Urban Fringe Areas Research Articles

Stormwater contaminant loading following southern California wildfires

Contaminant loading associated with stormwater runoff from recently burned areas is poorly understood, despite the fact that it has the potential to affect downstream water quality. The goal of the present study is to assess regional patterns of runoff and contaminant loading from wildfires in urban fringe areas of southern California. Postfire stormwater runoff was sampled from five wildfires that each burned between 115 and 658 km(2) of natural open space between 2003 and 2009. Between two and five storm events were sampled per site over the first one to two years following the fires for basic constituents, metals, nutrients, total suspended solids, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). Results were compared to data from 16 unburned natural areas and six developed sites. Mean copper, lead, and zinc flux (kg/km(2)) were between 112- and 736-fold higher from burned catchments and total phosphorus was up to 921-fold higher compared to unburned natural areas. Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon flux was four times greater from burned areas than from adjacent urban areas. Ash fallout on nearby unburned watersheds also resulted in a threefold increase in metals and PAHs. Attenuation of elevated concentration and flux values appears to be driven mainly by rainfall magnitude. Contaminant loading from burned landscapes has the potential to be a substantial contribution to the total annual load to downstream areas in the first several years following fires.

Wise Expansion Strategy of Urban Fringe Area in Chengdu

In the high-speed urbanization of China, urban fringe is at the forward position of urban expansion whose ecological security pattern, special form, land uses, industrial structure and traffic model would determine the future of the city. Based on PLUREL program, this article analyzed the negative and positive influences of urban fringe to urban expansion, pondered the reasons behind those negative influences and put forward advice to Wise Urban Expansion in Chengdu such as crack-shape land layout, mixed land use, tie-in implementation for ecological Greenland, conversion from traditional agriculture to ecological agriculture and so on.

LAND PRICES AND LANDSCAPE PRESERVATION RESTRICTION IN A METROPOLITAN AREA: THE CASE OF KYOTO CITY

This paper provides an empirical analysis of the effect on land prices of the “New Landscape Preservation Policy” enacted in Kyoto City in 2007. The main feature of this policy is building height restrictions in the central part of the city. We use a hedonic approach and find there has been a rise in land prices around the central part of the city, similar to the simulation results of previous studies using computational general equilibrium models. There has also been a rise in land prices in the central part of the city, which differs from the findings of previous studies. Additionally, a negative macroshock on the entire city and a fall in land prices in the urban fringe area are observable.

Neighborhood Change in Semiurbanized Villages: Case Study of Shanghai

AbstractIn common with some underprivileged racial groups in U.S. cities, migrant workers tend to be regarded as an undesirable group in Chinese urban societies. The ongoing influx of migrant workers into urban neighborhoods will accordingly result in neighborhood change in China. As a peculiar neighborhood pattern, semiurbanized villages have started to emerge in fringe areas of China’s rapidly expanding cities as the country is going through a transitional phase. Taking such urban neighborhood pattern in Shanghai as an example, this study examines neighborhood change within urban fringe areas as they experience inflow of migrant workers. It is argued that the invasion-succession model is not applicable to neighborhood change research in the Chinese semiurbanized village context. The transitional process taking place among these neighborhoods is different from that predicted by the classical model. The differences are largely attributable to the peculiar urban-rural dualistic structure in China that is a...

Local Wisdom of Settlement Growth in theUrban Fringe Areas

The population growth in the urban fringe area of developed countries is dominated by the urban sprawl and followed by “white flight phenomena”. In Indonesia, although the physically growth of settlements is similar, but the socially one is different. The modern housing estates have been built in the next to the rural settlements. In addition, the autonomous settlements have been emerged surrounding housing estates; the spread settlements will integrate in the following years. This research has been done with the qualitative methods and successfully revealing the existence of local wisdomof settlement growth in Semarang fringe area. Keywords: fringe area, urban sprawl, white flight, local wisdom

An integrated spatio-temporal classification method for urban fringe change detection analysis

The urban fringe is the transition zone between urban land use and rural land use. It represents the most active part of the urban expansion process. Change detection using multi-temporal imagery is proven to be an efficient way to monitor land-use/land-cover change caused by urban expansion. In this study, we propose a new multi-temporal classification method for change detection in the urban fringe area. The proposed method extracts and integrates spatio-temporal contextual information into multi-temporal image classification. The spatial information is extracted by object-oriented image segmentation. The temporal information is modelled with temporal trajectory analysis with a two-step calibration. A probabilistic schema that employs a global membership function is then used to integrate the spectral, spatial and temporal information. A trajectory accuracy measurement is proposed to assist the comparison on the performances of the integrated spatio-temporal method and classical pixel- and ‘snapshot’-based classification methods. The experiment shows that the proposed method can significantly improve the accuracies of both single scene classification and temporal trajectory analysis.

SOCIOECONOMIC STATUS AND ACUTE MYOCARDIAL INFARCT ADMISSIONS TO HOSPITAL IN MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA

Background and Aims: Explanatory studies of the relationship between area deprivation and health have highlighted urbanisation and inequality as an emerging theme. Socioeconomic influences on health have been reported at both the individual and area levels of analysis. Acute myocardial infarction (AMI) morbidity in Melbourne and socioeconomic status was mapped to demonstrate spatial associations within the data. Methods: Age standardised rate ratios are calculated by determining the age specific rates for each age group, the expected and observed AMI were calculated. The observed AMI divided by the expected AMI provided a ratio of observed to expected AMI admissions controlling for differences in age structure. The standard Melbourne population was the baseline population. The measure of socioeconomic status used to examine health inequalities was the 2001 area-based Socio-Economic Index for Areas (SEIFA). AMI admissions to hospital were classified into SEIFA quintiles according to SEIFA value for place of residence. Each quintile contained approximately 668,000 adult persons. Quintile 1 includes the most disadvantaged areas and quintile 5 the least disadvantaged areas. Results: The absolute and relative differences in AMI admissions to hospital for SEIFA quintiles 1-5 indicate that rates of AMI admissions are higher in the most disadvantaged areas in the western suburbs, the urban fringe and industrial areas. The rate ratio suggests there were twice as many AMI admissions in quintile 1 (most disadvantage) than in quintile 5 (least disadvantage). Conclusions: The analysis indicates that socioeconomic inequality contributes to AMI admissions to hospital in Melbourne. Regional differences in AMI admissions were quantified and described. Spatial analysis was used to identify spatial clusters of AMI admissions in Melbourne metropolitan region. Quintile maps highlighted the differences in AMI admissions rates per quintile. AMI risk was presented in a spatial framework capable of informing policy and addressing disease prevention.

Leaving the City: Artist Villages in Beijing

Leaving the City: Artist Villages in Beijing

Characteristics and risk factors of traffic injuries of adolescents (0-19 years old) in the urban and rural areas of Chongqing

Objective To study the characteristics and risk factors of traffic injuries among the adolescents (0-19 years old) in the urban and rural areas of Chongqing and discuss the preventive strategy. Methods Data of road traffic crashes and injuries involving 0-19 years old adolescents over a seven-year period (2000-2006) in three districts of Chongqing was picked up from Road _Traffic Crashes and Injuries Database. Epidemiological characteristics of the traffic crashes and injuries among 0-19 years old adolescents were analyzed and differences between rural and urban areas were studied. Results From 2000 to 2006, both incidence rate and mortality rate peaked in the urban fringe area were 95.43/100 000 and 3.44/100 000 respectively. Traffic accidents in the suburbs and counties had the highest injury extent, with mortality rate of 9.06％ and severe injury rate of 17.33％. Brain injuries were the primary cause of death. Among the victims, 62.7％ were the pedestrians, of which 20.72％ bore equal responsibility because of disobeying traffic signals, suddenly walking across roads and not walking along the sidewalk. Ninety percentage of the traffic accidents occurred in the sections with no traffic signals or traffic control system. Conclusion It is important to enhance the traffic safety consciousness of teenagers and children, strengthen preventive measures in fringe areas and rural areas and improve the emergency medical system in rural areas to provide the teenagers and children with a safety traffic environment. Key words: Accidents, traffic; Adolescent; Epidemiology

The spatial context of transport disadvantage, social exclusion and well-being

This paper explores the spatial differences in measures of transport disadvantage, social exclusion and well-being in a survey of inner metropolitan, outer suburban, urban fringe and regional areas of Victoria, Australia. Its aim is to understand how geographic context may influence transport disadvantage which may in turn influence social exclusion and well-being. There were very clear differences in mobility and car reliance between geographic locations. Car reliance peaked in fringe Melbourne with regional areas showing slightly less car reliance. Mobility and kilometres travelled also increased with distance from central Melbourne, which in turn resulted in greater sensitivity to fuel price increases. Again these factors were greatest in fringe Melbourne. Links between transport disadvantage and social exclusion were small and inconsistent in this paper although they have been demonstrated in other research. Links between transport disadvantage and well-being were strongest in the regional sample. The implications of these findings and their connection to the transport literature are discussed.

Detecting land-use/land-cover change in rural–urban fringe areas using extended change-vector analysis

Detecting land-use/land-cover (LULC) changes in rural–urban fringe areas (RUFAs) timely and accurately using satellite imagery is essential for land-use planning and management in China. Although traditional spectral-based change-vector analysis (CVA) can effectively detect LULC change in many cases, it encounters difficulties in RUFAs because of deficiencies in the spectral information of satellite images. To detect LULC changes in RUFAs effectively, this paper proposes an extended CVA approach that incorporates textural change information into the traditional spectral-based CVA. The extended CVA was applied to three different pilot RUFAs in China with different remotely sensed data, including Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM), China–Brazil Earth Resources Satellite (CBERS) and Advanced Land Observing Satellite (ALOS) images. The results demonstrated the improvement of the extended CVA compared to the traditional spectral-based CVA with the overall accuracy increased between 4.66% and 8.00% and the kappa coefficient increased between 0.10 and 0.15, respectively. The advantage of the extended CVA lies in its integration of both spectral and textural change information to detect LULC changes, allowing for effective discrimination of LULC changes that are spectrally similar but texturally different in RUFAs. The extended CVA has great potential to be widely used for LULC-change detection in RUFAs, which are often heterogeneous and fragmental in nature, with rich textural information.

Quantitative Analysis of Urban Expansion Using RS and GIS, A Case Study in Lanzhou

Urbanization has changed the pattern of urban landscapes and the natural landscape. Evaluations of the spatial and temporal changes of the urban landscape pattern could support the urban expansion analysis commendably. This study has two objectives: (1) to present methods to characterize the spatial behavioral features and the corridor effect of urban expansion by using geographical information system (GIS) and remote sensing (RS) images and (2) to apply the methods to Lanzhou as an example. In this study, ERDAS IMAGINE was used to process and prepare RS images and digital land-use maps. In addition, information on urban expansion was extracted by using the man-machine interactive interpretation method under the ArcTools model of ArcInfo. The landscape indexes were calculated by FRAGSTATS, which is a spatial pattern analysis program utilized to evaluate categorical maps. All other indexes were calculated and displayed by using the grid model, spatial analysis model, and network analysis module of ArcInfo. The landscape transition matrix, landscape index of the urban construction area, urbanization gradient, and corridor effect of urban expansion in Lanzhou were then studied. Landscape transition matrix analysis revealed that the urban construction area in Lanzhou expanded rapidly and considerably between 1986 and 2006. Analysis of the urbanization gradient revealed that there was isolated urbanization in the suburban area, amalgamated urbanization in the rural urban fringe area, and peripheral urbanization in the main built area. On the basis of the module that provides a comprehensive effect between the artificial corridors and natural corridors during the urban expansion process, Lanzhou will develop into a network city with a multicore structure, network shape, and compounded function. Overall, the results of this study demonstrated that RS integrated with GIS technique is an effective approach to the analysis of urban expansion.

Ecological Landscape Planning and Design of an Urban Landscape Fringe Area: A Case Study of Yang’ an District of Jiande City

The fringe area of urban hills and rivers is an important aspect of urban landscape construction. Adhering to landscape environmental protection and the principle of the fringe effect in ecology, the ecological landscape planning of Yang’an District Jiande City explores some new ideas by building an ecological landscape layout, creating an ecological landscape structure, and shaping ecological landscape techniques.

A cross-sectional study of ownership of backyard poultry in two areas of Palmerston North, New Zealand

AIMS: To determine the proportion of residential land parcels with backyard poultry in an urban and urban-rural fringe area of provincial New Zealand. To document key husbandry and biosecurity practices of owners of backyard poultry, and to identify factors that might assist animal health authorities in locating backyard poultry flocks in the event of an infectious disease emergency. METHODS: A cross-sectional survey was undertaken, in which residents of 449 land parcels in an urban and urban-rural fringe area within and adjacent to the city of Palmerston North, respectively, were visited between February and November 2006. Residents were asked if backyard poultry were kept on the premises. Details recorded for those that kept poultry included the type and number of birds kept, and details of management and biosecurity practices. The geographical distribution of poultry-positive land parcels was assessed for evidence of spatial clustering. RESULTS: Backyard poultry were kept on 3.5 (95% CI=2.15.0)% of land parcels; 1.6 (95% CI=0.7-3.4)% in the urban area and 18.9 (95% CI= 11.6–29.3)% in the urban-rural fringe area. There were no significant clusters of poultry-positive land parcels in either area. On all poultry-positive parcels birds were allowed, for at least a portion of the day, to range freely over the property. Three poultry-positive land parcels were within a distance of 1 km of a commercial poultry enterprise in the urban-rural fringe area. Most owners of backyard poultry used feed prepared commercially. CONCLUSIONS: The prevalence of ownership of backyard poultry in this area of New Zealand was low, and varied according to classification of the land, viz urban, or urban-rural fringe. The close proximity of backyard flocks to the single commercial enterprise in the urban-rural fringe area reiterates the importance of strict biosecurity measures on commercial farms. In the event of an infectious disease emergency, it is proposed that a sampling frame of owners of backyard poultry might be rapidly obtained by contacting suppliers of commercial feed.

URBAN SPRAWL OF THE CITY OF YOGYAKARTA,SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE STAGEOF SPATIAL TRANSFORMATION (Case Study at Maguwoharjo Village, Sleman District)

The study was conducted in Maguwoharjo Village, Depok Sub-District, Sleman District, which is part of urban fringe area experiencing regional transformation. This study aims at understanding the regional transformation stages in the location studied. The survey method using in-depth interviews with some informants was implemented. The data analysis was done descriptive qualitatively. From this study, it is found out that spatial distribution of regional transformation stages is closely associated with street connection and growth areas. Some areas directly bordering on Yogyakarta-Surakarta roads have higher regional transformation intensity than villages distant from the streets and growth areas.

From Green Belts to Green Infrastructure? The Evolution of a New Concept in the Emerging Soft Governance of Spatial Strategies

The green belt idea is being questioned as an effective way of managing the protection and development of urban fringe areas, and a new concept—green infrastructure (GI)—is being proposed as a better way to plan and manage these spaces. GI is claimed to allow for more sophisticated and dynamic understandings of such spaces and to enable the identification and quantification of formerly under-appreciated assets of the urban fringe, including newly identified economic benefits. The rapid evolution in England of regional and sub-regional ‘soft governance’ bodies that prioritize economic development provides fertile territory for the claims for GI to be promoted. We track the progress of the new discourse around GI in two northern regions in relation to emerging strategies for spatial and economic development planning. We conclude that the policy purchase of the greenbelt is being challenged by the ‘upstart’ GI policy and we explore some implications of the evolving policy transition.

Detection of urban sprawl using a genetic algorithm-evolved artificial neural network classification in remote sensing: a case study in Jiading and Putuo districts of Shanghai, China

Urban sprawl results in the most complex process of land use and land cover change, which in turn has a compound impact on the structure and function of ecosystems in urban areas. The detection of urban sprawl based on remote sensing was studied in two districts of Shanghai, China. The study area includes Jiading district which is one of the fastest developing urban fringe areas, and Putuo district which is one of the downtown areas in Shanghai. The structure of the artificial backpropagation neural network (BPN) classifier was evolved by genetic algorithm (GA), including the connection values between neurons, hidden layer numbers and their neurons, and neuron correction values in all layers. A comparison of the proposed method was made with conventional classification methods such as the minimum distance (MD) classifier, maximum likelihood (ML) classifier and improved backpropagation neural network classifier. The result shows that the proposed approach has higher accuracy and reliability for the classification of remotely sensed data. Therefore, three epochs of Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) imageries of the study area were selected in 1990, 2000 and 2006, and the changes of urban lands for different time intervals were detected. A comparison of the two districts and their towns was also made, which characterizes urban sprawl in the typical urban fringe and downtown areas of Shanghai.

Ocorrência de Leishmania spp. em felinos do município de AraÇatuba, SP

Brazilian Spotted Fever (BSF) is an often fatal zoonosis caused by the obligate intracellular bacterium Rickettsia rickettsii. The disease is generally transmitted to humans by Amblyomma spp. ticks. Serological evidence of past infection by R. rickettsii has been reported in horses, but the pathogenicity of R. rickettsii in horses remains unknown. Cart horses are still widely used in urban and urban fringe areas in Brazil, and these animals may constitute suitable sentinels for BSF human in these areas, for example, in Sao Jose dos Pinhais, where the first BSF human case in the state of Parana was diagnosed. Serum samples were randomly obtained from 75 cart horses between April 2005 and June 2006 and were tested by means of the indirect immunofluorescence assay (IFA) for antibodies against rickettsia of the spotted fever group. A total of 9.33% of the animals were considered positive, with titers ranging from 64 to 1,024. These results indicate the presence of the agent in such areas, although at low rates.

Land use-cover change processes in Urban fringe areas: Trabzon case study, Turkey

Urban settlements account for only two percent of the Earth’s land surface, however, over half of the world’s population resides in cities (United Nations, 2001). High population density in urban areas has resulted in a large-scale modification of the environment in urban fringe. Urbanization is a complex process of converting urban fringe and rural land to urban land uses and has caused various impacts on ecosystem structure, function and dynamics (Luck and Wu, 2002). On one hand, the high rate of urbanization causes high density in settlement limited areas of cities, on the other hand, it costs increases to society due to the resulting unplanned and uncontrolled urbanization and land use with the skirts, especially in urban fringe of natural habitat/ landscape pieces and the corrupted use of urban areas without taking into account natural law or the ecological balance (Aydemir et al., 1993). Suburban, urban fringe and rural development are a leading cause of biodiversity loss and natural resource degradation in Trabzon province. The detection and analysis of land use changes in the urban environment is an important issue in planning. Remote sensing and geographic information systems (GIS) are considered as appropriate and efficient techniques for this type of studies. These techniques were used to investigate the effects of urbanization on ecosystem structure (landscape) and to quantify urban growth of Trabzon urban area. Changes of landscape pattern from 1987 to 2008 were analyzed by FRAGSTATS with four metrics, indicating that the diversity and landscape fragmentation are positively related to the degree of urbanization. The study showed that the percentage of urbanization in Trabzon Centrum increased from 4.72 in 1987 to 6.27 in 2008 based on supervised classification of images. Cumulative urbanization accounted for 1.55% of the whole area of Trabzon (254 ha) and 32.8% of the settlement area of the Trabzon from 1987 to 2008. This translates to an annual rate of urbanization of 1.35% between 1987 and 2008.This study demonstrated additional insights into landscape change by integrating the spatial and the temporal perspectives and targeting the forms of residential developments towards urban fringe. Keywords: GIS, land use/land cover change, remote sensing, urban fringe, fragmentation, urbanization.

Effects of soil texture and land use interactions on organic carbon in soils in North China cities' urban fringe

Limited information exists on the linkages between soil texture and land use on C storage efficiency. Organic C concentration in soils at the rural–urban interface was measured in 1982, 2000, and 2006 to determine controlling factors and optimal land use type to enhance soil organic C (SOC) storage in benchmark soil textural classes in the North China Plain's Daxing district. Soil texture was the key to attaining elevated SOC concentrations in different land use types under different management intensities. From 1982 to 2006, the order of increasing SOC concentrations across land use types was fine sand (FS) < sand loam (SL) < light loam (LL) < middle loam (ML), indicating that soil with larger proportions of fine particles has larger storage capacities and rates of SOC accumulation. Since 1982, increased use of inorganic fertilizers, intensive cropping and increased crop yields, and the practice of returning crop residues to the soil have been beneficial to C storage in agricultural soils across the district. Diversification of land uses was extensive since 2000, but only the continuous wheat–maize (WM1982–WM2000–WM2006) system has maintained elevated SOC concentrations across the range of soil texture classes ranging from FS to ML. Differential declines in SOC concentrations were observed in most other land uses that included vegetables, watermelon, fruits, and other cash crops. Conversion of a WM land use type to horticultural land use types was more detrimental to FS soils than to finer-textured SL or LL soils, particularly with the continuous use of low-biomass producing land use types in urban fringe areas in the North China Plain.