The multifunctionality of urban farming: perceived benefits for neighbourhood improvement

Urban farming – a type of urban agriculture focused on entrepreneurial food production – serves multiple functions in neighbourhoods; yet these are not well delineated. Expectations for urban farming often centre on traditional measures of economic development, potentially overlooking other benefits. Through a qualitative case study conducted in Baltimore, Maryland, we sought to understand community perceptions regarding the ways in which urban farms can benefit cities. Interviews with residents, neighbourhood leaders, and urban farmers in three residential neighbourhoods with urban farms revealed the pathways by which community members view farms as improving neighbourhoods. Benefits stemmed from four primary changes urban farms made to study neighbourhoods: creation of public projects welcoming involvement, physical improvement of degraded space, production of local food, and creation of new businesses. These changes led to multiple perceived benefits including increased social connectedness, a transformed physical landscape, improved neighbourhood reputation, increased access to fresh produce, and educational, youth development, and employment opportunities. Our findings demonstrate the importance of a multifunctional paradigm that accounts for social and educational functions in assessing the value of urban farming and bring empirical evidence to the concept of multifunctional agriculture. Urban farms with strong social aims may appear to contribute little to economic development if measured using traditional indicators of success such as job creation or fiscal impacts, but provide numerous other benefits for community development.     

资源产业空间集聚与区域经济增长:“资源诅咒”效应实证

针对"资源诅咒"研究中自然资源度量指标选取存在的科学性问题,利用资源产业空间集聚代替自然资源丰裕度和资源产业依赖度作为自然资源丰裕程度的解释变量。首先,在Krugman空间基尼系数的基础上,构建适用于测度资源产业空间集聚的计算公式,基于我国30个省(区、市)层面的数据,量化1999—2013年间资源产业的空间集聚程度,分析其排名情况和分布格局。研究显示:我国有15个省(区、市)存在资源产业空间集聚现象,这些地区大多位于长江以北,且均为自然资源富集地区。其次,构建经济增长计量模型,选取存在资源产业空间集聚现象的省(区、市)作为样本空间,并采用多种计量分析和检验方法考察资源产业空间集聚度与区域经济增长之间的直接和间接关系,分析"资源诅咒"的传导机制。研究显示:1在模型整体估计中,资源产业空间集聚的系数符号均为负,且在5%的水平上显著,说明资源产业空间集聚与区域经济增长间的关系呈现负相关,符合"资源诅咒"的基本假设。2在模型分步估计中,人力资本投资、技术创新投入和制造业发展与区域经济增长正相关,符合经典经济增长理论的逻辑关系;物质资本投资与区域经济增长负相关,可能是由于当地经济主体的消费跨期替代弹性较小,导致物质资本投资对经济增长的直接增益效应小于其对社会人力资本积累的负向效应,进而阻碍区域经济增长;政府干涉程度越高越不利于经济增长。根据研究结果,建议应明确市场调节为主、政府调控为辅的导向机制,进一步提升资源产业空间集聚程度,强化行业人员素质与技术水平匹配,逐步提高自然资源生产和利用效率,从而实现加快地区经济转型,有效促进经济可持续发展的全面提升。     

2000~2014年武汉市城市扩展时空特征分析

基于不同时相的高分辨率遥感影像，采用面向对象的解译方法提取了武汉市2000、2005、2010和2014年的土地覆被信息，从城市扩展强度指数，城市中心坐标迁移和分形维数等方面分析了武汉市2000～2014年城市扩展时空特征。结果表明：2000～2014年间，武汉市城市扩展强度指数为1.41，各主城区城市扩展强度不一，洪山区建设用地的增加对主城区城市扩展的贡献最大；在扩展过程中，武汉市城市分形维数增加，城市空间形态变复杂；其扩展呈现核心-放射扩展模式，并逐渐转向圈层式；自然条件、经济、人口、交通、政策和城市规划是武汉市城市扩展的主要驱动力，但随着交通的发展，自然条件和经济对武汉市城市扩展的驱动作用正逐渐减弱。     

基于高频AQI数据的关中城市群空气污染规律探索

基于高频分时AQI及各污染物浓度数据,本文使用"AQI小时指数"、首要污染物等进行统计分析并建立VAR模型对关中城市群空气污染的总体情况、日内波动规律以及城市间空气污染的关联规律做了不同层次的挖掘。研究结果表明:(1)关中城市群的空气质量整体较差,春、冬季空气污染程度明显大于夏季,空气污染的"季节效应"和"集簇性"明显,且主要表现为颗粒物污染。(2)空气质量的日内波动规律在春、冬两季表现为下半天优于上半天,夏季夜间优于白天。但在不考虑四季AQI小时指数图"相位"差异的情况下,四季空气污染的日内波动呈现出明显的相似性。(3)各城市空气污染存在明显的关联规律。城市群内一个城市空气污染的恶化会加剧其他城市的空气污染,并且对其他城市空气污染的影响峰值会在24小时之内出现,且该影响会随着空间和时间尺度的增大而逐步衰减。     

The Financial Impact of Different Stormwater Fee Types: A Case Study of Two Municipalities in Virginia

Eight stormwater user fees (SUFs) were applied to the City of Roanoke and the Town of Blacksburg, Virginia, to determine the effect each has on how land use type impacts the sources of revenue. Roanoke is larger and includes more industrial areas, but less multifamily impervious areas than Blacksburg, which translates differently in the SUFs. Residential parcels comprise the highest percentage of the revenue in all eight SUFs in Blacksburg and four in Roanoke. For both municipalities, two specific SUFs consistently comprised the highest percentage burden for residential homeowners while three other SUFs demonstrated the highest burden for commercial parcels. Open space parcels contain little impervious area, yet account for up to 27% of the revenue in the Blacksburg Area fee structure. Industrial parcels comprise more revenue in Roanoke, averaging 10.1‐4.5% in Blacksburg. Fee types that are easier to administer (e.g., Flat fees) may not fully represent the stormwater contribution from the parcels. SUF types that more accurately represent the stormwater burden on the municipality are also more administratively intensive and are more variable with fee factors.     

Toward an Alignment of Stormwater Flow and Urban Space

Urban stormwater practices are individually diverse, but they are components of an overall urban watershed system. This study proposes a conceptual model of that system, including its component spatial areas, their arrangement along the flow route, and their associations with urban land uses and values. The model defines three spatial areas along the flow route which have evolved over time into their present forms: (1) the source area, which is arranged and furnished primarily or entirely for human use, accommodation, and comfort; (2) the perimeter area, where specialized stormwater facilities carry away source‐area runoff or buffer downstream areas from its impacts; and (3) the downstream area, which receives the discharges from the perimeter or directly from the source area. Each area presents a specific combination of stormwater features and human interactions, and excludes others. Considering stormwater flows and functions in the context of physical urban spaces brings into view the spaces’ urban structures and interacting agendas. This model allows practitioners to navigate conceptually through the system, and to focus appropriate objectives and structures on each project site.     

Two Hundred Years of Local Avian Extinctions in Eastern Amazonia

Local, regional, and global extinctions caused by habitat loss, degradation, and fragmentation have been widely reported for the tropics. The patterns and drivers of this loss of species are now increasingly well known in Amazonia, but there remains a significant gap in understanding of long‐term trends in species persistence and extinction in anthropogenic landscapes. Such a historical perspective is critical for understanding the status and trends of extant biodiversity as well as for identifying priorities to halt further losses. Using extensive historical data sets of specimen records and results of contemporary surveys, we searched for evidence of local extinctions of a terra firma rainforest avifauna over 200 years in a 2500 km² eastern Amazonian region around the Brazilian city of Belém. This region has the longest history of ornithological fieldwork in the entire Amazon basin and lies in the highly threatened Belém Centre of Endemism. We also compared our historically inferred extinction events with extensive data on species occurrences in a sample of catchments in a nearby municipality (Paragominas) that encompass a gradient of past forest loss. We found evidence for the possible extinction of 47 species (14% of the regional species pool) that were unreported from 1980 to 2013 (80% last recorded between 1900 and 1980). Seventeen species appear on the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List, and many of these are large‐bodied. The species lost from the region immediately around Belém are similar to those which are currently restricted to well‐forested catchments in Paragominas. Although we anticipate the future rediscovery or recolonization of some species inferred to be extinct by our calculations, we also expect that there are likely to be additional local extinctions, not reported here, given the ongoing loss and degradation of remaining areas of native vegetation across eastern Amazonia. Doscientos Años de Extinciones Locales de Aves en la Amazonia Oriental     

Growth in urban extent and allometric analysis of West African cities

Urban area expansion is happening at much faster rates in Asian and African cities than elsewhere in the world. This study uses multi-temporal Landsat images to map the urban extent of six small to large cities in West Africa at four different time steps from the early 1970s–2010. The selected cities are Kumasi of Ghana, Daloa of Cote d’Ivoire, Abuja and Kano in Nigeria, Kindia of Guinea, and Ouagadougou of Burkina Faso. All cities revealed significant urban growth in both urban area and population; however, it was apparent that there was a lot of variability in urban area development. Exponential urban growth rates in the cities were measured as ranging between 0.026 and 0.077, with allometric scaling factors matching those of other countries.     

我国长江流域中三角区域大气污染物排放特征研究

中三角区域已经是我国第四个国家级城市群,也将成为我国经济增长的"第四极"。在经济发展的同时,更需要以节能减排、资源环境等为重点,以实现经济建设与生态文明"双可持续"的协同发展。本文以二氧化硫、氮氧化物、烟(粉)尘为主要大气污染物,对我国中三角区域大气污染物排放进行了详细的分析,并与京津冀、长三角、珠三角、"三区十群"等进行了多方位比较。结果表明,2013年中三角区域二氧化硫排放量为151.7万t,其中工业二氧化硫排放量为140.1万t;氮氧化物排放量为147.2万t,其中工业氮氧化物排放量为93.6万t;烟(粉)尘排放量为81.8万t,其中工业烟(粉)尘排放量为71.4万t。中三角区域二氧化硫、氮氧化物、烟(粉)尘排放量均位于"四极"的第三。中三角区域二氧化硫、氮氧化物、烟(粉)尘单位GDP排放强度分别为25.03t/亿元、24.29 t/亿元、13.50 t/亿元,分别位于"四极"的第一、第二、第二。同时,本文还从经济发展模式、产业结构调整、煤炭消费方式等方面对我国中三角等经济"四极"提出了相关建议。