分别改变街道贴线率、街道界面密度、街道高宽比3个关键要素的数值来观察街道风环境的变化情况。结论主要有： 街道内的风速大小随着街道贴线率的增大呈抛物线趋势变化,先增大后减小,在街道贴线率接近70%时,城市街道内风速达到最大; 随着界面密度的不断减小,城市街道内各个测点的风速变化的幅度越来越大,这样会让在其中行走的行人感受到强烈的风速变化,舒适度大为下降; 城市街道内的平均风速和街道高宽比成反比例关系。     

Gravitational field routing strategy considering the distribution of traffic flow

Traffic flow transmission is a constantly important aspect of complex networks, geographical information science, and other science and engineering fields. Previous studies have shown that vehicle flow is more strongly correlated with morphological properties of streets than those of axial lines. In addition, street-based topological representations are more suitable for vehicle flow prediction, as well as more memory-oriented and global in nature. In this study, we construct a dual graph to represent the street–street relationship and propose a routing strategy for networks on the basis of gravitational field theory. We aim to diminish traffic congestion and enhance the transmission performance of networks. We borrow from gravitational field theory in establishing a gravitational field stimulated by a node in packet transmission and in defining the corresponding gravitational field equation. On the basis of this study, we present a mathematical model and a routing strategy. Experimental results indicate that compared with the shortest path routing strategy, the proposed method considerably enhances network capacity and effectively balances network traffic flow, especially for congested networks. We achieve critical gravitation that can always maximize network capacity, regardless of the values of other parameters.     

昆明市街道灰尘重金属污染及潜在生态风险评价

利用X-Ray荧光光谱仪对昆明市街道灰尘的Cu、Zn、Pb、As、Cr和Ni等元素进行了分析,讨论了街道灰尘中重金属含量的水平和空间分布特征;采用潜在生态危害指数法对灰尘中重金属的潜在生态风险进行了评价。结果表明:昆明市街道灰尘中重金属Cu、Zn、Pb、As、Cr和Ni的平均含量分别为166.6、316.53、97.49、20.56、79.41和21.45 mg/kg,与全国土壤背景值相比有较大积累,其中Cu、Zn、Pb和As都达到相对富集类,污染程度较重;重金属元素在旱季有明显积累趋势,雨季相对降低;重金属在工业区含量最高,其次为交通区,其中内城重金属污染源主要来自于汽车交通污染,外城来源于工业污染。灰尘中重金属潜在生态风险处于轻微生态危害水平,且潜在生态风险系数大小顺序为Cu>Zn>As>Pb>Cr>Ni,其中Cu是最主要的生态风险因子。     

街景图片识别城市贫困的适用性——基于广州市中心城区的验证

以广州市为例,选取中心4个区6 670个采样点（涵盖121个社区）的百度街景图片,从城市建成环境特征探讨了城市贫困识别的可能。首先,训练基于深度神经网络的街景图片分类模型后,对街景要素进行语义分割,并通过缓冲区分析统计社区尺度的街景指标;其次,经主成分分析法提取出建筑围合感、植被围合感、天空开阔感和道路开阔感4个街景主因子,并验证其与多重贫困指数（IMD）的相关性;最后,通过采用简单随机抽样法选取61个社区,构建街景预测的多元线性回归模型,对剩余60个社区进行贫困预测,验证街景指标测度城市贫困的度量精度。结果发现,案例社区的多重贫困指数（IMD）与建筑围合感呈正相关,与植被围合感、天空开阔感、道路开阔感呈负相关;从整体看来,街景预测结果与传统城市贫困测度的空间规律基本相符,而且结果通常比传统测度的城市贫困程度高。这是因为受测度内容、社区类型、街道属性等方面的影响,街景识别方式比较适用于判断建成环境较差的贫困社区。街景图片预测有利于刻画城市贫困人群真实的生活环境,便于对城市建成区进行及时监测,在一定程度上可以与传统城市贫困测度相互校正、弥补不足。     

Assessing the implications of the recent community opening policy on the street centrality in China: A GIS-based method and case study

Recently, the Chinese government raised an urban planning policy which suggests communities open their private roads for public transport and establish street networks with high spatial density in cities. In this context, the purpose of this study is to analyze the potential changes to street network accessibility using GIS techniques and to provide spatial information that may influence the decision making of urban managers. In addition to the existing street network data in the case study city, Shenzhen, intra-community roads are extracted from building footprints in GIS topographic database and used to construct a potential street network with respect to the community opening policy. An automatic GIS-based method is proposed here to analyze the location advantage information in the simulated urban environment, by combining Delaunay triangulation model and graph theory concepts. Specifically, we establish a two-step framework based on the spatial relationships between roads and buildings. Firstly, intra-community roads between neighboring building footprints are generated using a Delaunay triangulation skeleton model, and with the existing inter-community roads they form the simulated network. Secondly, street centrality indices of the current and simulated networks are compared in terms of closeness, betweenness and straightness. Results indicate that after applying the policy the global accessibility in the city would be increased at some places and decreased at others, and places' directness among others would be generally improved. In addition, the skeleton of central routes for through traffic would not change much. The presented method can also be applied to other cities.     

街道网络视角下北京旧城商业中心的演变过程和作用机制（英文）

The synergistic relationship between urban functions and street networks has always been a focus in the field of urban research and practice.From the perspective of street networks,by adopting space syntax,this study analyzed the deep structural characteristics and potential evolution rules of commercial blocks attached to street networks in different periods,as well as the corresponding economic,political,and cultural characteristics of ancient Beijing city over the past 800 years.By combining these with changes in the street network,we further explained the function mechanism of layout and level adjustment in commercial blocks,and the influence of the street network on commercial blocks in the process of historical change.The main conclusions included the following:(1) The urban centripetal-centrifugal siphon effect:the layout form,topological structure,and traffic mode changes in the street network had corresponding guidance for the layout and hierarchical system of commercial blocks,while the centripetal development of the street network could guide the agglomeration effect of commercial blocks,although centrifugal development caused commercial blocks to display outward evacuation.(2) Stage transformation from mutation node to smooth development:the layout of commercial blocks came to depend on the ability to cross the commuting flow center,which originally relied on the accessibility of transportation nodes as local centers.Changes in traffic modes mainly affected the adjustment of the first-level commercial blocks,which easily led to overall layout mutation.Traffic levels have an obvious positive hierarchical relation with the second-and third-level commercial blocks.(3) The adaptation of traditional commercial blocks to the needs of a modern city:affected by the different emerging times and unevenness of the original commercial foundation,commercial blocks have formed various developmental models that meet the needs of modernization,and reach a balance between cultural continuity and functional adaptation.     

Designing efficient and balanced police patrol districts on an urban street network

In police planning, a territory is often divided into several patrol districts with balanced workloads, in order to repress crime and provide better police service. Conventionally, in this districting problem, there is insufficient consideration of the impacts of street networks. In this study, we propose a street-network police districting problem (SNPDP) that explicitly uses streets as basic underlying units. This model defines the workload as a combination of different attributes and seeks an efficient and balanced design of districts. We also develop an efficient heuristic to generate high-quality districting plans in an acceptable time. The capability of the algorithm is demonstrated in comparison to an exact linear programming solver on simulated datasets. The SNPDP model is successfully implemented and tested in a case study in London, and the generated police districts have different characteristics that are consistent with the crime risk and land use distribution. Besides, we demonstrate that SNPDP is superior to an aggregation grid-based model regarding the solution quality. This model has the potential to generate street-based districts with balanced workloads for other districting problems, such as school districting and health care districting.