What Is Urban after All? A Critical Review of Measuring and Mapping Urban Typologies in Portugal

Abstract

The concept of urban area is complex and has been discussed for many years by several authors and organisations through different perspectives and methodological approaches. For administrative and comparison purposes statistical institutions, both at the national and international levels, classify territories according to a certain degree of urbanisation defining typologies from which indicators and certain public policies are applied. The purpose of this study is to discuss the relevance and suitability of different urban typologies. Through mapping and measuring the data of official documents, the urban dimension of Mainland Portuguese territory is discussed and its usefulness concerning the allocation of resources for promoting territorial cohesion is stressed. Results show the inadequacy of these classifications to inform planning actions, decision making, and to promote territorial policies. It also provides evidence of inaccuracies that distort the reading of the territorial reality of the case study.

Spatiotemporal Characteristics of Urban Land Expansion and Population Growth in Africa from 2001 to 2019: Evidence from Population Density Data

“…Taking Lagos as an example, urban land generated from LandScan mainly overlapped on the builtup land from MCD12Q1 (Figure 4). Using the simple dichotomous division method [10], the built-up land that did not coincide with urban land was regarded as rural land. As a result, land-use maps comprised eight types, including forest, grassland, urban land, rural land, cropland, barren land, water, and other.…”

“…To study the land-use change of u integrated the urban land generated above with these seven types of lan Lagos as an example, urban land generated from LandScan mainly overl built-up land from MCD12Q1 (Figure 4). Using the simple dichotomous div [10], the built-up land that did not coincide with urban land was regarded As a result, land-use maps comprised eight types, including forest, grasslan rural land, cropland, barren land, water, and other. At last, through the tran urban land-use change, we can get the situation of other land-use types occu land.…”

Urban Boundary Demarcation—An iCN Model Approach

“…However, lesser attention has been paid from the research community to delineate the urban boundaries in a systematic manner, as most of the countries continue to remain on the minimum population size threshold with fixed administrative classifications to delineate the urban boundaries of cities by considering the diversity of natural and physical attributes. (Dijkstra et al 2021), (Henriques et al 2020). For instance, in Sri Lanka, Municipalities and Urban Council areas are distinguished as urbanized areas by considering the population density and natural and physical characteristics of the land in these areasregardless of its urban functionality.…”

“…Thus, applying these thresholds and classifications as spatial units to classify the urban boundaries of cities has resulted in a significant mismatch of the cities' actual scale, size, and shape of the urban boundaries and reduced the international comparability of the urban scales of cities (Dijkstra et al 2021), (Song et al 2018). This contradiction of urban area classification is discussed in depth by (Henriques et al 2020), and it distinguishes the different approaches applied to classify the different territories as urban, depending on the different official institutions and the purposes that initiate these classifications. In such a context, this dilemma hindered the implementation of sustainable development measures and the social policy making of cities because such efforts were not affected to the actual city area (Dijkstra et al 2021).…”