Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science

During the 1940s a series of remarkable and radical planning documents, generally now collectively referred to as ‘reconstruction plans’, were produced for many British cities. Universally, these sought to introduce a highly interventionist, comprehensive planning, often with strong elements of ‘clean sweep’ reconstruction. The author considers two such plans, for the historic cities of Durham and Warwick. He examines how the authors of these plans sought to reconcile the desire to achieve functional modern places with historic character, in a period of growing consciousness of the historic qualities of place. The author concludes by briefly considering the legacy of these plans on ideas about planning in historic towns and cities.

Accurate and timely traffic information enables road users to make informed decisions to enable them to optimise their route choices by avoiding congestion. Such information is instrumental to transport management as bus and taxi operators can reschedule their fleets in response to prevailing traffic conditions to minimise the effects of traffic congestion on their services. The information can also be used by the traffic management control centres of transport and highway authorities to streamline the timing control of traffic signals and the broadcast of traffic advice via variable message signs. Real-time traffic information is gathered from point-based traffic surveillance and monitoring detectors, and the piecemeal data fitted to interpolate or model road conditions over a transport network. The process of gathering and transforming point-based traffic data to display an area view is computationally intensive and often fails to meet the instant requirements of a real-time traffic information system. The authors propose a real-time traffic multimedia Internet geographic information system that is capable of transmitting video images and modelling road conditions in real time. The prototype system is capable of calibrating data from traffic closed-circuit television images that are modelled over the entire road network for broadcasting to road users on the world-wide web with a time lapse of 3–4 minutes. The authors also suggest potential applications of the prototype system.

Business improvement districts (BIDs) are a popular economic development tool as evidenced by their proliferation from North America to Africa to Europe. In an effort to provide investors, visitors, and residents with more secure public spaces, the majority of BID organizations pay for supplemental security and sanitation services. Following a brief discussion of the theoretical underpinnings of the BID concept, this study describes BID security and sanitation programs and evaluates their impact on patterns of criminal activity in the City of Philadelphia using a customized goegraphic information system. Further, it introduces a point-based method of analysis that simultaneously considers the spatial and temporal characteristics of individual crime incidents. Results from this quantitative–qualitative study suggest that BID security services have a deterrent effect on such criminal activities as theft and burglary. Additionally, this paper makes the case that, as BID organizations continue to emerge, it is imperative that we develop more sophisticated models for evaluating their potential impacts. Controversies, like whether BIDs cause wealth-based inequalities in the delivery of public services, remain viable avenues for future research.

This paper presents a conceptual framework to formalize an individual-based and spatially explicit model of the epidemiology of infectious diseases. The framework differs from that of the traditional population-based epidemiological models in terms of assumptions, conceptual models, and model structures. In particular, the author discusses four aspects of the model: (1) population segments or unique individuals as the modeling unit, (2) continuous process or discrete events to represent the disease development through time, (3) traveling wave or network dispersion to represent the disease transmission in space, and (4) within-group and between-group interactions to represent local and long-distance transmissions. Based on these conceptual discussions, a simple influenza epidemic is simulated in order to illustrate the application of the proposed framework.

It has been widely asserted that the morphology of urban areas is a result of the interactions of urban function and urban form. This has led a number of studies to postulate, either explicitly or implicitly, that a mapping exists between the physical form (land cover) of the urban fabric and its corresponding function and activity (land use), although relatively little quantitative evidence has been presented to support this assertion. This paper presents the results of an investigation into the relationship between urban form and urban function using fine spatial scale digital map data. These are used to derive quantitative information on the morphological properties and spatial structure of the buildings present in a series of urban land-use categories identified in two urban areas (Cardiff and Orpington) in the United Kingdom. A statistical separability analysis of these land-use samples suggests that a mapping exists between urban form and function, which, if replicated for other urban areas, would allow urban land use to be inferred from an analysis of the spatial disposition of land-cover parcels, particularly buildings.

Urban policy in the United Kingdom emphasises the importance of good design as a key component in the revitalisation of towns and cities. In particular, housebuilders are being encouraged to develop sustainable construction practices, and to sensitise the design of dwellings to incorporate local building materials, design styles, and traditions. The government has noted that the building regulations will play a key role in ensuring the development and delivery of design quality. However, there is little or no knowledge of how far, and in what ways, the building regulations will be able to attain the objectives that government has set. The paper evaluates the role and relevance of the building regulations in seeking to deliver design quality in dwellings. It does so with reference to an empirical study of Part M of the building regulations (for England and Wales). This requires builders to provide access to dwellings for disabled people. The research indicates that the use of the building regulations is unlikely to raise, significantly, the quality of design in dwellings.

A growing trend towards high-density urban living increases the significance of natural features within the urban fabric. In high-rise living the view is one means of continuing contact with the environment. Using visualizations, public survey techniques, and a geographic information system (GIS), we estimate the effect of parks, water, industry, and high-rise buildings on willingness to pay for views from high-level apartments. With the GIS we determine what will be visible within the view and the proportion of different land uses or structures that make up the view. In order to link the analytical variables to the view values a set of base images is systematically altered in terms of the proportion of water, parks, buildings, and industry present in the scenes. Surveys are conducted to determine the willingness of people to pay for preferred views. The results from a regression analysis show that water and green space have positive coefficients and buildings and industry both have negative coefficients. Particular attention is paid to the influence of distance on the view proportions. Our calculations are compared with empirical results from other studies.

Two arguments are made based on the analysis of traveling science exhibitions. First, sufficiently refined techniques of spatial analysis allow us to identify the impact of layout upon visitors' paths and behaviors, even in moderately sized open plans which afford almost random sequences of movement and relatively unobstructed visibility. Specifically, contact with exhibits is associated with their relative accessibility while active engagement is associated with exhibit cross-visibility. Second, newly developed or adapted techniques of analysis allow us to make a transition from modeling the mechanics of spatial movement (the way in which movement is affected by the distribution of obstacles and boundaries) to modeling the manner in which movement registers additional aspects of visual information, particularly the arrangement of exhibits according to conceptual organizing themes. The advantages of such purely spatial modes of analysis extend into providing us with a sharper understanding of some of the underlying constraints within which exhibition content is conceived and designed.