City Size Research Articles

Spatial Relationship of Inter-City Population Movement and Socio-Economic Determinants: A Case Study in China Using Multiscale Geographically Weighted Regression

In the current field of regional studies, there is a growing focus on regional spatial relationships from the perspective of functional linkages between cities. Inter-city population movement serves as an embodiment of the integrated functionality of cities within a region, and this is closely tied to the socio-economic development of urban areas. This study utilized Location-Based Services (LBSs) to collect the scale of inter-city population movement across 355 cities in China. Additionally, socio-economic data published by local governments were incorporated. By establishing a Multiscale Geographically Weighted Regression (MGWR) model, this research explores the spatial relationships between inter-city population movement and socio-economic influencing factors in China. This study aims to elucidate the spatial scales of the relationships between various variables. Our research findings indicate that the relationship between inter-city population movement and potential socio-economic determinants exhibits spatial non-stationarity. It is better to explore this spatial relationship through the MGWR model as there are different determinants operating on inter-city population movement at different spatial scales. The spatial distribution of the coefficient estimates shows significant regional differences and numerical variations. In China’s economically developed coastal regions, there is relatively balanced development among cities, with advanced manufacturing and producer service industries acting as significant drivers of mobility. In inland regions of China, city size is the most influential variable, directing a substantial flow of human and economic resources towards regional socio-economic hubs such as provincial capitals. The main contribution of this study is the re-examination of the relationship between inter-city population movement and socio-economic factors from the perspective of spatial scales. This approach will help China to consider the heterogeneity of different regions more extensively when formulating regional development policies, thereby facilitating the targeted promotion of regional element flow.

A Comparative Regional Study of Carbon Accounting Disclosure Based on the Fuzzy Comprehensive Evaluation Method--Taking the Eastern, Western, Southern, Northern and Central Regions as an Example

With the gradual development of corporate ESG investment concepts, it is becoming increasingly clear that exploring carbon accounting disclosure can contribute to the promotion of low-carbon economic development. In view of this, this study divides the country into five regions: east, west, south, north and central, firstly constructs three-level indicators affecting the disclosure of carbon accounting information, then assigns weights to the indicators using hierarchical analysis, and finally uses the fuzzy comprehensive evaluation method to score the overall level of disclosure in the five regions, and identifies that the central region has the highest scores, the western region, the southern region, and the northern region have medium scores, and the eastern region has the lowest scores. It also identified that the central region has the highest score, the western region, the southern region and the northern region have the middle score, and the eastern region has the lowest score, and that factors such as enterprise size and annual carbon emissions of cities are important factors affecting carbon accounting information disclosure.

Size does matter: A maturity model for the special needs of small and medium-sized smart cities

A significant amount of people live in small and medium-sized cities. In the context of smart cities and their further development, these are still often neglected in scientific considerations. We present a maturity model developed by a design science approach on the basis of theory and practice, specifically for the needs of small and medium-sized cities, in order to support them in their development into a fully comprehensive smart city. We derived requirements from the literature on the one hand and on the basis of expert interviews on the other hand. We evaluated our model using the example of the medium-sized town of Bad Hersfeld. Our maturity model can be easily applied by those responsible in small and medium-sized cities and provides a means of comparison with other cities of a similar size. It can further help city leaders to plan the next step in their smart city.

Breaking Barriers, Building Businesses, and International Markets: Strategies of Female Innovators in the Chinese Market

In China, which in the past was dominated by state-owned and male-led ventures, female entrepreneurs are now increasingly popular. However, the specific pathways to internationalization for female-owned firms in China and their contribution to the country’s economic growth remain unexplored. Based on the principles of the resource-based approach, the article explores the innovative strategies used by Chinese female-owned firms to overcome resource constraints, formal and informal institutional barriers to business internationalization (entering the global markets through indirect exports). The article puts forward and empirically tests 5 sets of hypotheses according to which Chinese female-owned firms are: 1) more efficient in internationalization through indirect export strategies; 2) more inclined to digital innovation; 3) not focused on innovation conversion, but rather on successful adaptation of existing offerings for international markets or efficiency gains; 4) do not prioritize innovation in communication technologies, focusing more on innovation to reach customers, build relationships and enter international markets; 5) use the female business ecosystem to obtain safer pathways to innovation, such as external partnerships or adapting existing technologies, rather than focusing on investing internal R&D with elevated risk. Within each block, 2 additional hypotheses were put forward. They consider the impact of the relevant factor (digital innovation, innovation conversion, communication innovation, internal innovation) on indirect exports and its role in mediating the relationship between female ownership and the success of business internationalization. The study is based on a sample of 2,700 Chinese firms surveyed from November 2011 to March 2013 using the World Bank Enterprise Surveys China 2012 (a comprehensive recoding was performed, adhering to established practices in quantitative research). The control variables are the location of the respondent company in the capital/province, city size and firm size. The study used two types of factor analysis – Exploratory (EFA, including Promax rotation, oblique rotation method) and Confirmatory (CFA, Alpha Cronbach test, full path analysis model, including both direct and indirect effects, Monte Carlo method). SPSS 29 software was used for the data sample and AMOS 26.0 for the modeling process. A direct positive relationship was found between female ownership and indirect exports in China and digital ecosystem innovations, as well as between communication innovations and indirect exports. A significant negative direct relationship was found between female ownership and communication innovations, between digital ecosystem innovations and indirect exports, and between internal innovations on indirect exports. It also reveals the absence of a significant direct impact of innovation conversion on indirect exports. Mediating effects were also confirmed for communication and digital ecosystem innovations; partially for internal innovations; not confirmed for innovation conversion.

Evaluating future flood risk mitigation capacities in major cities across China

Rapid urbanization and climate change have significantly altered urban hydrological processes. Previous research has highlighted their adverse effects on escalating risk of urban flood. Nevertheless, few assessments have quantified how future urban flood risk mitigation capacities evolve under various urban expansion and climate change scenarios. This study simulates urban expansion of major cities across China using future urban-regional environment simulation model at 30-m resolution under shared socioeconomic pathways scenarios (SSP). Concurrently, future precipitation intensity changes are assessed based on climate projection data. Finally, the urban flood risk mitigation capacity impacted by urban expansion and climate change is evaluated using the soil conservation service model. The results reveal: (1) The sizes of major cities are projected to expand 30% by 2050, and the north and east China are primary urban growth poles. (2) Major cities' precipitation intensity increase 0.4% in SSP126, but decline 5.4% and 2.3% in SSP245 and SSP585. (3) The flood risk mitigation capacities of major cities decrease 2.7% in SSP126 and 2.1% in SSP585, but increase 0.2% in SSP245. Most cities experiencing capacity decrease are located in the north and east China. These results provide valuable insights for the formulation of future urban flood adaptation and mitigation strategies.

Assessing the Influence of Urban Lights on Night Sky Brightness with a Smartphone

The darkness of the sky is a critical parameter for assessing the suitability of an astronomical site. Among various sources of light pollution, urban lights pose the most significant threat to ground-based optical astronomical and planetary observations. Quantitatively assessing the impact of urban lights with varying scales and fluxes is indispensable for selecting an ideal optical observation site. In order to quantitatively assess the changes in Night Sky Brightness (NSB) relative to the distance from urban areas and to establish a foundation for safeguarding the light environment at the newly developed Lenghu astronomical site on the Tibetan Plateau, we employed both a Sky Quality Meter and a pre-calibrated smartphone. These instruments were used to measure the NSB in the vicinity of two cities, Da Qaidam and Delingha, which vary in size and radiant flux, on the Tibetan Plateau. The findings indicate that the NSB around both cities decreases significantly as the distance from the city center increases, although the rate of decrease varies between the two locations. This decline can be effectively modeled using an exponential decay function. Notably, the influence of city lights on NSB becomes negligible at distances exceeding 30 km from Da Qaidam, while for Delingha, this distance extends to 50 km due to its larger city size and higher total radiant flux. The methodologies and results presented in this paper offer valuable insights for the selection of astronomical observation sites and the development of light pollution management policies.

Mediating the Effect of the Parent-Child Relationship in the Relationship Between Self-concept and Career Maturity in Children and Adolescents

The objective of this study is to determine whether the parent-child relationship exerts a mediating effect on the influencing relationship of the self-concept of children and adolescents with career maturity. To this end, we processed data from 5621 students who participated in the first through fifth rounds of the survey in the 2013 Korea Education Longitudinal Study. We performed a paired sample t-test to verify differences between the groups of children and adolescents. To verify the mediating effect of the parent-child relationship on the influencing relationship of self-concept among children and adolescents with career maturity. The results showed that there was a difference depending on gender and city size in terms of self-concept, career maturity, and relationship. This study also revealed a significant discrepancy in the self-concept and parent-child relationship based on the developmental stages. In addition, the study also verified the mediating effect of the parent-child relationship in the relationship between the self-concept of children and adolescents and their career maturity. Based on these findings, it is necessary to implement a systematic education program for parents because the parent-child relationship is highly important in improving students’ career maturity.

Analysis of greenery coverage of the area of the City ofWarsaw on the quality of life of residents on the basis of spatial and statistical data

Biologically active areas play an extremely important role in the structure of a city and increasing their coverage, especially in large urban centres, is an activity with a number of advantages. This article compares, in terms of green spaces, two European cities of similar size – Warsaw (517.2 km2) and Oslo (454 km2). Both cities are capitals of their respective countries but implement different spatial policies in the scope of the Green Deal. In Warsaw, many industrial and post-industrial areas still exist and simultaneously urban green areas are decreasing year by year. In Oslo, a strategy based on deindustrialisation of the city and possible maximum use of urban greenery and public spaces is implemented. The research described in this article involved analysing the coverage of the analysed cities and their districts with biologically active area and then checking the correlation with other indicators that can be affected by this coverage. These included data on the incidence of the most common diseases among residents, the attractiveness of living for the elderly and families with children, as well as air and soil pollution and the occurrence of negative effects of climate change. The correlation of urban space use in terms of the presence of industrial land in relation to currently existing green spaces in the districts concerned was subsequently determined.

City sizes and economic roles: Urban typologies within the Australian urban system

The aim of this paper is to investigate the empirical correlations between inter-city population distribution, intra-city urban economic structures, and networked inter-city relationships to propose a conceptual classification framework for the Australian urban system. This paper sets the pre-COVID-19 benchmark for future research which will investigate the impact of COVID-19 on the economic geography of the Australian urban system. This research confirms that the form of Australia's urban structure is informed by a combination of population distribution, economic concentration, specialisation and diversity of industries and occupations, and networks between cities. Based on these results, we propose an urban structure framework characterised by hierarchical sub-systems and typologies of cities. The framework consists of standalone regional centres and larger cities which form a networked megaregion. Additionally, we propose five typologies of cities based on their functional roles. The Australian urban system presents a unique hybrid economic geography where its structure of networked megaregions of cities and standalone regional centres each with its complementary functional roles, presents itself an interesting case study to inform population policies for other geographies.

Unveiling urban governance diversity: Clustering cities based on mitigation actions

Embracing a “more global” urban comparison in scientific assessments of climate actions by cities is essential to drive greater and more inclusive participation in global efforts to curb climate change. This comparison needs to engage cities irrespective of their size and status: when we do so, distinctive patterns of urban climate mitigation actions across a diverse range of cities emerge. Employing K-means clustering as a pattern recognition method, this study compares cities based on selected aspects of their reported mitigation actions to the Carbon Disclosure Project. It explores whether the identified clusters facilitate the comparison of a socio-spatially diverse range of cities. The study identifies five clusters within two themes, namely the nature and finance–implementation of actions, shedding light on shared and distinct governance aspects of mitigation actions by cities. Notably, the study underscores how governance patterns transcend city size and global status. These findings offer valuable insights for broadening the comparative imagination of cities and inter-city networking opportunities.

Effects of primary health care and socioeconomic aspects on the dispersion of COVID-19 in the Brazilian Northeast: Ecological study of the first pandemic wave.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a negative impact on socioeconomic and public health conditions of the population. To measure the temporal evolution of COVID-19 cases in cities near the countryside outside metropolitan areas of northeastern Brazil and the impact of the primary care organization in its containment. This is a time-series study, based on the first three months of COVID-19 incidence in northeastern Brazil. Secondary data were used, the outcome was number of COVID-19 cases. Independent variables were time, coverage and quality score of basic health services, and demographic, socioeconomic and social isolation variables. Generalizable Linear Models with first order autoregression were applied. COVID-19 spreads heterogeneously in cities near the countryside of Northeastern Brazilian cities, showing associations with the city size, socioeconomic and organizational indicators of services. The Family Health Strategy seems to mitigate the speed of progression and burden of the disease, in addition to measures such as social isolation and closure of commercial activities. The spread of COVID-19 reveals multiple related factors, which require coordinated intersectoral actions in order to mitigate its problems, especially in biologically and socially vulnerable populations.

The impact of city size and basic eldercare services on the disability risk of older adults: empirical evidence from 122 cities in China

The impact of city size and basic eldercare services on the disability risk of older adults: empirical evidence from 122 cities in China

Do New Urbanization Policies Promote Sustainable Urbanization? Evidence from China’s Urban Agglomerations

China’s urbanization has received as much attention as its economic growth in recent years. While rapid urbanization has promoted modernization and wealth creation, it has also brought many problems and challenges. So, since 2014, the Chinese government has implemented a new urbanization policy nationwide. However, few researchers have examined whether China’s new urbanization policies promote sustainable urbanization. This paper evaluates the sustainable urbanization of 19 urban agglomerations in China using the elastic coefficient. The results indicate a significant increase in the number of cities achieving sustainable urbanization since the implementation of China’s new urbanization policy. The number has risen from 46 in the period of 2010–2015 to 71 in the period of 2015–2021. Considering the impact of the new coronavirus on economy, there would have been even more cities entering sustainable urbanization during the latter period. This indicates that the new urbanization policy has a positive influence on the sustainable urbanization of China’s urban agglomerations. The sustainable urbanization status is not static and changes with different policies that are implemented in different time periods. Therefore, it is important to find useful policies that can guide and enhance the urbanization process in these cities. In addition, cities that have a sustainable urbanization status are not perfect. To address this issue, it is important to categorize and implement targeted policies for cities experiencing both sustainable and non-sustainable urbanization. Changes in a city’s size or urbanization rates are not related to the city’s sustainable urbanization status. A larger city size does not indicate sustainable urbanization, and, similarly, cities with faster urbanization rates do not exhibit a higher level of urbanization sustainability.

A Systematic Review of the Potential Influence of Urbanization on the Regional Thunderstorm Process and Lightning Activity

In the context of global climate change, lightning disasters have emerged as a serious environmental factor that restricts the sustainable development of megacities. This paper provides a review of the research on the impact of urbanization on thunderstorm processes and lightning activity, exploring various aspects, such as aerosols, urban thermal effects, urban dynamic effects, and building morphology. Despite numerous significant achievements in the study of the impact of air pollutants on lightning activity, there is no consensus on whether aerosols serve to enhance or inhibit lightning activity. The temperature difference between the urban underlying surface and the natural underlying surface could sustain and promote the occurrence and development of convective systems, thus enhancing lightning activity. In terms of urban dynamics, the barrier effect has led to the maximum center of lightning appearing at the edge of a built-up area, which might be associated with factors, such as urban heat island (UHI) intensity, wind speed, synoptic background, and city size. Additionally, the size of a city and the height of the buildings was also an influencing factor on lightning activity. In summary, scholars have made progress in understanding the characteristics and drivers of urban lightning activity in recent years, but there are still some urgent problems that need to be solved: (1) How to analyze, comprehensively, the spatiotemporal patterns of urban lightning activity under different thunderstorm intensity backgrounds? (2) How to conduct analysis to investigate the influence of alterations in the boundary layer structure, water–heat energy balance, and water vapor circulation processes on urban lightning activity in the context of urbanization? (3) How to couple numerical models of different scales to enhance the understanding of the impact of complex underlying surfaces on urban lightning activity? Future studies could investigate the relationship between urbanization and thunderstorm/lightning activity using a combination of observational data, numerical modeling, and laboratory experiments, which holds promise for providing valuable theoretical insights and technical support to enhance the prediction, nowcasting, early warning, and risk assessment of thunderstorms and lightning in urban areas.

A long-term, regional-level analysis of Zipf's and Gibrat's laws in the United States

We test the validity of Zipf's and Gibrat's laws for city size distributions at the regional level from 1900 to 2010 by considering US states. Zipf's law is satisfied for a majority of states, but for the United States as a whole it only held during the first half of the twentieth century. The null hypothesis of a power law is not rejected at the national level or for most states (the maximum number of rejections in one year is 13 states out of 48). There is evidence supporting a weak version of Gibrat's law in the long-term; mean growth is independent of initial population for most city sizes over the entire United States and in 27 states, while the variance of growth is size-dependent.

Associations between environmental perception and self-rated health in the city hierarchy of China: Findings from a national cross-sectional survey

Identifying environmental determinants of health and clarifying their variations is crucial for health promotion in different cities by providing tailored intervention strategies. Although the association between perceived urban environment and health (e.g., self-rated health) has been repeatedly explored, most studies have focused on cities of a specific size, and it is still unknown whether either significant environment variables or the magnitude of the association would vary across different-sized cities. This study investigated how perceived urban environment variables significantly associated with individuals’ self-rated health varied from small cities to mega cities in China, based on a national survey including 5963 valid respondents. The results showed that the relationship between self-rated health and city size was U-shaped, with respondents in medium and large cities reporting a low-level self-rated health. Perceived greenness, public facilities, housing supply, and medical services were positively and significantly associated with self-rated health, with the odds ratio (OR) of 1.37 (95%CI: 1.29–1.46), 1.27 (95%CI: 1.19–1.35), 1.14 (95%CI: 1.09–1.20), and 1.17 (95%CI: 1.10–1.24), respectively. Furthermore, the magnitude of the association was significantly larger in mega cities. These findings provide useful evidence for promoting public health in cities of different sizes for achieving health equity and indicate that smaller cities and their health-supportive environment need further attention.

Media narratives of industrial plant closures in Ontario, Canada, from 2000 to 2019

AbstractSince the 1970s, a defining feature of advanced economies has been industrial plant closures, stemming from the broader process of economic restructuring. Plant closures have been extensively covered by the media due to their adverse effects on localities. However, no media analysis of closures has been conducted in the plant closure literature. In addition to providing a wealth of information, such an analysis can provide insight into media narratives of closures. Media profoundly affects economies by disseminating narratives that influence society, institutions, and politics. To bridge the plant closure and media literature, this paper conducts a media analysis of closures in Ontario, Canada, from 2000 to 2019. Like other advanced economies, the province has experienced many plant closures over the past several decades. The paper found that the overarching narrative presented by the media was that ‘no one is responsible’ for plant closures and therefore ‘no one can or should act’. Also, it was found that differences in media narratives of closures were primarily due to the political slant of news outlets, not city size or scale of news outlets or whether news outlets were independently owned or part of a media conglomerate. Lastly, the paper found that the dissemination of media coverage on plant closures throughout the province was primarily based on the number of job losses, resulting in media coverage of smaller closures remaining localised, while media coverage of larger closures spreading throughout the province.

From Innovation to Green: Does China’s Innovative City Construction Contribute to Green Development?

ABSTRACT China’s government has launched the innovative city pilot (ICP) policy since 2008 and taken green development as the principle goal of innovative city construction. However, whether or not the ICP policy shapes green development remains largely unknown. Leveraging variation in the timing of the ICP policy implementation across cities, we investigate the causal impact of innovative city construction on green development, as measured by green total-factor productivity (GTFP). Our staggered difference-in-differences (DID) estimator shows that cities which implement the ICP policy experience a 5.3% increase in GTFP. This effect appears one year after the introduction of ICP policy and shows an upward trend over time. Our mechanism analysis further confirms that the ICP policy effect is driven by green innovation effect, which is realized through the support of innovation policy and increased investment in innovation. Finally, substantial heterogeneity is explained by geographic location, environmental constraint, resource endowment, city size and different levels of innovation. Our paper underscores the pivotal role of innovative cities in promoting green development, which warrants nationwide expansion.

STRUCTURAL FEATURES OF RESIDENTIAL BUILDINGS IN MODERN UKRAINIAN CITIES, BASED ON THE EXAMPLE OF ODESA CITY

The article is devoted to Ukrainian cities that are very different in their history, size, functions and architecture. In the period of crisis and almost complete halt of new housing construction and critical resource limitation, the most promising approaches for the development of residential areas are those that use existing housing structures and available resources. One of the most advanced areas is the use of existing housing structures. Instead of building a new housing stock with new networks and infrastructure, it is possible to develop and compact the existing housing stock (both historical and Soviet), thus reducing the amount of old housing stock and increasing the number of available square metres of housing for city residents. Each city has its own specific history and background, as well as housing structures that were formed at different times. The history of the formation and structural features of the residential development of Odesa city have been studied, so it is important to understand it in the general typology of Ukrainian urban settlements. The main criteria for dividing urban settlements into the types are the following factors: city size, number of residents, historical background, planning structure and functional content. The structural features of the residential development of modern Ukrainian cities are studied, the characteristic features and their impact on the development of residential development are identified. The development strategy for Odesa residential areas has been proposed to create a high-quality high-density living environment in historic cities. The purpose of this paper is to study the structural features of the residential development in modern Ukrainian cities, to determine their characteristic features and influence on the development of the residential development on the example of Odesa. The materials for this study are the structural features of residential development in modern cities. In particular, the impact and consequences of the crisis period on the housing infrastructure and the city structure are considered in order to understand better the crisis contribution to the formation of the modern city. The combination of the research results of the available material base and theoretical foundations of the structural features of residential development in modern cities became the main methodological basis of this work.

Varying road network resilience of Chinese cities

China boasts a multitude of cities exhibiting distinctly spatial characteristics, leading to variations in resilience. While attention has been garnered in individual cities, comprehensive studies for the whole system are scarce. Visualising and comparing the variations of spatial resilience across cities prove valuable in understanding disparities among city systems in terms of their spatial development and resilience consequences. This research measures the evolving resilience of spatial networks in nearly all cities within mainland China under intentional attack scenarios. Chinese cities exhibit different compositions of evolutional efficiency and scale effects when attacks exacerbate. The regions detected by the dissimilar compositions of spatiotemporal resilience showcase the spatial heterogeneity of road network resilience. Road network resilience of individual cities is related to city size and urbanised levels, but uncertainty is still revealed. Forming such an individual and regional scope to scrutinise the in-depth structure of spatial resilience of many cities can aid in allocating relevant spatial policies and evaluating the structural resilience risk for given cities in subject to all others.