Comparing the Use of Spatially Explicit Indicators and Conventional Indicators in the Evaluation of Healthy Cities: A Case Study in Shenzhen, China

Jun Yang, Xiangyu Luo, Yixiong Xiao, Shaoqing Shen, Mo Su, Yuqi Bai and Peng Gong
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Jun Yang: Key Laboratory of Urban Land Resources Monitoring and Simulation, Ministry of Natural Resources, Shenzhen 518034, China
Xiangyu Luo: Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System Modeling, Department of Earth System Science, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Yixiong Xiao: Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System Modeling, Department of Earth System Science, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Shaoqing Shen: Shenzhen Research Center of Digital City Engineering, Shenzhen Municipal Bureau of Planning and Natural Resource Management, Shenzhen 518034, China
Mo Su: School of Resource and Environment Science, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430079, China
Yuqi Bai: Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System Modeling, Department of Earth System Science, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Peng Gong: Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System Modeling, Department of Earth System Science, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 20, 1-17

Abstract: Various indicator systems have been developed to monitor and assess healthy cities. However, few of them contain spatially explicit indicators. In this study, we assessed four health determinants in Shenzhen, China, using both indicators commonly included in healthy city indicator systems and spatially explicit indicators. The spatially explicit indicators were developed using detailed building information or social media data. Our results showed that the evaluation results of districts and sub-districts in Shenzhen based on spatially explicit indicators could be positively, negatively, or not associated with the evaluation results based on conventional indicators. The discrepancy may be caused by the different information contained in the two types of indicators. The spatially explicit indicators measure the quantity of the determinants and the spatial accessibility of these determinants, while the conventional indicators only measure the quantity. Our results also showed that social media data have great potential to represent the high-resolution population distribution required to estimate spatially explicit indicators. Based on our findings, we recommend that spatially explicit indicators should be included in healthy city indicator systems to allow for a more comprehensive assessment of healthy cities.

Keywords: indicator system; health cities; evaluation; spatial distance; social media data (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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