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Rapidly expanding rural communities (often termed 'rurban') face complex social challenges around inclusion of newcomers and resulting changes to long-established community identity. Although participatory CSCW provides resources to support rurban social inclusion, complementary approaches may be needed to facilitate potentially uncomfortable creative and political responses to questions of agency, power, inclusion and confrontation. We suggest that socially engaged art (SEA) has the appropriate qualities and track record to complement better known CSCW approaches in these settings. SEA offers a specifically experiential and dialogical approach to community participation in design, where the kinds of interactions made available by SEA can provide a space for a more dissensual participation. As well as introducing SEA and explaining its potential contribution to participatory CSCW, the paper presents a focus group study undertaken in an Irish rurban community, and considers the implications of insights from that study in future SEA-informed CSCW with this community. The focus group analysis highlighted supportive organised community action, queried social encounters in public space, examined misperceptions and poor communication, and problematised the role of powerful organisations in fostering inclusion. SEA-informed design considerations in support of social inclusion in this community include: supporting volunteerism; examining the evolution of community institutions; reimagining interactions in public place; and dispelling misconceptions through building mutual understanding. We propose that the dialogical aesthetic of SEA complements other CSCW approaches by drawing attention to tacit, visceral and emotional experiences; dialogue and conflict in collaborative processes; and increasing participant (including emerging community) agency in enacting alternative possibilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Planning Education & Research is the property of Sage Publications Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This research provides a brief insight into the spatial nature of urban sprawl in functional urban areas (FUAs) of European capitals, as opposed to most investigations into urban growth that focus on case studies. Its purpose is to identify European capitals that grow the most and characterize the spatial aspect of urban sprawl and dynamics of ensuing land‐cover change between 2006, 2012, and 2018. We employed open data from the Urban Atlas, which we processed with spatial analyses and the NUASI (Normalized Urban Atlas Sprawl Indicator) to quantify the scale of urban sprawl in the investigated areas. The results demonstrate the most dynamic growth for Central and Eastern European and Iberian Peninsula capitals, while it seems to be slowing down in other Western European and Balkan countries. Moreover, we found out that FUAs of European capitals differ in terms of the scale and pace of uncontrolled urban sprawl. The results of our comparative analyses are relevant to urban development because they can identify areas exhibiting various scales and paces of urban sprawl to take targeted actions depending on the needs defined by decision‐makers and strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nighttime light (NTL) remote sensing has emerged as a powerful tool in various fields such as urban expansion, socio-economic estimation, light pollution, and energy domains. However, current annual NTL products suffer from several critical limitations, including poor consistency, severe background noise, and limited comparability. These issues have significantly interfered with the research of long-term NTL trends and diminished the accuracy of related findings. Therefore, this study developed a de-difference smoothing algorithm for producing high-quality annual NTL products based on monthly National Polar-orbiting Partnership Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (NPP-VIIRS) NTL data. It enabled the construction of a continuous global high-quality NTL dataset, named the De-Difference Smoothed Nighttime Light (DDSNL), covering the period from 2012 to 2023. Comparative analyses were conducted to validate the accuracy and availability of the DDSNL product against the benchmark EOG NPP-VIIRS and NPP-VIIRS-like NTL datasets. The results showed that DDSNL products had strong correlation with the NTL distribution of EOG NPP-VIIRS, but little correlation with NPP-VIIRS-like. Notably, DDSNL demonstrated better background noise reduction and higher separability between NTL and non-NTL areas compared to EOG NPP-VIIRS NTL. In contrast to the complete exclusion of background in NPP-VIIRS-Like, the retention of background values in DDSNL leads to more reasonable representation in the urban fringes. In the analysis of NTL changes matching impervious surface changes, the DDSNL product demonstrated the least interference from noise, resulting in the smallest segmentation threshold and the highest matching accuracy. This indirectly demonstrates the spatial and temporal consistency of the annual DDSNL product, ensuring its reliability in change detection-related studies. The annual DDSNL product developed in this research exhibits high fidelity, strong consistency, and improved comparability, and can provide reliable data reference for applications in electrification and urban studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The urban fringes are experiencing a significant surge in surface temperature during the transition from rural to urban, inducing imperceptible disturbances. The present study analyses the temperature modulations from 2000 to 2022 in Kalarahanga and Raghunathpurjali fringes in North Bhubaneswar to understand the relationship between spatiotemporal changes and land-surface temperature in the fringes. The investigations reveal a consistent decrease in the area under water bodies and crops, with an increase in the builtup area. Besides, there exists an inverse correlation between the area under high and medium temperature with the area under cropland (-0.820) and the area under water bodies (-0.799), and a positive correlation coefficient (0.813) with the built-up area/impervious surfaces. This insists on eco-sensitive planning of the urban fringes with consistent monitoring of land use and thermal dynamics for apt control of the changes in the urban microclimate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Ecology & Rural Environment is the property of Journal of Ecology & Rural Environment Editorial Office and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Managed retreat, a key strategy in climate change adaptation for areas with high hazard exposure, raises concerns due to its disruptive nature, vulnerability issues and overall risk in the new location. On-site upgrading or near-site resettlement is seen as more appropriate and effective compared to a relocation far from the former place of living. However, these conclusions often refer to only a very limited set of empirical case studies or do not sufficiently consider different context conditions and phases in resettlement. Against this background, this paper examines the conditions and factors contributing to community resilience of different resettlement projects in Metro Manila. In this urban agglomeration reside an estimated 500 000 informal households, with more than 100 000 occupying high-risk areas. In light of the already realized and anticipated climate change effects, this precarious living situation exposes families, already socio-economically vulnerable, to an increased risk of flooding. The response of the Philippine government to the vexing problem of informal dwellers has been large-scale resettlement from coasts, rivers and creeks to state-owned sites at urban fringes. However, only very few resettlement projects could be realized as in-city projects close to the original living space. The study employs a sequential mixed-method approach, integrating a large-scale quantitative household survey and focus group discussions (FGDs) for a robust comparison of resettlement types. Further, it reveals community-defined enabling factors for managed retreat as climate change adaptation strategy. Results indicate minor variations in well-being conditions between in-city and off-city resettlement, challenging the expected impact of a more urban setting on resilience. Instead, essential prerequisites for resettlement involve reduced hazard exposure, secure tenure and safety from crime. Beyond these essential conditions, social cohesion and institutional support systems emerge as significant influencers for the successful establishment of well-functioning new settlements. With this findings, the study contributes to the expanding body of literature on managed retreat, offering a comprehensive evaluation based on extensive datasets and providing entry points for the improvement of retreat as a climate change adaptation strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws upon a quasi‐natural experiment of county‐city mergers in China to examine whether state‐led urbanisation makes a difference in local labour markets. Based on the difference‐in‐differences framework and three waves of data from the China Household Finance Survey, we show that, on the urban fringe, residents' probability of working in nonagricultural sectors increased by 6.69 percentage points after the policy. Residents responded mainly by shifts from the agriculture sector to being self‐employed. The results indicate that, after fringe counties connect to the corresponding big city in substance, residents in peripheral areas could benefit from the positive spillover effect from large cities and gain employment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the production and development of entertainment venues along Park Avenue in Ankara. The study approaches the development as a problem of urban growth and urban planning in Ankara. While piecemeal urban planning paves the way for unintended urban development at the fringe of the city, entertainment venues are produced by the contingency of capital. In such situations, capital owners make use of strategies and politics to produce these places. This study explains why and how such entertainment venues have emerged along Park Avenue, examines the inadequacies of urban planning practices and investigates the prevailing market conditions. There is evidence that the development of these venues along Park Avenue is marked by different periods in which distinctive decisions, relation patterns and events occurred. Through this process, urban land that is earmarked for a particular land function is transformed for entertainment use via fragmentary or/and progressive methods in which capital dynamics are the main determinant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rapid urbanization has resulted in the substantial population growth in metropolitan areas. However, existing research on population change of the cities predominantly draws on grid statistical data at the administrative level, overlooking the intra-urban variegation of population change. Particularly, there is a lack of attention given to the spatio-temporal change of population across different urban forms and functions. This paper therefore fills in the lacuna by clarifying the spatio-temporal characteristics of population growth in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) from 2000 to 2020 through the methods of local climate zone (LCZ) scheme and urban–rural gradients. The results showed that: (1) High population density was observed in the compact high-rise (LCZ 1) areas, with a noticeable decline along urban–rural gradients. (2) The city centers of GBA experienced the most significant population growth, while certain urban fringes and rural areas witnessed significant population shrinkage. (3) The rate of growth tended to slow down after 2010, but the uneven development of population-based urbanization was also noticeable, as urbanization and industrialization varied across different LCZ types and cities in GBA. This paper therefore contributes to a deeper understanding of population change and urbanization by clarifying their spatio-temporal contingences at landscape level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exploring urban spatial structures through spatial coupling analysis methods is an important method to provide theoretical support for the construction of sustainable urban structures. In order to make up for the neglect of POI species differences in previous studies, information entropy was introduced to calculate POI confusion, and a comprehensive POI index was constructed by combining kernel density and the entropy weight method; impervious surface coverage was extracted based on land cover data. The spatial distribution of the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei urban agglomeration and some typical cities was analyzed by coupling two types of data using the dual-factor mapping method. The research indicates the following: (1). The spatial distribution of the two sets of data in the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei region is highly consistent, indicating a state of high spatial coupling; Beijing has the highest proportion of coupling in the same region at the city level (73.39%). (2). The areas with different coupling of the two types of data are mainly distributed in the urban fringe areas transitioning from the city center to the suburbs, as well as in large-scale areas with single functionality such as airports, scenic spots, and ports. This study shows that analysis combining the POI comprehensive index and impervious surface coverage can effectively characterize urban spatial structure characteristics, providing a new perspective for the study of the spatial structure of the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei urban agglomeration. It is of great significance for a deeper understanding of the laws of urban agglomeration spatial structures and guiding the coordinated development of the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei urban agglomeration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The botanical knowledge of Mapuche people settled on the peripheries of Esquel city (Argentine Patagonia) was compared with that of urban residents in order to know their particularities, and to understand how rural–urban (rurban) hybridization resignifies their practices and medicinal plants richness for better adaptation to city life. Interviews were conducted with a sample of 79 patients attending primary health care centers (33 rurban Mapuches, 46 urban), and data were qualitative–quantitatively analyzed. Rurban residents cite similar plant richness to that of urban ones (∼69 species), though they are different in composition. Local medicinal flora provides responses to diseases with a similar incidence in both groups, but each group addresses them based on the resources it recognizes as most effective and accessible. The rurban system is flexible facing the challenge that life in the city implies, evidencing the incorporation and replacement of native resources by exotic ones as an expression of restructuring processes and cultural diversification. These changes allow for recreation of memory about the importance of medicinal plants, and adjustment of therapeutic practices to a present time, having different needs from those of rurality. Urban residents incorporate plants from Mapuche pharmacopoeia, some of which are on visualization, evidencing bidirectional resource and ethnobotanical knowledge transference between groups. As a conclusion, this case study points out the importance of recognizing rurbanity as a starting point for the establishment of public policies that improve governance and access to health for Mapuche migrants in the city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rapid urbanization rates and weak development control machinery have led to exponential city sprawling to urban fringes. This paper examines how urban sprawl impacts livelihoods of urban fringe dwellers and their coping strategies. A multiple case strategy was deployed and a sustainable livelihoods framework was used in the analysis. Empirical data were obtained through literature review, household and key informant interviews, observations, Focus Group Discussions and analysis of satellite images. Results indicate that negatively urban sprawl has increased households' transport expenditure to work at unaffordable levels; traffic congestion; cost of food products; and inadequate provision of essential livelihood-enhancing facilities. Positively, urban sprawl has presented new livelihood opportunities and enabled households to access minimal social amenities and services. We recommend diversification of economic activities, change of economic activities, making urban fringe livelihoods key element of policy formulation and essential infrastructure and services provision to harness positive impacts and mitigate negative ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The City of São Paulo Improvements and Freehold Land Company Ltd (Cia. City) was founded in London in 1911 to promote subdivisions in the urban fringes of the city of São Paulo. By adapting to the real estate development market in the 1950s and 1960s to expand its market, Cia. City continued as a land developer, expanding its business within the state of São Paulo. This article provides an overview of this trajectory to analyze its performance in the 1970s, based on three projects that it carried out: City Nova Piracicaba, City Ribeirão and City Barretos. Based on the following analyses: the conception of garden suburbs, the relationship with the municipality and legal arrangements; registry practices; as well as designing projects and advertisements, this article presents evidence that shows the permanence of characteristics of its performance until 1970s. The analysis of the three projects demonstrates the company's concern with the urban design of the projects and preserving the brand. The article also reveals that while the idea of the garden suburb remained throughout the whole period, its layouts changed substantially, departing from the original organic parcelling pattern. Otherwise, the proximity and relationship with the pre-existing city determined its location. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a periodized overview of informal urbanization in Vienna in the twentieth century. It offers a new perspective on the evolution of planning discourse and the phenomenon's handling by planning authorities. The variegated manifestations of 'Informal Vienna' triggered an ongoing dispute on how orderly city development could be re-established after 1945. Our approach combines quantitative and qualitative aspects and illuminates not only the shifting significance of informal urbanization over several decades – especially in their lengthy formalization process – but also highlights the co-evolution of formal planning and the Viennese informal 'grand project'. In a comparative historical analysis based on the evaluation of the balances of formal and informal production of space, previous narratives of Red Vienna's dominant role in answering the 'housing question' in the interwar period (and beyond) are challenged. The frictions it created with the instruments and categories of formal planning, we argue, are crucial to understanding the consequences of informal development in Vienna. Furthermore, we present a typological approach on the grades of informality which allows for a reconstruction of the formalization processes in time. This 'graduation of informality' contributes to the ongoing attempts to classify various manifestations of informal urban development in the global South and North. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transition ecologies, namely ecotones, are where life started. Deltas, estuaries, bayous, and wetlands are places where different ecosystems merge and evolutionary processes take place. This paper explores three time periods in four coastal cities to look at the relationship between environmental values and urban expansionist paradigms through reclamation projects. It argues that these thresholds, occurring contemporaneously in expanding metropolitan regions, correspond to changing conceptualizations of urban–nature relationships, in other words urban core's changing relationships to fringe ecosystems. The metropolitan regions used as case studies for this piece are Mumbai, Amsterdam, New York, and Tokyo. Each has used reclamation as a grand expansion strategy during political or economic transitions. During each grand alteration attempt in these regions, the developers, reclamation enthusiasts, or urban planners revisited the city's immediate ecological fringe for expansion, and following these revisitations, a new geographical order formed in their subsequent regions. The urban fringe has become the socio-spatial zone where new and experimental ideas about urban development encounter complex natural systems. The land-use negotiations and reclamation's role in shaping the urban–nature relationships are missing pieces of the planning field. Any future looking climate resiliency plan today should build on the reading of this palimpsest and understand how these environmental values were traded and how global expansion narratives transformed the urban–nature gradient. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an urban fringe of Surakarta City-Indonesia, Grogol District is experienced by increasing temperature. The purpose of this study is: 1) to determine the spatial and temporal variations of air temperature in the Grogol District and 2) to determine the difference in air temperature between built-up land cover and non-built-up land cover, particularly rice fields. Air temperature data was obtained by temperature data logger from four sample points on October 27th to December 13th, 2021. Air temperature and land cover data were analyzed by descriptive and inferential statistics as well as spatial interpolation on air temperature data. The result indicates that higher air temperatures are spread over the northern part which is dominated by settlements. Lower air temperatures are found in the southern part which is dominated by rice fields. The temporal variation of air temperature at the four sample points shows almost the same pattern. However, the air temperature was higher in the built-up land cover than in the rice fields. The statistical difference test also showed that there were differences between the two land covers. In conclusion, Grogol District is affected by the urban heat island phenomenon from Surakarta City. This is particularly related to land cover change and increasing population. Therefore, to prevent the increasing temperature, the protection of the open greenspace area should be implemented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban-rural integration is the critical process of urbanization, while during this process there are various corresponding problems generated, safety is the most important one, especially at urban-rural fringe areas due to mixed traffic flow and complicated land use. This study intended to investigate the injury severity interaction between urban area and urban-rural fringe area, and explore the correlation within injury severity levels and heterogeneity attributed to unobserved factors. To address the correlation and heterogeneity issues, a grouped random parameters seemingly unrelated bivariate (SUB) probit model was proposed, in which the SUB probit model addressed the correlation of residuals, while the random parameters model accommodated the heterogeneity due to unobserved factors. By comparing the pooled with random parameters models, the results showed that random parameters SUB probit model performed better than the pooled one, and the dataset collected from 2013 to 2017 in Chengdu, China was adopted to illustrate the proposed model. It is found that crash location, speed limit and age of person injured are significant for injury severity in urban and urban-rural fringe areas, but crash form plays a significant role in urban area while number of persons involved should be paid more attention due to injury severity in urban-rural fringe area. Some empirical suggestions are presented to improve the safety in urban and urban-rural fringe areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Both the renovation of rainwater pipes and the addition of sponge city facilities in the low-terrain residences of urban fringes were rarely systematically simulated using the Storm Water Management Model (SWMM). With the waterlogging prevention project in an old residential quarter at a fringe of Hefei city being an example, this study used the SWMM to simulate the effect of the renovation of rainwater pipes and sponge city facilities under different return periods. The results showed the key nodes on the main pipes met the drainage requirements based on water depth analysis after renovation below the 20-year return period, and the reduction rate of the maximum water depth at the key node J5 was the greatest, with 87.7%. The four flow parameters (the average flow rate, the peak flow rate, the total discharge, and the percentage of water flow frequency) for the two outlets (PFK1 and PFK2) all improved after renovation under five return periods (2, 5, 10, 20, and 50 years [a]). The addition of sponge city facilities effectively reduced the amount of rainwater runoff from 28.68% to 14.78% during 2 a to 50 a, and the maximum reduction rate of water depth, being 61.15%, appeared in J5 under 20 a. The curve integral area of the depth over the elapsed time was innovatively used to indirectly express the accumulated rainwater volume through the rainwater well. This study verified that the SWMM model can be well applied to old low-terrain residential quarters in urban fringes and broadened the application scenario of the model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to reveal the complex socioeconomic structure of Indian villages by utilizing a dataset obtained from several government sources, which includes a wide range of 150 distinct variables. This study intends to uncover the underlying structure of these groups by using powerful data analytics and clustering approaches and further group Indian villages into meaningful clusters by finding socioeconomic differences and geographical details in India's rural landscape. The final research findings suggest a four-cluster strategy as the most insightful solution for providing a more detailed understanding of India's rural regions' diversity and its specific requirements. By describing the diversity of these clusters, this research study improves the framework for data-driven policy formation and development interventions that address the specific requirements of each group. Finally, this study highlights not only the potential of data-driven techniques in rural development, but also the importance of targeted customized solutions in solving India's rural development challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research presented in this paper addresses the critical challenge of ranking Indian villages based on their potential for socio-economic growth, inspired by the objectives of the Shyam Prasad Mukerji Rurban Mission (SPMRM). Leveraging a novel algorithm known as ClusterRank, an extension of the PageRank algorithm, we endeavor to provide a timely, efficient, and accurate solution for village ranking. The ClusterRank algorithm, an extension of the well-known PageRank algorithm, serves as the cornerstone of our approach. It excels in its ability to efficiently and accurately rank villages, outperforming alternative ranking methods. Notably, our findings reveal the superior convergence speed of the ClusterRank algorithm, affirming its capacity to produce rapid results. To assess the efficacy of ClusterRank, we employ a range of statistical ranking coefficients, including the Spearman, Kendall, and Point Biserial correlation coefficients. Our analysis demonstrates a strong positive correlation, with a Spearman correlation coefficient of 0.89, between the rankings generated by ClusterRank and the ground truth rankings provided by SPMRM. This correlation underscores the effectiveness of ClusterRank in identifying villages with high growth potential and highlights its alignment with the objectives of the SPMRM. This research presents a compelling case for the adoption of the ClusterRank algorithm by SPMRM as a valuable tool in the identification of rural areas poised for rurban development. Such adoption not only promises substantial time and resource savings but also directs the focus of SPMRM towards the implementation of targeted interventions and initiatives to uplift rural communities. Moreover, our supplementary analyses using Kendall and Point Biserial correlation coefficients further validate the robustness of the ClusterRank algorithm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What characteristics of space predict exclusive policies? Intuitively, socioeconomically exclusive spaces – such as wealthy urban centers in China – would also be exclusive in welfare provision. Drawing from cross-district comparisons within a Chinese metropolis, we identify a counterintuitive pattern where the urban center had easier migrant school access policies than the urban fringe. This pattern has existed in both the 2010s and 2020s, surviving a major school admissions policy reform. We call this pattern the inclusion paradox. The inclusion paradox can be attributed to two causes: a compartmentalization of school access along urban district boundaries, and a tendency of fringe districts to carry more migrant population with less fiscal capacity. As a result of the inclusion paradox, migrant children were more likely excluded from school access precisely where they were more likely to live. The inclusion paradox implies that policy exclusion and spatial exclusion substitute each other, a pattern that brings migrant school access in China in conversation with unequal school access in other contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The term co-radicalization refers to intergroup hostilities leading to conflicts through cycles of reciprocal threat. This article explores the concept of co-radicalization in violent and non-violent terms and its potential application particularly in Turkey and broadly in the Middle East, a region characterized by ethnic, cultural, and religious diversity, as well as socio-economic disparities. Drawing from the social fragmentations recently observed in Turkey, where scientific research on radicalism and co-radicalization is insufficient, the article offers several subjects of scrutiny, including (1) socio-economic co-radicalization between the native and migrant people in the fringes of the urban spaces, (2) the religious norm carriership led by the state institutions and the rise of “Deism” and atheism in response, and (3) the variety of non-violent radical expressions feeding each other, from music to satire. We conclude that the study of coradicalization should be distinguished from the reductionist approaches to the concept, which tend to take terrorism and radicalism synonymously; the social scientific goal is to obtain a deeper understanding of the intricate dynamics behind societal divisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper explores the relationship between state-led urbanization and primary industry development using the difference-in-differences (DiD) method. Design/methodology/approach: The study uses the DiD method. Findings: Exploiting county-city mergers during 2010–2018, the key strategy to expand the city outward and promote urbanization on the urban fringe by local government, the authors find that county-city mergers led to the growth of primary industry decline by 4.23%. The result can be explained by the loss of essential production factors, including land and labor used for farming. In addition, the negative effect is more pronounced for counties with more substantial manufacturing. The results indicate that urbanization in China relocates land and labor; however, it does not improve the efficiency of agricultural output. Originality/value: This paper contributes to the understanding of urbanization and rural development from the perspective of the primary industry by showing production factor redistribution. Second, this study complements the literature on local government mergers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I measure the economic effects of greenbelts that prohibit new construction beyond a predefined urban fringe and therefore act as urban growth boundaries. I focus on England, where 13% of the land is designated as greenbelt land. I provide reduced-form evidence and estimate a quantitative equilibrium model that includes amenities, housing supply, a traffic congestion externality, agglomeration forces, productivity and household location choices. Greenbelt policy generates positive amenity effects, but also strongly reduces housing supply. I find that greenbelts increase welfare because amenity effects are sufficiently strong. At the same time, however, greenbelts decrease housing affordability by limiting housing supply. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A dynamic combination of environmental, social, and economic factors shapes and manages the urban landscape. Understanding these factors behind urban growth can help us discern more about its past and future. This study examines the fractal dimension of the built-up area (BUA) boundaries of two municipalities in the emerging South Bengal Region (SBR) urban areas that have developed gradually over the last three decades. Fractalyse software (version 3.0-0.9.1) was used to estimate the fractal dimension using the box-counting method and generalized nonlinear and logarithmic models to link the changing socioeconomic patterns of the study areas over time. The fractal dimension measurement increased significantly between 1991 and 2021, with the overall global structure growing similarly to large metropolises in developed economies in the 20th century. In particular, the models have offered a framework for examining the link between urban form and socioeconomic structure to construct the concept of spatial replacement dynamics in urban landscapes. The results of this study have the potential to aid cities in gaining a deeper understanding of the possibilities and threats they will face in the future and in formulating efficient plans to improve their adaptation and resilience. The findings of this study also imply that urban fringes are conducive to denser expansion and prosperous economic growth. The fractal dimension values decrease as the distance from Kolkata, the core city, increases, while upscaled industrial zones create inhospitable landscapes along the Hooghly River. Therefore, this study suggests several recommendations for sustainable growth and development corresponding to the rapid urbanization of eco-sensitive zones in developing economies. According to this study, the SBR's population is anticipated to expand, suggesting that economic forces would contribute to the region's urbanization, tending toward built environment saturation. While population growth and development are desirable, they may pose social, economic, and environmental challenges in the studied regions if they occur at an insufficient pace. Sustainable development and conservation efforts in places of high environmental significance need the findings of this research to be used in contexts comparable to those in South Bengal, India. Applications in Urban Form and Development: Sustainability Planning may benefit from urban form studies because they reveal information about the spatial organization of urban areas in eco-sensitive zones, which is helpful for both ecological planning and the identification of ecologically sensitive areas needing protection and conservation. In the same vein, urban form studies assist in the planning and designing of infrastructure projects, which in turn may help facilitate sustainable infrastructure development by improving our knowledge of natural topography and the reallocation of space in response to an expanding built environment. This safeguards the area's ecology, biodiversity, and ecological equilibrium by ensuring that development interventions have minimal adverse effects. Practical applications of socioeconomic studies knowing how a population's socioeconomic features stack up helps improve livelihoods and increase community involvement in decision-making. Incorporating local knowledge makes it possible to better tailor development projects to the wants, requirements, and cultural norms of the people living in environmentally vulnerable areas. Policymakers may use it, and the general public benefits from more conservation and heightened understanding. Protecting the environment, promoting sustainable livelihoods, engaging people, formulating effective policies, and raising awareness of the need for conservation are all achievable via the application of urban form and socioeconomic research in eco-sensitive zones of South Bengal. These applications aid in the maintenance of biodiversity, the improvement of local quality of life, and the promotion of long-term economic growth in the area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mountainous cities face various land use challenges, including complex topography, low land use efficiency, and the insufficient control of land use in small-scale areas at the urban fringe. Considering population changes, environmental conservation, and urban planning, this study first established three scenarios: economic priority (Econ. Prior.), ecological priority (Ecol. Prior.), and balanced development (BD), and then used the Multi-Objective Planning (MOP) model to calculate the optimal land use structure. Finally, it carried out land use spatial layout optimization based on the Patch-generating Land Use Simulation (PLUS) model in 2035, Caijia Cluster, Chongqing, China. This approach, known as MOP-PLUS modeling, aimed to optimize land use. Meanwhile, the applicability of the PLUS model in simulating land use changes was discussed in small-scale mountainous areas. The results show the following: (1) The "quantity + space" approach in the MOP-PLUS model demonstrated the feasibility of the PLUS model in simulating land use change in small-scale mountainous areas. The overall accuracy (OA) of land use change simulation reached 81.60%, with a Kappa value of 0.73 and a Figure of Merit (FoM) coefficient of 0.263. (2) Land use optimization: Under the Econ. Prior. scenario, economic benefits peaked at 4.06 × 1010 CNY. Urban expansion was the largest, leading to increased patch fragmentation. The Ecol. Prior. scenario yielded the highest ecological benefits, reaching 7.46 × 107 CNY. The urban development pattern exhibited inward contraction, accompanied by urban retrogression. In the BD scenario, economic benefits totaled 3.89 × 1010 CNY, and ecological benefits amounted to 7.16 × 107 CNY. Construction land tended to concentrate spatially, leading to relatively optimal land use efficiency. Therefore, based on a comprehensive consideration of the regional land use constraint policies and spatial layout, we believe that a balance point for land use demands can be found in the BD scenario. It can ensure economic growth without compromising the ecological environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Arid Land Geography is the property of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology & Geography and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The development of digital technology has made it much easier for most people to access online communication through smartphones. Such a phenomenon has encouraged operators to develop an online transportation service system, which has also been growing in Indonesian urban areas. The urban community accepts the new alternative of the application-based transportation system since it offers a much more efficient way to reach transportation services. Moreover, the online transportation system also offers a much wider range of destination locations. It is believed that the creation of an application-based transportation service system will affect metropolitan areas' social and economic conditions and how urban communities' travel. The development of this application-based transportation service would change the configuration of urban non-working trip distribution patterns, which should be understood as inputs for the urban transport development plan. This research aims to understand the impact of online transportation services on nonworking trip distribution patterns in Indonesian urban areas, with Bandung City as the case study. The method used in this research is statistical descriptive, using respondents' responses to map the influenced trip generation and distribution patterns. The results show that online transportation has enabled the community to travel more easily and reach wider areas. Such changes have formed a new travel pattern that extends the destination locations to a wider peri-urban area. In the future, the government should anticipate urban fringe area land use growth, changing the region into more "urbanized-built-up" areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the dynamics of fringe land invasion in Birbir Town, southern Ethiopia by adopting a descriptive survey design with both qualitative and quantitative data analyses. Primary data were acquired through a household survey, key informant interviews, focus group discussions, and observations. This study also benefited from relevant secondary sources. Using a simple random sampling technique, 156 household heads were selected from Birbir and two adjacent rural areas. The study revealed that informal settlement expansion in the form of fringe land invasion occurs in Birbir Town predominantly due to population increase, urban sprawl, migration, poor land administration and governance systems, a lack of boundary demarcation, and the presence of available unserviced public land near the town. The process was intensified by actors such as farmers, local administrators, informal dealers, politicians, and local elders. The encroachment of urban fringe areas has led to deforestation, relinquishment of cultivable acreage, entitlement disputes, a prevailing trend of illicit land occupation, an unstructured urban expansion pattern, and a surge in criminality, fostering discordant communities. This study contributes to the understanding of informality on the urban fringe as posing socioeconomic and governance challenges in small towns of developing countries by presenting the case of Birbir.

Contemporary humanity is confronted with the development dilemma, especially in developing countries, of limited environmental capacity and increased pressure to protect the environment. Based on the concept of the Leading Functional Space Partition, this study identifies land-use conflicts in the urban fringes of ecologically fragile areas in Western China. The purpose is to explore the distribution characteristics of land-use conflicts in urban fringe areas and provide data references to solve a series of ecological and environmental problems inherent in the process of urbanisation. First, relevant software was applied to analyse the current situation of regional land use, and clustering was conducted in line with the goal of "production-living-ecology" to form territorial space zoning with the same function. Then, three leading function evaluation systems were constructed with natural patches of land as the unit to evaluate the current suitability. According to the evaluation results and relevant planning, areas with land-use conflicts were identified, and their spatial characteristics were analysed on this basis. The results demonstrate that the incidence of land-use conflicts in urban fringe areas is high and the spatial distribution presents variability. In the case, the incidence of land-use conflicts in urban fringe areas is very high, with the highest concentration in areas 10–30 km away from urban built-up areas. And the proportion of ecological conflicts in urban fringe areas is the highest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Night-time light data (NTL) have been extensively utilized to map urban fringe areas, but to date, there has not been a comprehensive evaluation of the existing spatial clustering methods for delineating the urban fringe using different types of night-time light data. Therefore, we first selected three popular sources of night-time light data (i.e., NPP/VIIRS, Luojia 1-01, and NASA's Black Marble) to identify the urban fringe. The recognition of spatial mutations across the urban–rural gradient was conducted based on changes in night light intensity using a spatial continuous wavelet transform model. Then, we employed three representative dual spatial clustering approaches (i.e., MK-Means, DBSC, and DSC) for extracting urban fringe areas using different NTL. By using dual spatial clustering, the spatial patterns of the mutation points were effectively transformed into homogeneous spatially adjacent clusters, enabling the measurement of similarity between mutation points. Taking Nanjing city, one of China's megacities, as the study area, we found that (1) Compared with the fragmented and concentrated results obtained from the Luojia 1-01, NASA's Black Marble and NPP/VIIRS data can effectively capture the abrupt change of urban fringes with NTL variations; (2) DSC provided a reliable approach for accurately extracting urban fringe areas using NASA's Black Marble data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The urban fringe is the transitional area from rural form to urban form, and it is also the urban space reserve land in the Territorial Spatial Plan. However, few researchers predict its overall evolution and guide the implementation of the Territorial Spatial Plan. This study attempts to explore the dynamic evolution law of urban fringe, analyze its driving factors, predict its future development, and put forward management suggestions for the implementation of the Territorial Spatial Plan. In this paper, the land use data of Wuhan in 2000, 2010 and 2020 are applied to delimit the urban fringe area of Wuhan by means of a sliding t-test. Fifteen driving factors are selected from three dimensions, natural factors, socio-economic factors and traffic accessibility, and brought into the Logistic model to explore the driving factors of its spatial evolution. The CA–Markov model is used to predict the fringe area of Wuhan in 2035. The results show that the transformation of rural hinterland into urban fringe is obviously affected by the distance from railway stations, highways, commercial centers and urban main roads. It is predicted that the outer boundary of Wuhan's fringe area in 2035 will be basically the same as the planned urban development boundary. In order to realize the intention of land space planning, the development and construction of the northwest of the Huangpi District, the East Lake Scenic Area, and the west side of the Jiangxia District should be restricted. From the perspective of the evolution of the fringe area, this paper puts forward some management suggestions for the implementation of the Territorial Spatial Plan and makes a beneficial attempt in theory and method to understand the development characteristics of the fringe area and promote the implementation of the Territorial Spatial Plan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spatially equitable educational facilities play an important role in narrowing the gap between social strata. This paper, taking the example of Lanzhou, aims to classify households into different social strata by the hierarchical cluster method and analyze their spatial feature to identify the strata attributes of the community and calculate the spatial equity of educational facilities within different strata by constructing a fairness index model. We verify the positive correlation between social stratification level and educational equity, which has been largely ignored in previous studies based on basic education facilities. The results indicate that the spatial differentiation trend of social strata in Lanzhou shows that a circle structure of the center belongs to the upper social stratum and the marginal areas belong to the lower social stratum. Urban villages in the urban fringe are an important area of social stratum differentiation. Different social strata have significant differences in terms of access to educational facilities. The spatial fairness of educational facilities from high to low is the wealthy and the elite class (WEC), the middle class (MC), the low class (LC), and the lower class (LEC). The higher the social class level is, the greater the equity difference. The lower the social class is, the smaller the difference. The equity of educational facilities within the WEC and the MC is obviously better than that of the LC and the LEC. The spatial distribution of educational facilities among social strata is unfair, and at the urban edge, there exists an obvious weakening phenomenon of spatial justice and social equity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ticks (Acari: Ixodidae) are major disease vectors globally making it increasingly important to understand how altered vertebrate communities in urban areas shape tick population dynamics. In urban landscapes of Australia, little is known about which native and introduced small mammals maintain tick populations preventing host‐targeted tick management and leading to human–wildlife conflict. Here, we determined (1) larval, nymphal, and adult tick burdens on host species and potential drivers, (2) the number of ticks supported by the different host populations, and (3) the proportion of medically significant tick species feeding on the different host species in Northern Sydney. We counted 3551 ticks on 241 mammals at 15 sites and found that long‐nosed bandicoots (Perameles nasuta) hosted more ticks of all life stages than other small mammals but introduced black rats (Rattus rattus) were more abundant at most sites (33%–100%) and therefore important in supporting larval and nymphal ticks in our study areas. Black rats and bandicoots hosted a greater proportion of medically significant tick species including Ixodes holocyclus than other hosts. Our results show that an introduced human commensal contributes to maintaining urban tick populations and suggests ticks could be managed by controlling rat populations on urban fringes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Residents in new greenfield suburbs on the urban fringe often experience long delays in public transport provision leading to some developers choosing to fund and coordinate bus services themselves. This article reports on an investigation into this trend in Australia which uncovered ten such services which mostly offered direct connection to the nearest train station during peak periods. These were provided to improve the attractiveness and amenity of the estate. While such services are useful for early transport options, they are temporary and fairly limited and should be seen as a pathway to more comprehensive state-funded bus services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rationally relieving the population of urban centers in large cities, such as megacities and supercities, is one of the current goals of population development in China. The fringe area of a large city is a potential area to undertake the population of the central area. Studying the relationship between the population and the built environment in this area can help urban planners formulate targeted construction strategies to attract the population of the city center to move to the fringe areas. This paper takes the fringe areas of Wuhan in 2010 and 2020 as its specific research object and puts forward the "5D" index system of built environments that affects the spatial distribution of population based on population data and built environment data. The OLS model is used to screen the influencing factors. This paper analyzes the correlation between population and built environment using a multi-scale geographic weighted regression model as well. According to the results of the regression analysis combined with the development and construction of the fringe areas of remote urban areas in Wuhan over the past 20 years, some suggestions are put forward for the planning and construction of remote urban areas. The results show that the "5D" index system of the built environment covers the influencing factors of the spatial distribution of the population. MGWR reveals the correlation between the influencing factors and the spatial distribution of population in the marginal areas on the global scale and the local scale, respectively, which provides a clear direction for the development of planning and construction to improve the attractiveness of the non-central areas to the population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Melbourne, like many cities of the global north, is growing rapidly through migration. Many migrants find home on the urban fringe in Master Planned Estates. This settlement is encouraged by urban policy, but there is a need to understand and respond to the needs of the multitude of religious communities. This paper traces the development of places of worship on the fringe of western Melbourne and the possibilities for expression of faith on the periphery of established settlement. It illustrates, in particular, how places of worship are often either spatially disconnected from the communities which they seek to serve, or not fit for purpose in failing to meet the requirements of religious and cultural activity. The transformation of land into commercialisable units of housing, or commerce invites an improvisational response on behalf of religious communities. Overall the study finds that the rudimentary consideration of places of worship in greenfield development is a touchstone of the difficulties that the Australian planning system faces in encompassing the diversity of the community. The 'superdiverse' migrant body with its transnational economic, cultural, and religious connections represents a dynamic shift and complication of the suburbs that are all too often dismissed for a supposed homogeneity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban sprawl leads to an increase in distance traveled, time, and dependence on private vehicles, mainly motorcycles, in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. This study aimed to investigate the on-road particulate matter exposure levels under a scenario of urban expansion. On-road particulate matter (PM1, PM2.5, PM10, and PM2.5–10) concentrations were measured on different road types from the fringe urban areas to the inner-city districts. A real-time and portable monitor was utilized to measure the on-road particulate matter concentrations during two periods (morning rush hours and afternoon non-rush hours) in July 2020. The results showed that commuters traveling on suburban roads were significantly exposed to higher exposure levels of particulate matter than those on urban roads. The highest particulate matter concentrations were obtained on suburban roads with the most rapid urbanization. During the morning rush hours, substantially high particulate matter concentrations were found when commuting from the fringe areas to the inner-city districts compared to the opposite direction (i.e., inner city to suburban). In a multivariate model for PM2.5, temperature and urban ambient concentration explained 79.1% of the on-road PM2.5 variation. In conclusion, residents living in the urban fringe areas were exposed to high on-road particulate matter concentrations when they took trips to the inner-city districts, especially if the distance traveled and time were accounted for. Therefore, for long commutes in Ho Chi Minh City, our findings suggest that commuters should use public transport such as buses instead of private motorcycles to protect human health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the multiple links between Pentecostalism and the production of security in Cape Town's isiXhosa-speaking townships and traces the ways in which Pentecostal churches have become embroiled with Cape Town's criminal economies, illegality and violence. In these marginalised urban spaces, which are also territories of relegation, Pentecostal pastors compete with other spiritual specialists who lay claims to spiritual protection just like the state's law-enforcement agencies over the meanings of crime and violence and legitimate ways to counter them. This competition thrives on the fact that physical harm and the associated states of victimhood are seen as resulting not only from criminal assaults but also from the congeries of spiritual forces that enable them. Simultaneously, there is mounting competition within the religious field and increasingly strenuous assertions of religious sovereignty vis-à-vis the secular state. I argue that all of these developments have contributed to Pentecostalism's links with illegality. Importantly, capacities to wield spiritual power are as central for understanding the dynamics of the market of spiritual protection against risks as are accusations that those wielding them do so with malign intent. The ambivalent perceptions of Pentecostalism with regard to crime and protection against harm therefore echo those of witchcraft. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What are the recursive effects of planning on valuations of land, value capture and returns to developers and hence what urban planning can achieve in the building of new urban fringe communities? Valuations affect returns on investment in ways that impact on developer contributions while planning fuels hope in ways that land value capture instruments can never fully realise. We illustrate the discussion with reference to Melbourne, Australia drawing on research interviews with local and state and private sector planners, real estate brokers and valuers. In conclusion, we note the implications of the hope generated by planning for the capture of land value uplifts in the name of new community building; the desirability of integrating insights from the property and planning disciplines; further investigating the temporalities of planning; and the contribution of built environment professions in shaping discourses surrounding the value of planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The role of agricultural activities in countries with mature economies suggests, on the one hand, the traditional role of producing foodstuffs and dietary fibers; on the other, it speaks to the offering of landscape, cultural, recreational, and environmental services. The member states of the European Union have for some time derogated the control of agricultural processes to EU decision-making, within an overarching vision that recalls both roles of this primary activity. The COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia–Ukraine military crisis have heightened the urgency to protect national agricultural production and guarantee minimum levels of agricultural provisions. In Italy, this orientation clashes with practices of unauthorized construction, favored by policies of "building amnesties", and the pressure exercised on urban growth that, particularly in fringe areas, modifies the mercantile nature of agricultural lands. This paper examines the theme in operative terms, analyzing an urban fringe in the city of Bari. The use of multiple regression analysis, applied to the agricultural land market, evidenced how prices in these areas are clearly impacted by their potential transformation into buildable terrains, even when urban plans do not foresee this use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban fringe areas, characterized by relatively larger community sizes and lower population densities compared to central areas, may lead to variations in walkability as well as gender differences, such as safety perception. While objective measurements have received considerable attention, further research is needed to comprehensively assess subjective perceptions of walking in the urban periphery. As a case study, we evaluated survey responses of community perceptions of "Imageability", "Enclosure", "Human scale", "Complexity" and "Safety" of Shanghai's five new towns, comparing these with responses from the central area in terms of gender difference, and analyzed influencing factors and prediction performance of machine learning (ML) models. We developed a TrueSkill-based rating system to dynamically collect audits of street view images (SVIs) from professional students and used the result to integrate with Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Computer Vision (CV), Clustering analysis, and ML algorithm for further investigation. Results show that most of the new towns' communities are perceived as moderately walkable or higher, with the city center's community exhibiting the best walkability perceptions in general. Male and female perceptions of the "Human scale" and the factors that affect it differ little, but there are significant disparities in the other four perceptions. The best-performing ML models were effective at variable explanations and generalizations, with Random Forest Regression (RFR) performing better on more perception predictions. Responses also suggest that certain street design factors, such as street openness, can positively influence walkability perceptions of women and could be prioritized in new town development and urban renewal for more inclusive and walkable cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban–rural integration zones are areas with the most prominent and complex contradictions in economic and social, humanistic and geographical, and urban–rural contexts. Properly identifying such zones is essential for promoting urban–rural integrated development and rural revitalization efforts. In this study, symbiosis theory and urban expansion theory are employed to analyze and identify the spatial characteristics of urban–rural integration zones in the main urban area of Dalian City. Two distinct methods, namely the G-statistic (G-S) method and the urban–urban–rural integration zone–rural gradient model (U-URIZ-R GM) method, are used to delimit these zones. Furthermore, the results of these methods are compared and analyzed to explore their respective practical applications. The results indicate that both methods produce satisfactory identification outcomes for delimiting urban–rural integration zones in the main urban area of Dalian. Specifically, the identified urban–rural integration zones are predominantly situated in the northwest and south regions, aligning with the coastline and major transportation routes. However, hilly terrain is a crucial factor that influences the delimitation of urban–rural integration zones, and it is worth considering whether forested areas located in the urban fringe should be included based on the development needs of different cities. Notably, within the core area of Dalian's main city, an extensive expanse of mountainous woodland exists, leading to limitations in the applicability of certain indicators within the index system, such as surface temperature and vegetation cover, for determining urban–rural integration zones. Symbiosis and urban expansion theories play a vital role in guiding the identification of urban–rural integration zones. Although both methods can be used to demarcate these zones, the G-statistics method is probably more useful in cities with significant topographical features, while the urban–urban–rural integration zone–rural gradient model is more appropriate for cities with less impact from topography on urban expansion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Developing a sound urban green infrastructure system is critical for addressing climate change. Green infrastructure (GI) also plays an essential role in the urban system by providing ecosystem services for urban residents. Although some research on GI has been published in Taiwan, there is a lack of understanding of how changes in land use and GI affect the landscape patterns in urban fringe areas. This study explores the impact of changes in GI on the landscape pattern of the urban fringe and urban core areas in the Taipei metropolitan area (TMA). We used intensity analysis to investigate changes in land area and land use intensity between 1981 and 2015 at three levels: interval, category, and transition. Landscape metrics were employed to analyze changes in GI patterns. We found, firstly, that although the rate of change in the urban core area of the TMA was faster than the rate of change in the urban fringe area during 1981–1995 and 1995–2006, changes in the urban fringe area nevertheless maintained a state of rapid change in 1995–2006 and 2006–2015. Secondly, forest and agricultural lands in urban fringe areas were the GI categories with the greatest changes in area from 1981 to 2015. Thirdly, transition areas among forest, agricultural, and built-up areas in urban fringe areas were larger during 1995–2015 than 1981–1995. Finally, the results of landscape pattern analysis indicate that the urban fringe area of the TMA is experiencing landscape fragmentation. Although forest land remained the main category in the urban fringe from 1981 to 2015, the integrity of its patch area decreased over time, and the prevalence of small and complex patches of built-up and agricultural land increased. Spatial planning should therefore consider how to build a GI system to promote ecosystem services in urban fringe areas so as to enhance the ability to respond to climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]