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The unprecedented urbanization in China has dramatically changed the urban spatial structure of cities. With the proliferation of individual-level geospatial big data, previous studies have widely used the network abstraction model to reveal the underlying urban spatial structure. However, the construction of network abstraction models primarily focuses on the topology of the road network without considering individual travel flows along with the road networks. Individual travel flows reflect the urban dynamics, which can further help understand the underlying spatial structure. This study therefore aims to reveal the intra-urban hierarchical spatial structure by integrating the road network abstraction model and individual travel flows. To achieve this goal, we 1) quantify the spatial interaction relatedness of road segments based on the Word2Vec model using large volumes of taxi trip data, then 2) characterize the road abstraction network model according to the identified spatial interaction relatedness, and 3) implement a community detection algorithm to reveal sub-regions of a city. Our results reveal three levels of hierarchical spatial structures in the Wuhan metropolitan area. This study provides a data-driven approach to the investigation of urban spatial structure via identifying traffic interaction patterns on the road network, offering insights to urban planning practice and transportation management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban population size dynamic adjustment has been widely studied for a long time; however, the dynamic adjustment at the urban hierarchy level remains unknown. This study utilises China's urban population data to investigate the dynamic adjustment. Specifically, we utilise methods of the Gini coefficient, linear regression, and coefficients of Spearman, and Moran's I to explore the dynamic adjustment tendency, adjustment rate and correlation of urban population size distribution of different urban hierarchies and groups of different urban hierarchies. We find that the urban population size spatial distribution is gradually even within the same urban hierarchy. The adjustment rate to be even of Megacity II is the highest, and Megacity I is the bottom. We also find the population size spatial distribution of the whole urban system is gradually uneven. We explore the dynamic process by sorting urban hierarchies into six groups. Furthermore, we find there is a complex correlation between different urban hierarchies and global spatial correlation among China cities. These results are valuable as references for Chinese policy-makers and practitioners and will enable them to adopt sustainable land use and urban population management measures. The study outcomes will also benefit future studies on spatial population size distribution in international communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the pursuit for global competitiveness and economic growth, Chinese cities have recorded massive urban land expansion. This article examines the effects of development policies and economic restructuring on urban land expansion in China through a case study of Nanjing, representing the rapidly growing and globalizing coastal cities in China. Wei investigate the development process and changing contents of government policies, and analyze development zones and key projects as privileged, trait making, and even path-breaking elements of the development process. We highlight the transition and paradox of the Chinese state in the urban development process, and the broad contexts underlying urban land expansion in Chinese cities. We see urban expansion in China as a process largely responding to top-down policy change and economic transition initiated by the central government. We hold that the role of the state has to be analyzed to understand urban transformation and land expansion, moving beyond local factors of accessibility and feasibility. Development-zone and project fevers, and lagging administrative reforms, however, have made Chinese cities heavy with debt and led to wasteful development, corruption, and social unrest in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban clusters were the dominant form of cities along the Middle Niger (West Africa) from the inception of urbanism in the first centuries B. C. Many discrete habitation mounds, in close proximity, were occupied simultaneously and together functioned as home to a heterogeneous population that provided diverse services to a wider hinterland. Remarkably similar settlement processes characterized late Neolithic and early Bronze Age China. An examination of why the urban character of these cities was for so long nearly invisible to archaeologists serves to reveal the value-laden nature of our theories about urbanization. A brief review of traditional social thought about the role of early cities illustrates the ways in which the character of urban clusters deviate from scholars' traditional expectations of the physical plan of cities. Such expectations of the underlying social dynamics of early cities presumed the imposition of a coercive state apparatus forcing a heterogeneous population to crowd together, facilitating central control. This article illustrates other mechanisms by which the potential for conflict between corporate groups could have been reduced. The ambiguity of membership had to be resolved and prevented from growing intolerable as former villages became increasingly pluralistic. The elements of urban clusters served as symbols communicating a sense of corporate belonging and, by resolving ambiguities, contributed to the success of early urbanism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]