Assessing polycentric urban development in Shanghai, China, with detailed passive mobile phone data

Yang Xiao, Yao Wang, Siyu Miao and Xinyi Niu
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Yang Xiao: College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University, China.
Yao Wang: College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Suzhou University of Science and Technology, China.
Xinyi Niu: College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University, China.

Environment and Planning B, 2021, vol. 48, issue 9, 2656-2674

Abstract: Despite growing studies on the distinction between morphological and functional polycentricity, the present methods for identifying polycentricity often focus on the morphological dimension due to a lack of information about intra-urban functional flows, and are limited by the multifarious nature of people’s spatiotemporal interactions. This study proposes a new approach, examining the degree of polycentricity in Shanghai at the intra-urban level using passive mobile phone data. A series of polycentricity indicators are used and are benchmarked against previous studies. Notably, we found that people’s daily movements within a subcenter indicate that morphological polycentricity is also at play in Shanghai. We conclude that morphological and functional polycentricity may coexist at the intra-urban level, and that a mobile phone data approach can offer an alternative method to elucidate both the morphological and functional features of subcenters.

Keywords: Functional polycentricity; human activity; mobile phone data; Shanghai (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:envirb:v:48:y:2021:i:9:p:2656-2674

DOI: 10.1177/2399808320982306

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