Development Of Urban Agglomerations Research Articles

A study on dynamic evolution, regional differences and convergence of high-quality economic development in urban agglomerations: A case study of three major urban agglomerations in the Yangtze river economic belt

Based on the data of 85 cities in the three major urban agglomerations in the Yangtze River Economic Belt from 2011 to 2020, this paper measures the level of high-quality economic development of each city through the improved entropy-weighted TOPSIS method and uses the kernel density estimation method, Dagum Gini coefficient, and convergence model to further study the dynamic evolution, regional differences, and convergence state of the high-quality economic development level of the three major urban agglomerations in the Yangtze River Economic Belt. The study finds that: 1) the high-quality economic development level of each city within the three major urban agglomerations of the Yangtze River Economic Belt has been continuously improved over time, but the development level of each urban agglomeration is not the same; 2) the high-quality economic development level of the three urban agglomerations in the Yangtze River Economic Belt has spatial differences, that is, the high-quality economic development level of the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration is better than the two urban agglomerations; 3) the σ convergence and β convergence characteristics exist in the three major urban agglomerations as a whole as well as in each urban agglomeration, and the β convergence rates of the urban agglomerations are not consistent. On the whole, the convergence rate of the middle reaches of the Yangtze River urban agglomeration is the fastest, followed by the Chengdu-Chongqing urban agglomeration, and the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration is the slowest. Finally, based on the findings of the study, targeted policy recommendations to promote the high-quality economic development of the three major urban agglomerations in the Yangtze River Economic Belt are proposed.

Spatial Differentiation and Influencing Factors in the Ecological Well-Being Performance of Urban Agglomerations in the Middle Reaches of the Yangtze River: A Hierarchical Perspective.

Improving the ecological well-being performance (EWP) of natural resources and environmental consumption in relation to human well-being, within the ecological boundary, is necessary for sustainable development. This study used the Super-SBM model to measure the urban EWP of urban agglomeration in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River (MRYRUA) in 2020. The spatial differentiation characteristics of EWP in the MRYRUA were identified. The heterogeneity in the direction and size of the influencing factors of EWP at different urban hierarchy (UH) levels was empirically tested by establishing a threshold model. The results are as follows: (1) In 2020, the EWP of the study area showed a trend of high levels in the southwest and low levels in the northeast. The EWP presented a multi-center “core–periphery” distribution, and the characteristic of “central collapse” was evident. The UH level of the middle and lower hierarchy-level cities was inconsistent with its EWP. (2) A non-single linear relationship was found between the influencing factors of the EWP of the MRYRUA and the EWP. The impacts of technological progress, industrial structure, environmental regulation, and population density on the EWP of the MRYRUA all showed threshold characteristics. (3) Heterogeneity and stages were both observed for the influencing factors of EWP under different UH levels. The effect of technological progress on EWP presented the characteristics of bidirectional and two-stage developments, and environmental regulation presented the features of a significant positive three-stage development. Both industrial structure and population density presented two-stage aspects, but the former acted in a negative direction, while the latter served in a positive order. This study provides a theoretical basis for the government to formulate differentiated regional policies and promote the coordinated improvement of EWP among cities at all hierarchy levels in the urban agglomeration. This study is of great significance to the sustainable development of urban agglomerations. Its results can provide a reference for other urban agglomerations, metropolitan areas, and city clusters worldwide to coordinate economic development, ecological protection, and to improve people’s well-being.

Analysis of the Evolution of the Relationship between the Urban Pattern and Economic Development in Guangdong Province Based on Coupled Multisource Data

Regarding the rapid development of urban agglomeration (UA) in Guangdong Province in the past two decades, this study revealed the temporal and spatial evolution of the urban pattern of the province and the current urbanization process. This study determined the geographical spatial distribution and change in the UA lighting scale in Guangdong Province, analyzed the relationship between the lighting change and development and the dynamic evolution of the gross domestic product, and explored the expansion intensity and center of gravity migration direction of UA. The results showed that from 2000 to 2020, the lighting scale of the border areas of Guangdong Province was lower than that of the inland areas, whereas the lighting growth rate of the border areas was higher than that of the inland areas. The built-up area steadily expanded from the center to the outside within the time range of the study, and the center of gravity of the ellipse tended to shift northwest. The study provides visual and scientific data for the spatiotemporal evolution of the urban pattern in Guangdong Province and has important reference significance for analyzing urbanization development and planning urban construction.

Exploring the environmental properties and resource utilization of construction waste in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region.

Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region is a capital economic circle for the future. Promoting the coordinated development of its population, economy, resources and environment is a major national strategy. And as towns and cities continue to expand, the volume of construction waste is gradually expanding, posing a major challenge to the sustainable development of the construction industry. In order to solve this problem, this paper used portable X-ray fluorescence spectrometry to realize the on-site rapid monitoring of heavy metals in construction waste, and the correlation analysis result was R2 = 0.9908. The visualization of enrichment factor evaluation results was realized through ArcGIS. The Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region is mainly polluted by heavy metal elements Cr, Zn, Pb and Hg, showing regional pollution characteristics, and the results of mercury morphology analysis show that all are inorganic mercury pollution, and methylmercury is not detected, and the cause can be traced to heavy industrial production in Tangshan City, which is consistent with industrial ecology. The results of leaching toxicity and cation anion analysis showed that the construction waste in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region had environmental risks to the surrounding surface water and groundwater. The resource treatment and disposal path were determined by means of XRD, ternary phase diagram and oxide composition analysis to avoid secondary pollution. This study explores the environmental properties and resource utilization pathways of construction waste in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, laying the foundation for research work on construction waste in the development of national urban agglomerations, effectively solving regional environmental pollution problems and promoting the sustainable development of the construction industry.

Does High-Speed Railway Promote the Level of Human Capital? An Empirical Analysis Based on Three Urban Agglomerations in China

This paper analyzed the impact of high-speed railway (HSR) construction on human capital and its mechanism by establishing high-speed railway-city level panel data from 2003 to 2019 and constructing a multiperiod difference- in-differences (DID) DID model in China. The results showed that HSR has significantly promoted the level of human capital in Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei urban agglomeration, Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration, and Pearl River Delta urban agglomeration in China, with the overall effect value of 20.8%. The conclusion that HSR promotes the level of human capital is still valid through endogenous treatment of the instrumental variable method and robustness test. Further analysis showed that the impact of HSR construction on the level of human capital in urban agglomerations is mainly through the labor mobility and education investment potential, with the effect values of 3.65% and 4.44%, respectively. The findings of this paper highlight the importance of exploiting the external utility of HSR, improving the level of regional human capital, and promoting high-quality economic development of urban agglomerations.

Spatiotemporal patterns and influencing factors of green development efficiency in China's urban agglomerations

Urban agglomeration is an important means of collaborative regional development, and a critical organizational form for cities when their industrialization and urbanization develop to a certain stage. The green development of urban agglomerations is important for achieving coordinated, high-quality regional development. In light of this, this study established an input–output index system that considers technological innovation and environmental quality. Then, we used a super-efficiency epsilon-based measure model that included undesirable output to evaluate the green development efficiency of seven urban agglomerations in China: Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei, the Yangtze River Delta, the Pearl River Delta, Chengdu–Chongqing, the Yangtze River Midstream, the Guanzhong Plain, and the Central Plain. The spatiotemporal variability of the green development efficiency of each urban agglomeration was analyzed using kernel density estimation, the coefficient of variation, and the Theil index. Finally, a spatial econometric model was established to explore the factors affecting the green development efficiency of different agglomerations. The findings improve our understanding of the spatiotemporal patterns of green development in urban agglomerations, which can support the formulation of suitable strategies for collaborative regional green development.

Spatiotemporal of the Coupling Relationship between Ecosystem Services and Human Well-Being in Guanzhong Plain Urban Agglomeration.

Understanding the complex relationship between ecosystem services and human well-being during the rapid development of urban agglomerations can promote the sustainable development of urban agglomerations. In this paper, the InVEST model and ArcGIS10.2 were used to analyze the spatial and temporal evolution characteristics of ecosystem services and human well-being in the Guanzhong Plain urban agglomeration. On this basis, the coupling coordination index is used to reveal the spatiotemporal coupling relationship between them. (1) From 2010 to 2018, the water conservation services, soil conservation services, and carbon sequestration services of the Guanzhong Plain urban agglomeration showed a fluctuating downward trend. The spatial differences of ecosystem services were significant. (2) From 2010 to 2018, human well-being in the Guanzhong Plain urban agglomeration showed a fluctuating downward trend, with a decrease of 17%, and regional differences tended to narrow. (3) The coupling coordination degree between ecosystem services and human well-being has slightly decreased while maintaining the basic coordination state. The results show that there was a significant relationship between the decline of ecosystem services and the rapid development of the Guanzhong Plain urban agglomeration, and policies should be classified according to the coupling coordination types of human well-being and ecosystem services to promote the sustainable development of urban agglomerations.

Spatio-temporal Coupling Analysis of Population Urbanization and Economic Development in Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration

Population urbanization and economic development are highly correlated, and the degree of coordination between the two has gradually become one of the important issues for the healthy development of the region. With the advancement of high-quality integration in the Yangtze River Delta, it is particularly important to clarify the coupling and coordination process and spatial differentiation between population urbanization and economic development for the future integration and sustainable development of the Yangtze River Delta region. Given this, we establish a comprehensive evaluation index system of population urbanization and economic development based on the period of 2009–2020. Taking the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration as the research object, the entropy method and the coupling coordination model are used to carry out Spatio-temporal coupling analysis. The results show that (1) the level of population urbanization and economic development of the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration is continuously rising, while economic development lags behind population urbanization development, and the economic development level needs to be further improved. The degree of coupling coordination of population urbanization and economic development has continued to increase, and the synergistic development effect of the two has been improved, (2) the comprehensive level of population urbanization and economic development of each city in the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration shows an obvious inter-regional unbalanced development trend, and (3) there is an obvious polarization in the coupling coordination level between population urbanization and economic development in the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration.

China’s Urban Agglomeration Development Model and Its Impact Analysis: Expansion of Spatial and Cultural Components

본 논문에서는 중국 도시화 발전전략이 도시군(城市群)의 형태를 기반으로 발전하고 있는 현 시점에서 도시군 중심의 발전모형을 고안하고 그 효과를 분석하고자 하였다. 중국의 도시군 발전계획에서 공통적으로 제시하고 있는 핵심목표는 교통인프라 건설 및 연결, 산업 업그레이드 및 분업화, 상주인구 최적화 배치, 공공서비스 균등화 그리고 생태환경 개선이다. 본고는 인구의 집적과 산업화라는 경제요소를 단순화했던 기존의 도시화 발전 모형에 공간적 요소를 추가·확장하고, 도시군 발전에 대한 중국 정부의 영향력 확인을 위한 ‘문화 경직성’ 변수를 추가하여 보다 포괄적인 중국 도시군 발전 분석모형을 제안하였다. 30개 성(省)과 5대 도시군에 포함되는 13개 성(省)의 패널데이터 분석 결과, 문화적 요소인 ‘문화 경직성’은 전국 수준과 5대 도시군 분석에서 모두 통계적으로 유의미한 양(+)의 효과를 나타냈다. 공간요소의 경우, 전국 단위에서는 대중교통 관련 인프라 변수가 모두 유의한 양(+)의 효과를 나타냈고, 국가급 도시군 수준에서는 지하철이 유의한 결과가 나왔다. 경제요소의 경우, 정부지출과 고정자산투자가 전국 수준과 5대 도시군 수준에서 상이한 결과를 나타냈으며, 인구요소도 5대 도시군의 도시 취업비중이 전국 수준과는 상반되는 효과를 나타냈다. 특히, 인구밀도와 기술집약 산업화로 인한 5대 도시군의 특징으로 인해 도시 취업비중이 높을수록 5대 도시군 경제성장에는 부정적 영향이 나타난다고 볼 수 있었다. 본 연구의 확장된 도시군 모형은 현재 국가급으로 추진되고 있는 중국 도시군의 발전을 보다 포괄적 요인으로 점검하며, 정책적 방향을 검토하는 것에 기여한다.

Research on the Heterogeneity of Digital Economy Driving Regional Integration Development

Based on the panel data of 63 cities in China's Yangtze River Delta, Beijing Tianjin Hebei and Pearl River Delta urban agglomerations from 2011 to 2019, this paper measures the level of digital economy development and regional integration based on relevant theories and practical basis, and tests the impact of digital economy development on regional integration development and its heterogeneity in the three urban agglomerations, Finally, the following conclusions are drawn: ① The development level of digital economy has a significant positive impact on the development level of regional integration of urban agglomeration, that is, promoting the development of digital economy of urban agglomeration is conducive to the integrated development of urban agglomeration. ② There are significant differences in the impact of the digital economy development level of the three urban agglomerations on the regional integration development level of urban agglomerations, showing the phenomenon of Yangtze River Delta > Beijing Tianjin Hebei > Pearl River Delta. Finally, on this basis, the paper puts forward some suggestions on how to use digital economy to drive the development of regional integration.

Can national urban agglomeration construction reduce PM2.5 pollution? Evidence from a quasi-natural experiment in China

Urban agglomerations, as a new model of urbanization and a means of regional integration, provide modern ideas for achieving haze pollution control. Treating the implementation of Urban Agglomeration Development Plan as a quasi-natural experiment, the multi period DID method is applied to examine the impact of the national urban agglomeration construction (NUAC) on PM2.5 pollution reduction. Furthermore, the heterogeneity analysis, transmission mechanism and spatial spillover effects are explored in depth. Our analysis yields the following conclusions. First, NUAC has a positive effect on PM2.5 pollution control. More Specifically, the annual average PM2.5 concentration will decrease by 7.9% in urban agglomeration cities. And a series of robustness tests confirms the credibility of this conclusion. Second, regarding the heterogeneity of urban characteristics, the pollution mitigation effect of NUAC is more pronounced in central and western cities, small-scale cities, non-resource-based cities and cities with stricter environmental regulation. Third, analysis of transmission mechanism suggests that NUAC suppresses haze pollution mainly by accelerating industrial agglomeration, promoting technological innovation and reducing resource misallocation. Finally, taking the spatial correlation of air pollutants into account, the environmental improvement effect of NUAC still exists. Furthermore, results of spatial spillover effects show that the pilot policy is detrimental to PM2.5 pollution reduction in other urban agglomeration cities, which means that there is no linkage effect in regional pollution control and environmental management. These results provide reference to not only the Chinese government for effective strategies to cope with PM2.5 pollution but also the studies on regional environmental governance in the international context.

Evaluation and driving factors of land use economic efficiency in China's urban agglomerations under the impact of COVID-19 epidemic.

Land is an indispensable factor of production and the basic support for all social and economic activities. The COVID-19 epidemic has a great impact on China's macro-economy and land market. As a unit with a high concentration of economic entities, urban agglomeration is closely related to its land use economic efficiency. Under the impact of epidemic and the rigid constraints of the relative scarcity of land resources, improving the land use economic efficiency is crucial to the sustainable development of urban agglomerations. Taking the 10 major urban agglomerations in China as a case study, this paper constructs a theoretical and empirical analysis framework for the land use economic efficiency and its driving mechanism of urban agglomerations, and measures the land use economic efficiency of urban agglomerations from the aspects of single factor productivity and total factor productivity. The results show that the COVID-19 epidemic has a great impact on the land market of various cities in China's urban agglomerations. Whether single factor productivity or total factor productivity is used to measure land use economic efficiency of urban agglomerations, the driving effects of industrial agglomeration, industrial structure change, technological progress, and transportation infrastructure are all significant. It is necessary to take a series of measures to reform the market-oriented allocation of land elements, and improve a long-term mechanism for the smooth operation of the land market. It is necessary to improve the land use economic efficiency through a combination of industrial agglomeration, industrial structure adjustment, technological progress, and transportation infrastructure.

Externalities of Urban Agglomerations: An Empirical Study of the Chinese Case

Urban agglomerations are playing an increasingly important role in regional economic development, and economic externalities are the key factors in the formation and development of urban agglomerations. According to different mechanisms, agglomeration externalities can be divided into pecuniary externality and technological externality, but the literature has not paid enough attention to the differences between them. Based on the case of China’s five representative urban agglomerations, this paper analyzes and compares the origins, mechanisms, and factors of the two types of agglomeration externality. The results indicated that the pecuniary externality of urban agglomerations originates from the intercity flow and allocation of production factors, and its mechanisms include the specialized production brought by industrial division and the cost reduction caused by scale economy. While the technological externality originates from technological spillovers between cities, its mechanisms include knowledge sharing and technology cooperation. Among China’s five representative urban agglomerations, the key factor affecting their pecuniary externality is market size, and the key factor affecting their technological externality is economic density. In other words, the pursuit of a larger market and higher economic density are the two main driving forces for the formation of urban agglomerations in China. By distinguishing core cities from peripheral cities in China’s five representative urban agglomerations, we also find that there is no significant difference in their pecuniary externality. However, their technological externality presents complex differences. There is still much room to improve the externalities of agglomeration in China’s urban agglomerations. For example, the flow of capital does not show a shift to more productive cities. R&D activities are still mainly concentrated within a city, not intercity, in urban agglomerations.

Spatiotemporal association of carbon dioxide emissions in China's urban agglomerations

The reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and sustainable development in low-carbon ways are of great significance to urban agglomerations. However, few studies are exploring the relationship between CO2 emissions and socioeconomic development at city levels from the perspective of clusters of regions. Based on the open data of inventory for anthropogenic CO2 emissions, nighttime light data, and population dataset as a proxy for the socioeconomic development levels of urban agglomerations, we used Mann–Kendall trend test, Tapio decoupling analysis, and spatial autocorrelation analysis to explore the spatiotemporal association of CO2 emissions and the impact of socioeconomic development on emissions in the nineteen urban agglomerations in China. Findings showed that the growth of CO2 emissions in China was primarily concentrated in urban agglomerations. The CO2 emissions in eastern coastal and northern urban agglomerations were much higher than those in other areas, while the emissions in western urban agglomerations were the lowest. The periodic characteristics of CO2 emissions were consistent with China's five-year development plan. Urban agglomerations in the early stage from 2000 to 2002 or with developed and stable industrial structures tended to achieve decoupling. High-high (HH) clusters of socioeconomic development with CO2 emissions were mainly distributed in urban agglomerations of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region (BTH), the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA), Yangtze River Delta (YRD), Huhhot-Baotou-Ordos-Yulin (HBOY), Shandong Peninsula (SP), and Central Shanxi (CS). Most of the clusters except those in HBOY shrunk from 2000 to 2010 and remained relatively stable from 2010 to 2019. These urban agglomerations should promote synergistic emission reduction. High-low (HL) clusters mostly appeared in central cities with a high socioeconomic level and surrounding cities with low CO2 emissions s, i.e., in urban agglomerations of Chengdu-Chongqing region (CC), the Beibu Gulf (BG), and Lanzhou-Xining (LX). These urban agglomerations with prominent polarization phenomena should adhere to regional overall coordination and thus minimize total regional costs of CO2 emission reduction. The results could provide references for the synergistic reduction of CO2 emissions and the coordinated development in urban agglomerations.

Spatial planning-constrained modeling of urban growth in the Yangtze River Delta considering the element flows

ABSTRACT Urban growth models that consider spatial control and factor flows are important for the integrated management of urban agglomerations, and to date, no simulation method has been available to consider both thoroughly. We proposed a new cellular automaton (CAGBDT) model based on gradient boosting decision trees (GBDT) to simulate urban growth in the Yangtze River Delta (YRD) area of China. In this model, GBDT was used to retrieve land transition rules by integrating multiple weak learners and a feature expansion approach was employed to remove high correlations among urban growth drivers and then expand the factor features. We applied the final urban pattern as the dependent variable and selected nine drivers as the independent variables of urban growth in YRD. The simulation results show that the overall accuracies exceeded 89% and the figure-of-merits (FOMs) exceeded 27%, about 10% higher than other similar simulations in YRD, indicating the strong ability of CAGBDT to simulate urban growth in YRD. Although the inclusion of inter-city material and information element flows in the model improves the accuracy by only 1%, it reveals the different development patterns in Hangzhou Bay in the south of YRD and the Taihu Lake basin in the center of YRD. By considering urban scenarios under different strategies of spatial control, it shows that the simulated FOMs declined by 5% with the stronger enforcement of spatial regulations, reflecting that the actual urban growth in fully non-developable areas and 20% partly developable areas of YRD has already violated the regulations. The results can help urban planners and local authorities to develop solutions for the development of a high-quality YRD urban agglomeration. The proposed model is applicable to diagnose urban land-use change elsewhere, especially in rapidly developing cities that need balancing urban growth and ecological protection.

Horizontal ecological compensation as a tool for sustainable development of urban agglomerations: Exploration of the realization mechanism of Guanzhong Plain urban agglomeration in China

Horizontal ecological compensation can promote the division of labour and collaboration among cities in urban agglomerations (UAs) and coordinate the relationship between socioeconomic development and ecological protection through payments from ecological beneficiary cities to contributor cities. However, it’s difficult to determine the compensation subjects and standard. This study uses ecological footprint (EF) and ecosystem service value (ESV) to calculate the horizontal ecological compensation standard. The ecological compensation weight is introduced to calculate the horizontal ecological compensation payment or acceptance values (HECVs) to determine the compensation subjects and objects. And we take China’s Guanzhong Plain urban agglomeration (GPUA) as an example for empirical analysis. The results show that the EF of the GPUA has the characteristics of nonequilibrium. Except for the only ecologically functional city, all other cities had ecological deficits (EDs), and the spatial distribution of the ESV in each city was significantly different, which shows that the GPUA has the conditions to establish a horizontal ecological compensation mechanism. Further research results show that higher GDP and lower ESV mean higher HECVs, key ecological function cities have the largest HECVs, and key economic development cities pay the most HECVs. This horizontal ecological compensation method regulates the relationship among stakeholders through the migration of ESV, and solves the actual problems of “who compensates whom” and “how much to compensate”. It provides strong technical support for the formulation of horizontal ecological compensation schemes for UAs in developing countries and is conducive to maintaining environmental justice and promoting the sustainable development of UAs.

Economic Synergistic Development of Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area Urban Agglomeration: Based on Composite System.

Synergistic development is the only way which must be passed and a key point to achieve high-quality economic development. This paper regards regional synergetic development as a composite system, builds up the evaluation indicator system, and calculates the level of economic synergetic development of Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area Urban Agglomeration, by using the collaborative degree model of composite system. The results show that each subsystem of the composite system has a high degree of order from 2007 to 2019, but compared with Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei urban agglomeration and Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration, the level of economic collaborative development of Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area urban agglomeration in 2008–2019 is relatively low and has large spatial differences. The main reason is that under the background of “one country, two systems” policy, the institutional differences between Guangdong, Hong Kong, and Macao have not been effectively linked up and synergetic, Greater Bay Area urban agglomeration has not yet formed an organic whole, and the synergy effect of mutual support and promotion is relatively weak. Based on this, we should seize the great historical opportunity of the construction of Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, accelerate the construction of the mechanism for the synergetic economic development of the three areas, accelerate the establishment of an integrated market, build a reasonable division of labor system and collaborative innovation system, and jointly promote the synergetic economic development of Greater Bay Area.

A policy support framework for the balanced development of economy-society-water in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei urban agglomeration

Balancing socioeconomic development with water resources among cities is critical for the sustainable development of urban agglomerations. Despite this urgent need to analyse balanced development, a recognized method to measure and improve the balanced degree in urban agglomerations impacted by water resource constraints is still lacking. This study proposes a framework to evaluate the balanced development degree and simulate the impacts of interactions and management policies of economy-society-water on balanced development in urban agglomerations. This paper establishes a balanced development degree index using the coupling coordinated degree (CCD) model; constructs a system dynamic (SD) model to simulate economy-society-water interactions; and designs future scenarios to evaluate the impacts of industry, population, water, and comprehensive regulation policies on balanced development. The integrated framework that couples the above three methods was validated in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (BTH) region in China. The results showed that (a) industrial and population regulations slightly increase the level of balanced development by 0.0025 and 0.0024 in the BTH region but will increase water scarcity in Hebei; (b) improving water use efficiency is an effective way to relieve water stress; and (c) the balanced degree increases by 15% under comprehensive regulatory policies. Integrated water-economy-society management makes it possible to achieve co-development without increasing the water crisis in the BTH region. This study provides support for policy-makers and promotes sustainable development of the water-economy-society in urban agglomerations.

The Impact of the Quality of Digital Economy Development on Manufacturing in the Yangtze River Delta City Cluster

Yangtze River is the most dynamic, open and innovative region in China, as well as an important region for modernization and comprehensive opening. In this paper, under the strategic background of the integration of the Yangtze River Delta region, this paper systematically studies the transformation and upgrading of digitalization and manufacturing from the perspective of urban agglomeration, establishes a measurement model of the digital economy, constructs a comprehensive evaluation system for the quality of digital economy, and intuitively displays and studies the impact mechanism and realization path of digital economy and manufacturing transformation and upgrading. The objective of the study is to examine whether the development of the digital economy is a driver of regional development. The results of the study revealed that the quality of digital economy development in the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration has a positive impact on the transformation and upgrading of the local manufacturing industry.

Study on the Evolution of Multiple Network Resilience of Urban Agglomerations in the Yellow River Basin

To promote the healthy development of urban agglomerations in the Yellow River Basin, we construct a multi-city network-resilience evolution model based on social network theory, combined with QAP regression analysis and analyze the evolution of multiple-city network resilience in the Yellow River Basin in 2014 and 2021 by screening and drawing on indicators in social networks. The results show that (i) only the financial linkage network and the information exchange network are resilient networks, and the magnitude of the evolution of resilience level in the Yellow River basin is finance > information > innovation > transportation. (ii) Except for the increase in the hierarchy of transportation networks, other networks show the trend of flattening. (iii) The matching of the information exchange network shows a shift between heterogeneity and homogeneity, and the transmission and aggregation of the network fluctuate. Based on the study’s findings, a path to improve the resilience level of the Yellow River Basin urban agglomeration by consolidating the status of core cities, optimizing the structure of multiple city networks, and optimizing the flow of factors is proposed.