Showing papers on "Metropolitan area published in 2006"

Causes of Sprawl: A Portrait from Space

Abstract: We study the extent to which U. S. urban development is sprawling and what determines differences in sprawl across space. Using remote-sensing data to track the evolution of land use on a grid of 8.7 billion 30 30 meter cells, we measure sprawl as the amount of undeveloped land surrounding an average urban dwelling. The extent of sprawl remained roughly unchanged between 1976 and 1992, although it varied dramatically across metropolitan areas. Ground water availability, temperate climate, rugged terrain, decentralized employment, early public transport infrastructure, uncertainty about metropolitan growth, and unincorporated land in the urban fringe all increase sprawl.

Practical metropolitan-scale positioning for GSM phones

Abstract: This paper examines the positioning accuracy of a GSM beacon-based location system in a metropolitan environment. We explore five factors effecting positioning accuracy: location algorithm choice, scan set size, simultaneous use of cells from different providers, training and testing on different devices, and calibration data density. We collected a 208-hour, 4350Km driving trace of three different GSM networks covering the Seattle metropolitan area. We show a median error of 94m in downtown and 196m in residential areas using a single GSM network and the best algorithm for each area. Estimating location using multiple providers' cells reduces median error to 65-134 meters and 95% error to 163m in the downtown area, which meets the accuracy requirements for E911. We also show that a small 60-hour calibration drive is sufficient for enabling a metropolitan area similar to Seattle.

Urbanisation and Water Consumption: Influencing Factors in the Metropolitan Region of Barcelona:

Abstract: This paper is concerned with the relationships between urbanisation and residential water consumption, taking as a case study the Metropolitan Region of Barcelona. More precisely, it investigates the influence of certain demographic, behavioural and housing factors on this consumption using descriptive statistics and a regression analysis. The data are derived from a sample of 532 households in 22 municipalities of the study area. Results show that income, housing type, members per household, the presence of outdoor uses (garden and swimming pool), the kind of species planted in the garden and consumer behaviour towards conservation practices play a significant role in explaining variations in water consumption. It is concluded that, along with prices and incomes, further research is needed on other demographic and housing variables in order to obtain a more comprehensive understanding of the determinants of domestic water consumption in areas periodically affected by water stress.

The Geography of Opportunity: Race and Housing Choice in Metropolitan America

Abstract: action, and indeed we can learn about what to replicate from the good parts. However, in order to be really helpful, case examples need to tell us about errors in decisions and activities not to follow. The third book gives a fuller account of a case example and shows how a series of projects come together to form such a successful partnership. Promise And Betrayal: Universities and the Battle for Sustainable Urban Neighborhoods by Gilderbloom and Mullins is that story. It is the most substantial case study of the three works, with a foreword by Henry G. Cisneros describing the context for university/community projects. Although a true situation, this tenyear history of the University of Louisville/Russell neighborhood’s HANDS (Housing and Neighborhood Development Strategies) program is gripping in its narration of the highs and lows involved. The HANDS program was a partnership where success was based upon cooperation with business, community, government, and university. It proved that it is possibility to revitalize impoverished neighborhoods, provide housing ownership for low-income person, create job opportunity for unemployed, and encourage empowerment strategies; it is an urban version of the work of the traditional land grant university. The book also charts the success of the SUN (Sustainable Urban Neighborhoods) program; however, it points out the mistakes as well as the successes in pursuit of the program’s goal to form an active partnership within a sustainable neighborhood. This is the story of how a poverty-stricken neighborhood in Louisville rebounds as a vibrant sustainable place. After a slow and unnecessary attempt to legitimize partnerships, the book charts a really exciting first-person analysis of several years of building and sustaining long-term programs in the nineties involving partnership between the University of Louisville and its nearby neighborhoods, Russell and West Louisville. The programs come to a not unfamiliar end. The authors and principal faculty argue betrayal by the university, but one could easily read a betrayal by the community leaders involved as well. The programs lose support, on one hand, of the university as administrators change and go on to other interests and, on the other hand, of the community leaders, who fear new initiatives that are not in their turf and therefore sabotage them. A different and more professional scenario that empowers the community has been carried out by a few university–community partnerships. It is not to rely upon current institutions, either university or neighborhood, for the long term, but rather spin off a new, neutral, third-party institution to carry out the partnership mandate, such as a nonprofit community development corporation or community center. The potential for sustainability then becomes quite high. References

The Challenge of Change: Australian Cities and Urban Planning in the New Millennium

Abstract: This paper reviews recent research on the changing spatial structure of Australia’s major cities from the early 1990s, concentrating on (a) the location of employment and journey to work patterns, (b) the changing nature of housing, and (c) patterns of residential differentiation and disadvantage. The paper argues that the 1990s was a watershed decade during which some taken-for-granted aspects of Australian urban character experienced significant change. It then examines the latest generation of strategic planning documents for these major metropolitan areas, all published between 2002 and 2005, and argues that there is a mismatch between the strategies’ consensus view of desirable future urban structure, based on containment, consolidation and centres , and the complex realities of the evolving urban structures. In particular, the current metropolitan strategies do not come to terms with the dispersed, suburbanised nature of much economic activity and employment and the environmental and social issues that flow from that, and they are unconvincing in their approaches to the emerging issues of housing affordability and new, finer-grained patterns of suburban inequality and disadvantage. Overall, the paper contends that current metropolitan planning strategies suggest an inflexible, over-neat vision for the future that is at odds with the picture of increasing geographical complexity that emerges from recent research on the changing internal structure of our major cities.

Incorporating green-area user groups in urban ecosystem management.

Abstract: We analyze the role of urban green areas managed by local user groups in their potential for supporting biodiversity and ecosystem services in growing city-regions, with focus on allotment areas, domestic gardens, and golf courses. Using Stockholm, Sweden, as an example city-region, we compile GIS data of its spatial characteristics and relate these data to GIS data for protected areas and “green wedges” prioritized in biodiversity conservation. Results reveal that the three land uses cover 18% of the studied land area of metropolitan Stockholm, which corresponds to more than twice the land set aside as protected areas. We review the literature to identify ecosystem functions and services provided by the three green areas and discuss their potential in urban ecosystem management. We conclude that the incorporation of locally managed lands, and their stewards and institutions, into comanagement designs holds potential for improving conditions for urban biodiversity, reducing transaction costs in e...

The Presence of Organizational Resources in Poor Urban Neighborhoods: An Analysis of Average and Contextual Effects

Abstract: Wilson (1987) and others argue that poor neighborhoods lack important organizational resources the middle class takes for granted, such as childcare centers, grocery stores and pharmacies. However, this approach does not distinguish poor neighborhoods from segregated neighborhoods, ignores immigration and neglects city differences. Using Department of Commerce and 2000 Census data for zip codes in 331 MSA/PMSAs, we estimate HGLM models predicting the number of each of 10 organizational resources. We find that, (1) on average, as the poverty rate of a neighborhood increases, the number of establishments increases slightly; (2) as the proportion of blacks increases, the number of establishments decreases; (3) as the proportion of foreign-born increases, so does the number of establishments. Finally (4), metropolitan context matters: poor neighborhoods have more establishments in cities with low poverty rates, and in cities in the South and West, than in other parts of the country. Findings suggest reevaluating the de-institutionalized ghetto perspective as a theory of the effects of black segregation and depopulation, rather than poverty concentration, and approaching neighborhood poverty from a conditional perspective.

Why Has House Price Dispersion Gone Up

Abstract: We investigate the 30-year increase in the level and dispersion of house prices across U.S. metropolitan areas in a calibrated dynamic general equilibrium island model. The model is based on two main assumptions: households flow in and out of metropolitan areas in response to local wage shocks, and the housing supply cannot adjust instantly because of regulatory constraints. Feeding in our model the 30-year increase in cross-sectional wage dispersion that we document based on metropolitan-level data, we generate the observed increase in house price level and dispersion. In equilibrium, workers flow towards exceptionally productive metropolitan areas and drive house prices up. The calibration also reveals that, while a baseline level of regulation is important, a tightening of regulation by itself cannot account for the increase in house price level and dispersion: in equilibrium, workers flow out of tightly regulated metropolitan areas towards less regulated areas, undoing most of the price impact of additional local supply regulations. Finally, the calibration with increasing wage dispersion suggests that the welfare effects of housing supply regulation are large.

Planning, Anti-Planning, and the Infrastructure Crisis Facing Metropolitan Lagos

Abstract: When the Nigerian musician Fela Anikulapo-Kuti recorded his song “Water no get enemy” in 1975 he could not have anticipated that living conditions would continue to worsen in coming decades to the point at which Lagos would garner the dubious accolade by the 1990s of being widely regarded as one of the worst cities in the world.3 The deteriorating state of the city since the post-independence euphoria of the early 1960s, to reach its current position as a leitmotif for urban poverty and injustice, has occurred in the midst of a global transformation in patterns of urbanization. Lagos is now one of a number of rapidly growing cities in the Global South, which appears to challenge manypreviously held assumptions about the relationship between economic prosperity and demographic change: unlike the experience of nineteenth-century Europe and North America, for example, we observe a form of urban “involution” marked by vast expansion in combination with economic decline (see Davis 2004; Gandy 2005a; Sala-i-Martin and Subramanian 2003; UN 2003a). The UN has recently predicted that by the year 2015, the population of Lagos—currently estimated at over 10 million—will reach 17 million, making it one of the largest cities in the world (UN 2003b). The sprawling city now extends far beyond its original lagoon setting to encompass a vast expanse of mostly low-rise developments including as many as 200 different slums ranging in size from clusters of shacks underneath highways to entire districts such as Ajegunle and Mushin (see Map 11.1).

Delivering the Compact City in Australia: Current Trends and Future Implications

Abstract: This article presents an overview of the characteristics of the market for higher density residential property (flats, units and town houses) in the three largest Australian cities: Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. The article then discusses some of the implications of current planning proposals for further higher density housing in Australian cities under urban consolidation or compact city policies and reviews a range of issues that may well arise. In particular, issues concerning the role of the rental investment market and Strata Title framework in determining the outcomes of current metropolitan compact city policies and the implications of higher density housing for social stability are discussed.

The Distinctive City: Divergent Patterns in Growth, Hierarchy and Specialisation

Abstract: With accelerated world market integration, cities compete with each other cities as sites of production and consumption, targeting firms and households as semi-autonomous location decision-makers. Distinction may be sought in productive structure, consumption and identity. In this paper, contradictory trends towards homogenisation and distinctiveness are theorised. Studying the occupational structure of 50 large US metropolitan areas, it is found that distinctiveness has been increasing in economic base occupations though some heavily blue-collar cities' edge is eroding. Employment in consumption activities has been growing faster than in the economic base and cities are becoming more alike in consumption structure. It is concluded that the search for niches in exporting sectors and related occupational mix is key to urban resurgence.

The peri-urban water poor: citizens or consumers?

Abstract: Using the results of a comparative three-year research project in five metropolitan areas, this article reviews a range of practices in accessing water and sanitation by peri-urban poor residents a...

Carsharing in North America: Market Growth, Current Developments, and Future Potential

Abstract: Carsharing provides members access to a fleet of autos for short-term use throughout the day, reducing the need for one or more personal vehicles. More than 10 years ago, carsharing operators began to appear in North America. Since 1994, 40 programs have been deployed—28 are operating in 36 urban areas, and 12 are now defunct. Another four are planned to launch in the next year. Carsharing growth potential in North America is examined on the basis of a survey of 26 existing organizations conducted from April to July 2005. Since the mid-1990s, the number of members and vehicles supported by carsharing in the United States and Canada has continued to grow, despite program closures. The three largest providers in the United States and Canada both support 94% of the total carsharing membership. Growth potential in major metropolitan regions is estimated at 10% of individuals over the age of 21 in North America. Although carsharing continues to gain popularity and market share, the authors conclude that increa...

Urban Form and Household Activity‐Travel Behavior

Abstract: This article examines the relationship between weekday household activity-travel behavior and regional urban growth in the Portland, Oregon, metropolitan area. Behavioral observations were gleaned from an activity-travel survey conducted in the area during the mid-1990s. The authors note that research of this sort can inform development of urban land use policy that encourages the use of local opportunities, potentially leading to reduced motorized travel. They examine the potential household activity-travel response to a planned metropolitan polycentric hierarchy of activity centers. The evidence indicates an urban/suburban differential, with less daily travel and smaller activity spaces for urban households. Although most studies of this kind focus on commuting to work, this study considered the secondary effects of growth management, considering weekday activity travel separate from that required for commuting. The authors conclude that the results show a potential to reduce weekday travel by directing growth toward decentralized activity centers.

Urban Structure Matters: Residential Location, Car Dependence and Travel Behaviour

Abstract: Preface List of Figures List of Tables 1. Why is Knowledge about Urban Form and Travel Needed? 2. Urban Structures as Contributory Causes of Travel Behavior - A Theoretical Perspective 3. The Case of Copenhagen Metropolitan Area - Context and Research Methods 4. The "Car Tires" and the "Bike Hub": Typical Mobility Patterns in Different Parts of the Metropolitan Area 5. How does Urban Structure Motivate Daily-Life Travel Behavior? - Examples from Qualitative Interviews 6. Which Relationships Exist between Residential Location and Travel Behavior after Controlling for Demographic, Socioeconomic and Attitudinal Factors? 7. How does Residential Location Influence Location of Activities, Trip Lengths, Activity Participation and Travel Time? 8. Are there Additional, Indirect Effects of Residential Location on Travel? 9. Does Residential Location Influence Daily-Life Travel Differently among Different Population Groups? 10. Are Short Daily Trips Compensated by Higher Leisure Mobility? 11. Conclusions from the Copenhagen Metropolitan Area Study 12. Urban Form and Travel Behavior - A Wider Sustainability Perspective 13. Planning for a Sustainable and less Car-Dependent Urban Development References Appendix: The Independent Variables Included in Most of the Multivariate Analyses of the Main Survey Index Notes

From Traditional to Reformed: A Review of the Land Use Regulations in the Nation’s 50 Largest Metropolitan Areas

Abstract: Local land use regulations aid in the definition of the character of towns, cities, counties, and entire regions. Infrastructure control, zoning, urban containment, comprehensive plans, permit caps, and building moratoriums can promote density, drive development outward, or something in between. They can also directly affect the composition of residents by facilitating low-income residents and rental properties, especially when these regulations go along with programs to promote affordable housing. This comprehensive survey of local land use regulations finds a wide variety of regulatory types. It classifies them in four broad typologies, across the nation’s 50 largest metropolitan areas. These types range from restrictive and exclusionary to accommodating and innovative. The regulations produce a variety of effects on metropolitan density and growth, and on the opportunities afforded to the inhabitants of the areas.

Slums of urban Bangladesh: mapping and census 2005.

Abstract: This report presents results from a census and mapping of slums in the six main cities of Bangladesh in 2005. This effort has generated a wealth of information about the location and basic characteristics of their slums. The outputs include detailed maps of the six cities providing timely information on the location of slums within each including highly detailed ward-level maps revealing the position and geographic size of the slums within them. Accompanying these maps is an extensive database listing the slums within each ward of each city providing for each an exact address and a set of basic characteristics (including the number of households and total population as well as a basic demographic socioeconomic and environmental description). Taken together the outputs provide a powerful set of tools for generating a comprehensive picture of contemporary slum life in the main cities of Bangladesh. The census and mapping focused on the six city corporations of Bangladesh namely Dhaka Chittagong Khulna Rajshahi Sylhet and Barisal. In the case of Dhaka the effort extended beyond the limits of the city corporation to encompass the Dhaka Metropolitan Area (DMA). (excerpt)

Accessibility, Activity Participation and Location of Activities: Exploring the Links between Residential Location and Travel Behaviour:

Abstract: By investigating relationships between residential location and the availability of facilities, location of activities, trip distances, activity participation and trip frequencies, this paper seeks to contribute to a more detailed and nuanced understanding of the relationships between residential location and the amount of daily-life travel in an urban region. The empirical data are from a comprehensive study of residential location and travel in Copenhagen Metropolitan Area. Differences between inner- and outer-area residents in activity frequencies and trip frequencies are modest and partly outweigh each other. However, differences in trip distances due to the location of the dwelling relative to concentrations of facilities translate into substantially longer total travelling distances among suburbanites than among inner-city residents.

Modeling the problem of locating collection areas for urban waste management. An application to the metropolitan area of Barcelona

Abstract: Reverse logistics problems arising in municipal waste management are both wide-ranging and varied. The usual collection system in UE countries is composed of two phases. First, citizens leave their refuse at special collection areas where different types of waste (glass, paper, plastic, organic material) are stored in special refuse bins. Subsequently, each type of waste is collected separately and moved to its final destination (a recycling plant or refuse dump). The present study focuses on the problem of locating these collection areas. We establish the relationship between the problem, the set covering problem and the MAX-SAT problem and then go on to develop a genetic algorithm and a GRASP heuristic to, respectively, solve each formulation. Finally, the quality of the algorithms is tested in a computational experience with real instances from the metropolitan area of Barcelona, as well as a reduced set of set covering instances from the literature.

Job Accessibility as an Indicator of Auto-Oriented Urban Structure: A Comparison of Boston and Los Angeles with Tokyo

Abstract: Studies suggest that sprawling and auto-oriented development patterns present more difficulties for people without cars to access economic opportunities. We examine intrametropolitan and intermetropolitan variations in job accessibility by commuting mode as an indicator of auto-oriented urban structure, selecting Boston, Los Angeles, and Tokyo as study areas. Although in both US and Japanese metropolitan areas, job accessibility is significantly lower for public transit users than for auto users, job accessibility for public transit users in the US cases is strikingly lower than in Tokyo. The international comparison provides a clear picture of the significant disadvantage in accessing job opportunities encountered by US workers who are unable to use private vehicles. The empirical results uncover an important dimension of urban structure that deserves much attention from planners and policymakers.

Small Cities: Urban Experience Beyond the Metropolis

Abstract: 1. Conceptualizing Small Cities Part 1: The Political Economy of Small Cities 2. On the Dynamics of Ambivalent Urbanization and Urban Productivity in Port Louis, Mauritius 3. Temp Town: Temporality as a Place Promotion Niche in The World's Furniture Capital 4. Jumping Scale: From Small Town Politics to a 'Regional Presence'? Re-Doing Economic Governance in Canada's Technology Triangle 5. Tourism in a Reluctantly Small City-Island-Nation: Insights From Singapore Part 2: The Urban Hierarchy And Competitive Advantage 6. The Festival Phenomenon: Festivals, Events and the Promotion of Small Urban Areas 7. Gentrifying Down the Urban Hierarchy: 'The Cascade Effect' in Portland, Maine 8. The Re-Construction of a Small Scottish City: Re-Discovering Dundee 9. Urban Myth: The Symbolic Sizing of Weimar, Germany Part 3: The Cultural Economy of Small Cities 10. Garden Cities and City Gardens 11. Small Cities for a Small Country: Sustaining the Cultural Renaissance? 12. Creative Small Cities: Cityscapes, Power and the Arts 13. Rethinking Small Places - Urban and Cultural Creativity: Examples from Sweden, the USA and Bosnia-Herzegovina Part 4: Identity, Lifestyle and Forms of Sociability 14. Caudan: Domesticating the Global Waterfront 15. De-Centring Metropolitan Youth Identities: Boundaries, Difference and Sense of Place 16. Small City - Big Ideas: Culture-Led Regeneration and the Consumption of Place 17. Afterword - Sizing Up Small Cities

Urban Economics and Real Estate: Theory and Policy

Abstract: Part I: Economics and Urban Areas. Chapter 1. Introduction to Urban Economics. Chapter 2. Schools of Thought in Urban Economics. Chapter 3. Location Decisions, Agglomeration Economies, and the Origins of Cities. Chapter 4. The Economic Functions of Cities. Part II: Location Patterns in Urban Areas. Chapter 5. Introduction to Urban Location Patterns: Static Analysis. Chapter 6. Using the Monocentric City Model. Chapter 7. Empirical Testing of the Moncentric City Model. Part III: Urban Housing and Real Estate. Chapter 8. Housing in Urban Areas. Chapter 9. Housing Policy in the United States. Chapter 10. Real Estate Law and Institutions. Chapter 11. Real Estate Markets. Chapter 12. Real Estate Development and Investment. Part IV: Government in Urban Areas. Chapter 13. The Public Sector in Urban Areas. Chapter 14. Urban Transportation. Part V: Urban Social Problems. Chapter 15. An Overview of Urban Social Problems. Chapter 16. Urban Poverty and Its Spatial Concentration. Chapter 17. Crime in Urban Areas. Chapter 18. Education, Labor Markets, and Migration. Part VI: Urban Growth. Chapter 19. Models of Metropolitan Economic Growth. Chapter 20. Agglomeration Economies, Technical Change, and Urban Growth. Chapter 21. Economic Development Policies for Urban Areas. Appendix: A Review of Some Mathematics and Microeconomic Theory. Answers to Selected Exercises. Index.