Abstract
Urban road transport and land use (RTLU) jointly promote economic development by concentrating labor, material, and capital. This paper presents an integrated RTLU efficiency analysis that explores the degree of coordination between these two systems to provide guidance for future adaptations necessary for sustainable urban development. Both a super efficiency Data Envelopment Analysis model and window analysis were used to spatiotemporally evaluate RTLU efficiency from 2012 to 2016 in 14 cities of Hunan province, central China. The Malmquist index was decomposed into technical efficiency and technology change to reveal reasons for changes in RTLU efficiency. These evaluation results show regional disparities in efficiency across Hunan province, with western cities being the least efficient. Eight cities showed an increasing trend in RTLU efficiency while Yueyang exhibited a decreasing trend. In 13 of 14 regions, productivity improved every year. At the same time, five regions had a decline in technical efficiency even though technical progress increased in all regions. Our analysis shows that greater investment in road transport and urban construction are not enough to ensure sustainable urban growth. Policy must instead promote the full use of current resources according to local conditions to meet local, regional, and national development goals.
Highlights
Urbanization in China has accelerated since the implementation of economic reforms in 1978
We analyzed the joint efficiency of road transport and land use through a RTLU efficiency evaluation in a hybrid Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) framework in 14 cities from 2012–2016 in Hunan province, China
We explored the changes in efficiency using three components decomposed from the Malmquist index
Summary
Urbanization in China has accelerated since the implementation of economic reforms in 1978. The urban population has increased from 388.55 million to 813.45 million and the urban gross domestic product (GDP) has increased over ten times from 7.60 trillion RMB to 76.17 trillion RMB during the last 20 years. The scale of road construction in China has expanded dramatically with the rapid development of the urban economy. During the period of 2000 to 2018, the length of roads in China increased from 1.403 million km to 4.773 million km. Land use has undergone tremendous changes as the built-up area increased from 39,758 to 55,155 km.
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