scholarly journals Entropy of the Land Parcel Mosaic as a Measure of the Degree of Urbanization

Entropy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (5) ◽  
pp. 543
Author(s):  
Agnieszka Bitner ◽  
Marcin Fialkowski

Quantifying the urbanization level is an essential yet challenging task in urban studies because of the high complexity of this phenomenon. The urbanization degree has been estimated using a variety of social, economic, and spatial measures. Among the spatial characteristics, the Shannon entropy of the landscape pattern has recently been intensively explored as one of the most effective urbanization indexes. Here, we introduce a new measure of the spatial entropy of land that characterizes its parcel mosaic, the structure resulting from the division of land into cadastral parcels. We calculate the entropies of the parcel areas’ distribution function in different portions of the urban systems. We have established that the Shannon and Renyi entropies R0 and R1/2 are most effective at differentiating the degree of a spatial organization of the land. Our studies are based on 30 urban systems located in the USA, Australia, and Poland, and three desert areas from Australia. In all the cities, the entropies behave the same as functions of the distance from the center. They attain the lowest values in the city core and reach substantially higher values in suburban areas. Thus, the parcel mosaic entropies provide a spatial characterization of land to measure its urbanization level effectively.

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 66-78 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wioletta Szymańska ◽  
Tomasz Michalski

Abstract The article presents an attempt to analyse population changes and to measure the strength of the impact of factors causing these changes in former voivodeship (province) cities in Poland. In view of the ongoing processes of suburbanisation, the discussion also concerns the areas surrounding the city, i.e. those creating urban systems together with the city. These zones were delineated, calling them demographic influence zones, because only demographic factors were involved in defining them. The research was conducted in the period between1999–2015, and took into account the administrative reform of the country that degraded 31 cities from voivodeship (NUTS-2) capitals to poviat (LAU-1) cities. The main aim of the study was to find an answer to the question: do the directions and the strength of population changes confirm a hypothesis of the destructive impact of the loss of administrative function on settlement units. The results of the study only partially confirmed this hypothesis. Although a decrease in the population is overwhelmingly predominant in the city core, in the case of the demographic influence zone, it has already increased. Counting both parts together, it was found that in half of the cases there was a decline and in the other half a growth of the population.


Botany ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 98 (6) ◽  
pp. 333-339
Author(s):  
Lilí Martínez-Domínguez ◽  
Fernando Nicolalde-Morejón ◽  
Francisco Vergara-Silva ◽  
Dennis Wm. Stevenson

Research on urban systems has documented the contributions of cities as sites where insect pollinators undergo their life cycles, contributing to the reproduction of many groups of plants. However, reports of plants whose reproduction is assisted by specialist pollinators under conditions prevalent in cities are scarce. Cycads and insect pollinators are threatened mainly by loss and modification of their habitats. Here, we describe two cases in which cycad species from two genera distributed in Mexico (Ceratozamia tenuis (Dyer) D.W. Stev. & Vovides and Dioon edule Lindl.) reproduce and germinate successfully in urban areas, aided by insects, near their natural distribution areas. The plants examined were artificially planted in different gardens within the city of Xalapa-Enríquez. We found that specimens two genera of insect pollinators, Pharaxonotha sp. (Erotylidae: Pharaxonothinae) on C. tenuis, and Parallocorynus sp., (Belidae: Oxycoryninae) on D. edule, can survive in cycad pollen strobili, maintaining ecological interactions as they would occur in wild, conserved environments. In addition, we found beetles in ovulate strobili during the pollen receptivity phase, which suggests that they effectively reach ovulate strobili with pollen from pollen strobili. Characterization of this gymnosperm–beetle pollination system, which is unexpected in urban areas due the effects of human disturbance on insect communities, could promote new conservation biology research on flagship species in environments and landscapes shaped by anthropogenic impacts.


Proceedings ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 22
Author(s):  
Eric Tokuda ◽  
Cesar Comin ◽  
Roberto Cesar ◽  
Luciano Costa

The spatial organization and the topological organization of cities have a great influence on the lives of their inhabitants, including mobility efficiency. Entropy has been often adopted for the characterization of diverse natural and human-made systems and structures. In this work, we apply the exponential of entropy (evenness) to characterize the uniformity of city blocks. It is suggested that this measurement is related to several properties of real cities, such as mobility. We consider several real-world cities, from which the logarithm of the average shortest path length is also calculated and compared with the evenness of the city blocks. Several interesting results have been found, as discussed in the article.


Urban Science ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 75 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mafalda Toscano ◽  
Luísa Cannas da Silva ◽  
Teresa Heitor

Knowledge and creative businesses and industries have been at the core of discussions for urban renewal strategies worldwide. Educational facilities and the businesses they attract are key elements in urban dynamics, helping to promote urban diversity and contributing to enhancing the areas where they are imbedded. In Portugal, the higher education system follows a binary structure, in which institutions are divided into Universities and Polytechnics. The latter, whose mission is creating vocational-oriented knowledge, grounded on the specific needs of the regions they are in, are key regional drivers, with the possibility of becoming developers and promotors at a regional scale, affecting urban life and urban quality. This paper aims at exploring the location of polytechnic institutions within their hosting cities, attempting to understand location patterns and similarities among different institutions, as well as envisaging the impact of such a location in the engagement with the hosting city. The research is developed at two scales: the first (a) focuses on the location of the institution in its hosting city, while the second (b) focuses on the relative deepness of the internal spaces of the institution. This research aims at providing a methodology for general characterization of regionally oriented higher education institutions in terms of their location within urban systems, as well as exploring the spatial organization of the interior of the institutions analyzed.


Urban History ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 308-326 ◽  
Author(s):  
PHIL JONES

Between 1950 and 1971 Birmingham City Council built 464 housing blocks of five or more storeys. The city pursued parallel programmes of building high-rise flats both in the central areas on slum cleared land and in its suburbs on greenfield sites. Examining Birmingham's post-war suburban housing programme, this article suggests that the use of high-rise in suburban areas represented an important change in the nature of British cities, both in the use of a particular building type on the urban fringe and also in the location of high-density workers' housing far outside of the city core.


Author(s):  
Mykola Habrel ◽  
Mykhailo Habrel

The article assumes that the effectiveness of spatial development of the city largely depends on the analysis and consideration of new properties of space. The phenomena of isomerism and invariance as integral properties of urban space, their connection with other dimensions are studied. The theoretical provisions of the phenomenon of invariance and isomerism for urban planning are comprehended, their essence in relation to the problems of centrism is revealed; the role of urban networks and the dynamism of space; tasks of placing new objects in the complex spatial structure of cities. Approaches to the study and consideration of these characteristics in the spatial organization and development of urban systems are substantiated. The categorical-conceptual apparatus is specified. Invariants are quantities, ratios, and properties that do not change from the changes in the components associated with them. They determine the comfort of the environment, the availability of facilities, the effectiveness of solutions and other properties of the space. The phenomenon of invariance is revealed through the functional zoning of the territory, the concept of centrism and the center of cities, communication connectivity and configuration of the urban network, the location of new objects in urban space. These are the instrumental properties of urban space, which are concentrated around the human dimension and human needs. Isomers in urban planning are changes in the properties of urban space with a constant material structure and environment, which is usually associated with the position of a single element in the system. Understanding this phenomenon is important and effective for understanding the morphology and essence of urban systems. The city is an integral dynamic supersystem, and the development of urban space takes place both according to planned decisions and according to the laws of «living» matter. Space interacts with processes (social, technological, informational, functional and economic); combines squares, streets, recreational environment (parks, gardens, squares), creating their own social values. The principles and requirements for the use of invariance and isomerism in architectural and urban activities are substantiated. Invariants determine the proportions of the ratios of shapes and spaces, environmental friendliness, functionality, nodes and internal geometry of space. Isomeric properties of urban space form, as a rule, qualitative symbolic, aesthetic and historically significant urban elements. They: change the range of impressions for users due to changes in architectural and urban characteristics and interactions with the user; increase individual and collective personalization, as well as general identity; make the space safer for the population, provide continuity in their control; universalize the space, which allows to develop new activities and apply mixed functionalities; organize urban nodes as spaces with high connectivity to other urban nodes and zones. The requirements to the formation of urban space are substantiated: the correct definition of the proportional relations between closed and open space, shape and size; environmental friendliness; functional sufficiency; the internal geometry of space must be determined by man; nodal places as invariants should direct people to cross space in all directions - to guarantee visually expressive entrances, attractive visual landmarks, accessibility, convenience of being near them and in them; the label must meet the criteria of scale and traditional design. It is proved that the use of isomerization provisions and urban invariants can be effective for the recovery and effective development of the urban organism. 


2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (161) ◽  
pp. 58-68
Author(s):  
M. Habrel

The article considers the phenomenon of urban geometry and the essence of geometric problems in urban planning. The proposed approach corresponds to the generally accepted understanding of cities through knowledge of the arts, humanities, social sciences and engineering. Geometry expands the understanding of cities and processes in them both in the historical context and in modern realities and conditions. The definiteness of the geometric dimension in the problems of spatial organization and development of urbanized systems is confirmed. Professional consideration and use of geometric indicators and properties is a condition for increasing the validity of architectural and urban planning decisions. The geometry of the functional city was based on ideas and solutions that focused on process control. The geometry of the space of today's city, according to the author, should stimulate its development by analogy with a living organism. Historical analysis expands the idea of the geometry of the city and its spatial implementation. The characteristics of the geometric measurement of different periods allowed us to conclude that the principles of geometry apply to cities of any time and any culture, are associated with the patterns of urban growth. Urban forms change depending on the scale: increasing the scale of the city to hypercomplex urban systems, the organic analogy grows, pure geometric planning is preserved on a local scale. The theoretical provisions of urban geometry, geometric problems and methods of their solution are substantiated. Identified dichotomies are important for understanding, researching and designing the development of urban systems. They are useful for generalizing different worldviews of space, time and urban geometry: the opposition of the concepts of simplicity and complexity; division and integrity; continuous and intermittent; homogeneity and heterogeneity of the system; certainty and uncertainty. New paradigms and thinking of the city as a hypercomplex system of organic complexity are covered. Geometry determines complexity, scale and shape. Views on space and geometry on the scale of human history have been studied. An attempt is made to understand the "reality" of development and spatial organization of cities. Geometry is used to display order and regularity, as well as in solving urban problems of today. The article highlights, structures and reveals the role of geometry and geometric problems in urban systems, their relationship with other dimensions and problems of spatial organization and urban development. In the model of multidimensional urban space "human - functions - conditions - geometry - time", which was substantiated by the author to solve problems of urban planning (spatial organization and development of urban systems) a special role is given to the geometric dimension, which is described in detail in the article. It includes many characteristics and indicators: size, configuration, shape, concentration of elements, as well as properties related to scale, intrasystem connections and location in the environment. The importance of urban geometry is illustrated using the author's model of multidimensional urban space on the example of geometric problems of Lviv, in particular placement, relocation and division. The solution of the communication and transport problem in the city is characterized and substantiated taking into account the requirements of the new geometry.


1998 ◽  
pp. 41-42
Author(s):  
V. Jukovskyy

On June 5-7, 1998, in the city of Ostroh, Rivne Oblast, on the basis of the Ostroh Academy, the IV International Scientific and Practical Conference "Educating the Younger Generation on the Principles of Christian Morality in the Process of the Spiritual Revival of Ukraine" was held. This year she was devoted to the topic "The Bible on the Territory of Ukraine". About 400 philosophers, psychologists and educators from many Ukrainian cities, as well as philosophers and educators from Belarus, Canada, Poland, Russia, the USA, Turkey and Sweden participated in her work. The conference was attended by theologians and priests of all Christian denominations of Ukraine.


2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 133-161 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valerie Hobbs

Religious institutions in the USA, under the First Amendment, exhibit great strength in employment termination, given freedom by the Supreme Court to conduct their labour and employment practices with limited scrutiny. This article examines ways in which a Presbyterian seminary board report, justifying its decision not to renew a professor's contract, demonstrates discrimination in its use of the 'good family' ideal prominent within conservative Christianity. Focusing on intertextuality and representation of the professor's wife, a disabled woman, analysis presents evidence of an overall strategy of exclusion. The report consistently demonstrates support for negative witness statements about the professor and his wife while undermining the professor's accounts. The report's characterization of the professor's wife subsumes her identity under her husband's and assumes moral reasons for her disability and chronic illness, consistent with a nouthetic counselling ethos. Findings support the discriminatory potential of the 'good family' ideal, underscoring employees' unique vulnerability within religious higher education institutions. 


Urban Studies ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 004209802110140
Author(s):  
Sarah Barns

This commentary interrogates what it means for routine urban behaviours to now be replicating themselves computationally. The emergence of autonomous or artificial intelligence points to the powerful role of big data in the city, as increasingly powerful computational models are now capable of replicating and reproducing existing spatial patterns and activities. I discuss these emergent urban systems of learned or trained intelligence as being at once radical and routine. Just as the material and behavioural conditions that give rise to urban big data demand attention, so do the generative design principles of data-driven models of urban behaviour, as they are increasingly put to use in the production of replicable, autonomous urban futures.


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