The heterogeneity and change in the urban structure of metropolitan areas in the United States, 1990–2010

Leyk, Stefan; Balk, Deborah; Jones, Benjamin A.; Montgomery, Mark R.; Engin, Hasim

doi:10.1038/s41597-019-0329-6

Cited by 24 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 62 publications

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“…While there are established geographical databases on natural land-cover that have been derived using consistent methodologies, until recently there has been no equivalent for urban land-cover types. Since 2000 there have been a number of initiatives at mapping population and building land-covers at global scales using earth observation data, census and building footprint information 24 – 26 . However, these need to be complemented by a landscape approach that can distinguish urban surfaces on a holistic basis, which accounts for the typical combination of micro-scale land-covers and associated physical properties.…”

Section: Background and Summarymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Combining expert and crowd-sourced training data to map urban form and functions for the continental US

et al. 2020

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Although continental urban areas are relatively small, they are major drivers of environmental change at local, regional and global scales. Moreover, they are especially vulnerable to these changes owing to the concentration of population and their exposure to a range of hydro-meteorological hazards, emphasizing the need for spatially detailed information on urbanized landscapes. These data need to be consistent in content and scale and provide a holistic description of urban layouts to address different user needs. Here, we map the continental United States into Local Climate Zone (LCZ) types at a 100 m spatial resolution using expert and crowd-sourced information. There are 10 urban LCZ types, each associated with a set of relevant variables such that the map represents a valuable database of urban properties. These data are benchmarked against continental-wide existing and novel geographic databases on urban form. We anticipate the dataset provided here will be useful for researchers and practitioners to assess how the configuration, size, and shape of cities impact the important human and environmental outcomes.

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Section: Background and Summarymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The product is distinguished from other urban typologies (e.g. 26 , 28 , 29 ) which focus on individual aspects of urban cover (e.g. residential, commercial and industrial) without providing ancillary information.…”

Section: Background and Summarymentioning

confidence: 99%

Combining expert and crowd-sourced training data to map urban form and functions for the continental US

et al. 2020

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“…In this section, we provide an overview of the various input data sets, including a discussion of the uncertainties. Such uncertainties may have considerable impacts on the ultimate estimates of persons, particularly when stratified along an urban-rural continuum in the LECZ, and must therefore be carefully understood (Gesch, 2018;Hawker et al, 2019;Uuemaa et al, 2020;Mondal and Tatem, 2012;Lichter et al, 2010;Leyk et al, 2019b). Since it has been shown that accuracy of the digital elevation models (DEMs) -upon which the LECZs are based -is highly sensitive to local conditions, including land cover, it is therefore sensible to evaluate a variety of DEMs that can be used to estimate population and land area in the LECZ.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Estimating population and urban areas at risk of coastal hazards, 1990–2015: how data choices matter

MacManus

Balk

Engin

et al. 2021

Earth Syst. Sci. Data

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Abstract. The accurate estimation of population living in the low-elevation coastal zone (LECZ) – and at heightened risk from sea level rise – is critically important for policymakers and risk managers worldwide. This characterization of potential exposure depends on robust representations not only of coastal elevation and spatial population data but also of settlements along the urban–rural continuum. The empirical basis for LECZ estimation has improved considerably in the 13 years since it was first estimated that 10 % of the world's population – and an even greater share of the urban population – lived in the LECZ (McGranahan et al., 2007a). Those estimates were constrained in several ways, not only most notably by a single 10 m LECZ but also by a dichotomous urban–rural proxy and population from a single source. This paper updates those initial estimates with newer, improved inputs and provides a range of estimates, along with sensitivity analyses that reveal the importance of understanding the strengths and weaknesses of the underlying data. We estimate that between 750 million and nearly 1.1 billion persons globally, in 2015, live in the ≤ 10 m LECZ, with the variation depending on the elevation and population data sources used. The variations are considerably greater at more disaggregated levels, when finer elevation bands (e.g., the ≤ 5 m LECZ) or differing delineations between urban, quasi-urban and rural populations are considered. Despite these variations, there is general agreement that the LECZ is disproportionately home to urban dwellers and that the urban population in the LECZ has grown more than urban areas outside the LECZ since 1990. We describe the main results across these new elevation, population and urban-proxy data sources in order to guide future research and improvements to characterizing risk in low-elevation coastal zones (https://doi.org/10.7927/d1x1-d702, CIESIN and CIDR, 2021).

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“…By examining specific cities, we are able to better visualize and interpret fine-scale trends in classification over time. Here, we focus specifically on Atlanta and New York City, though bearing in mind that there is much heterogeneity in urban form, and change thereof, among the cities in the US [30]. The former is representative of cities of the sunbelt region that have experienced significant growth and expansion over the past half century.…”

Section: City-scale Census Analysis: Atlanta and New Yorkmentioning

confidence: 99%

Urban Change in the United States, 1990–2010: A Spatial Assessment of Administrative Reclassification

2020

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In today’s increasingly urban world, understanding the components of urban population growth is essential. While the demographic components of natural increase and migration have received the overwhelming share of attention to date, this paper addresses the effects of administrative reclassification on urban population growth as derived from census data, which remain largely unstudied. We adopt a spatial approach, using the finest resolution US census data available for three decennial census periods, to estimate the magnitude of reclassification and examine the spatial-temporal variation in reclassification effects. We supplement the census data by using satellite-derived settlement data to further explain reclassification outcomes. We find that while 10% and 7% of the population live in areas that underwent urban/rural reclassification during the 1990–2000 and 2000–2010 time periods, respectively (with smaller fractions of corresponding land), reclassification has a substantial effect on metrics derived to characterize the urbanization process—comprising roughly 44% and 34% of total urban population growth over each period. The estimated magnitude of this effect is sensitive to assumptions regarding the timing of reclassification. The approach also reveals where, how, to what degree, and, in some part, why reclassification is affecting to the process of urbanization on the fine spatial scale, including the impact of underlying demographic processes. This research provides new directions to more effectively study coupled nature–human systems and their interactions.

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The heterogeneity and change in the urban structure of metropolitan areas in the United States, 1990–2010

Cited by 24 publications

References 62 publications

Combining expert and crowd-sourced training data to map urban form and functions for the continental US

Combining expert and crowd-sourced training data to map urban form and functions for the continental US

Estimating population and urban areas at risk of coastal hazards, 1990–2015: how data choices matter

Urban Change in the United States, 1990–2010: A Spatial Assessment of Administrative Reclassification

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