Analyzing the Effects of Spatial Interaction among City Clusters on Urban Growth—Case of Wuhan Urban Agglomeration

Abstract

Abstract:For the past two decades, China's urbanization has attracted increasing attention from scholars around the world. Numerous insightful studies have attempted to determine the socioeconomic causes of the rapid urban growth in Chinese cities. However, most of these studies regarded each city as a single entity, with few considering inter-city relationships. The present study uses a gravity-based model to measure the spatial interaction among city clusters in the Wuhan urban agglomeration (WUA), which is one of China's most rapidly urbanizing regions. The effects of spatial interaction on urban growth area were also analyzed. Empirical results indicate that, similar to urban population or employment in secondary and tertiary industries in the WUA from 2000 to 2005, the spatial interaction among city clusters is one of the main drivers of urban growth. In fact, this study finds the effects of spatial interaction as the only socioeconomic factor that affected the spatial expansion from 2005 to 2010. This finding suggests that population migration and information and commodity flows showed greater influence than the socioeconomic drivers of each city did on promoting urbanization in the WUA during this period. We thus argue that spatial interaction among city clusters should be a consideration in future regional planning.

Decentralization and Polycentricity: Spatial Changes of Employment in Beijing Metropolitan Area, China

“…That has led to a major human migration from the countryside to cities, especially to Beijing, Shanghai and other large cities [3]. The population in the city center, which is overly aggregative and monocentric, has resulted in many urban ailments, such as traffic congestion [4], environmental degradation [5], housing shortages [6] and other problems.…”

Land Use Change, Spatial Interaction, and Sustainable Development in the Metropolitan Urban Areas, South Sulawesi Province, Indonesia

“…The core-periphery relationship is characterized by a pattern of population mobility and highly intensive circular migration. The authors of [28] stated that migration trends among countries in the five categories are described, and a tentative explanation of these patterns is offered. The phenomenon of spatial expansion in the core city of Makassar results in a movement of activities in the form of people, goods and services from the core city to the periphery.…”

Exploration of the Industrial Spatial Linkages in Urban Agglomerations: A Case of Urban Agglomeration in the Middle Reaches of the Yangtze River, China

“…In the 1940s, Zipf introduced the universal gravity model into city systems, and established a spatial interaction model of urban economy [8]. After that, the gravity model has become the most popular method for studying industrial spatial linkages [9][10][11][12][13][14]. For example, Tan et al had quantitatively measured the interaction between cities in the Wuhan Metropolitan Area (WMA) based on the gravity model [10].…”

“…After that, the gravity model has become the most popular method for studying industrial spatial linkages [9][10][11][12][13][14]. For example, Tan et al had quantitatively measured the interaction between cities in the Wuhan Metropolitan Area (WMA) based on the gravity model [10]. With the continuous advancement of related research, there are more quantitative models applied to the study of industrial spatial linkages.…”

“…These studies can only provide partial references, rather than any more detailed recommendations for regional economic development planning and policy making. In terms of methods, the more commonly used models are the gravity model [9][10][11][12][13][14], social network analysis [9,15], and the urban flow model [16,21]. Among these models, the gravity model is much more popular to study regional economic linkages due to its simple structure and universal applicability.…”