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In China, in recent years it has become a prevailing trend to promote the spatial maturity and high-quality transformation of new towns, yet there are few quantitative methods to evaluate their urban morphological maturity. From the perspective of quantitative urban morphology, this paper integrates street view data and cutting-edge analytical techniques into classic urban morphological study and develops a quantitative index for evaluating urban morphological maturity that fits Chinese cities by adjusting the indicators in line with the unique characteristics of the built environment of Chinese cities. Focusing on five new towns, as well as a historic area, of Shanghai, the paper evaluates their urban morphological maturity with this quantitative index and verifies its validity by comparing the evaluation result with that of expert consensus. It then proposes some design guidelines that may provide robust support for the regeneration of these new towns. Given its reliance on the multi-source data of open access and ready availability, this index holds promise for evaluating the urban morphological maturity of other new towns, to provide support for urban form improvement from both holistic and detailed perspectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The identification of built environment elements in neighborhoods that have significant impacts on obesity is the basis for scientifically preventing obesity and related chronic diseases, as well as formulating and implementing spatial intervention policies. In recent years, studies on the relationship between neighborhood built environment and obesity and related behaviors have increased rapidly in China with preliminary progresses. This paper systematically reviews the empirical research on the impacts of neighborhood built environment on obesity and related behaviors which was done in China from 2011 to 2021 and selects 44 papers to extract, summarize, and quantitatively synthesize the research results by using the meta-analysis method and through the weighted Z-test. The meta-analysis shows that, according to their significance, the measured built environment elements in neighborhoods that have significant impacts on obesity and related behaviors are ranked in a descending order as accessibilitydensity of physical activity facilities, accessibility-density of bus stops/transit stations, street connectivity--crossing density, and mixed land use rate--destination amount. Meanwhile, the elements of residential density--population density, accessibility-distance to bus stops/transit stations, and accessibility-distance to physical activity facilities do not show remarkable statistic difference. This implies that community planning should highlight the measures of increasing land use for sports facilities and green spaces, improving public transport system, optimizing road network, and strengthening mixed land use to build healthy communities that can facilitate the prevention of obesity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mode of urban renewal in China has changed from incremental expansion to a value-added stage, and the development of cities has increasingly focused on the human experience and quality improvement. However, Cultural Street Vending and the unique street spaces in the historic districts that bear important connotations to the city have shown a trend of rapid decline and even disappearance. Therefore, how to identify the characteristics and connotations of such street vending spaces, grasp the relationship between perception of locality and built environment elements in different states and formulate targeted protection and renewal strategies is presently an urgent problem to be solved. Many studies have now discussed in detail the identification of elements, street perception and preservation strategies for historic districts. However, the Cultural Street Vending space, which carries special urban memory connotations, has been neglected, especially the characterisation of this type of space in different time dimensions. This paper takes the Cultural Street Vending space as a research object and focuses on the perceptual differences between its market day and non-market day, aiming at grasping the perceptual characteristics and constituent elements of this type of street space in different time states, as well as the patterns of changes they undergo. This paper took the Baxian Temple, a typical Cultural Street Vending space in a historic district of Xi'an, as the research object and took 30 architecture students as the evaluators to score 33 pairs of adjectives and recall the elements of nine streets. This paper compared and analysed the differences in the structure of people's psychological perception of the street in the state of market day and non-market day by SD method. It was found that the activities of the vendors obviously promoted people's positive emotions, and three commonality factors including impression, vitality and morphosis were extracted through the factor analysis. Moreover, through the element recall method to understand the change in element perception on the market day, we found that the range of people's perception was smaller on the market day and summarised the element map of the space and the element components of high, medium and low characteristics. The correlation analysis between psychological quantities and environmental elements revealed that people's positive psychology has a positive correlation with vendors, goods and street components and a negative correlation with greening, colour and texture. This study can provide an important research basis for the development of conservation and renewal strategies for this type of Cultural Street Vending space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The issues of housing and traffic in China's mega cities have become increasingly pressing problems, particularly for middle/low-income tenant workers. These tenants are from less advantaged socioeconomic backgrounds, which has resulted in a significant geographical separation between their workplace and their residence. Although a large number of studies have confirmed that built environment factors have a solid impact on residents' commuting distance, few studies have investigated the mechanism underlying the nonlinear influence on middle/low-income tenants. This paper aims to provide an in-depth analysis of the key factors and nonlinear influencing mechanism of the built environment on middle/low-income tenant workers' commuting distance by establishing a gradient-boosting decision tree model, using Beijing as an empirical case. The paper reveals three primary findings: (1) An important nonlinear relationship between the surrounding built environment and peoples' jobs–housing spatial proximity can be observed for those middle/low-income tenant workers who use slow and public modes of commuting. Specifically, the density of public transport stations, road networks, and workplaces, and the land use mix play a dominant role. (2) A limited effect of built environment factors can be found for the same group of tenant workers who choose cars as their mode of commuting. (3) The differences in self-selected commuting modes have a significant mediating effect on the relationship between the built environment and jobs–housing situation among middle/low-income tenant workers. Given this, effective policy guidance for residents' travel modes is necessary to optimize the built environment indicators to achieve the best effect. In addition, we should consider giving priority to the matching indicators such as land use mix and resident population density. Another possibility is to strengthen the connection to the public transport stations, which in turn can optimize the walkability in residential environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Despite increased literature focusing on the role of the built environment (BE) in health, few cohort studies have quantitatively analyzed neighborhood walkability environment in relation to the risk of death and cardiovascular disease (CVD). This longitudinal study aimed at evaluating the association between perceived BE attributeswith mortality and major CVD based on the Prospective Urban Rural Epidemiology study in China (PURE-China)., Methods: The PURE-China study recruited 47,931 participants aged 35-70 years from 12 provinces of China between 2005 and 2009. The perceived BE information, including land use, street, aesthetics, and safety, was collected using the neighborhood environment walkability scale (NEWS) questionnaire, with higher scores indicating a more favorable rating. Two primary outcomes are all-cause mortality and major CVD event. The Cox frailty model with random intercepts was used to assess the association between the perceived total BE/subscales score and outcomes., Results: Of 32,163 participants included in this study, 19,253 (59.9 %) were women, and the mean (SD) age was 51.0 (9.5) years. After a median follow-up period of 11.7 years (IQR 9.4 - 12.2), we observed that one standard deviation higher of combined BE scores was related to a lower risk of all-cause mortality (HR = 0.85; 95 %CI, 0.80-0.90), and major CVD events (HR = 0.95; 95 %CI, 0.90-0.99). The subscales of perceived BE were related to a lower risk, although a few were not significant. Land use mix-diversity and safety from crime were the two most significant subscales. Stronger risks were observed among urban and female participants., Conclusion: Favorable perceived BE characteristics were linked with a lower risk of all-cause mortality and major CVD events in Chinese population, especially in urban areas and females. Our findings can be used by policymakers to take action to mitigate the adverse effect of poor community conditions on health, such as improving local amenities and transport connectivity, providing building paths for walking, running and cycling., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)

The "City in a Park" (CIP) is a new concept of urban transformation and development proposed in China in recent years, guiding the construction of healthy and sustainable living environments. This paper analyzes urban planning based on the CIP concept from a synergetic perspective, aiming to explore how the integrated planning of ecological spaces and built environments can promote systematic sustainable development in ecology, economy, and society. This research employs methods including document collection, unstructured interviews, field observations, and participatory observation, focusing on a case study of the Sichuan Tianfu New Area (STNA), a demonstration zone for the CIP. The study finds that the planning of the STNA extends the planning scope of urban ecological spaces beyond the traditional urban construction boundaries, not only preserving the natural resources but also enhancing the city's overall sustainability through regional ecological services. By designing ecological spaces as green infrastructure that connects urban and rural areas, the primary sector is more readily integrated with the secondary and tertiary sectors, facilitating the integration of the urban and rural infrastructure and industries. The STNA integrates urban and rural administrative divisions, builds a cross-departmental collaborative management platform, and guides public participation in the planning process, ensuring the efficiency and effectiveness of planning implementation and enhancing the equitable sharing of social services. This research provides new insights into comprehensive, cross-disciplinary, and ecology-oriented urban planning. It offers evidence for an understanding of the application pathways and effects of the CIP concept in urban planning practice and provides valuable experience for other cities to promote harmonious coexistence between the city and nature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's urban expansion, food security, and energy transition are in a critical situation. One solution is to tap into the green production potential of the built urban environment and explore new ways to save land space and alleviate ecological pressure through food and solar energy production. This paper differs from previous ecological compensation studies, which mostly focus on key ecological functional areas or fiscal compensation mechanisms, in that it innovatively establishes an ecological compensation mechanism within the urban space. In this paper, we propose the "green productive area" of cities as a way to measure the ecological carrying capacity improvement potential of cities from the perspective of urban ecology, and it is based on converting the green resource income of cities into the ecological footprint area they could save under the same conditions. First, a typological approach was used to establish a compensation strategy for green production. Second, a spatial inventory was taken of all elements of the built environment and an analysis of their green production potential was carried out. Finally, it was necessary to establish a unified accounting standard for the ecological land saving benefits of different green production options, which could be converted into green productive land area indicators. In the case of Xuefu Street in Nankai District, Tianjin, the available rooftops and idle land were used for green production, which supplemented the ecological carrying capacity provided by the natural land occupied by 12% of the buildings in the district. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent economic advances made by China have now obliged the country to address the need for sustainable urban redevelopment. Unlike other recently developed areas in China, urban villages are in dire need of improvement. Consequently, the redevelopment of urban villages has garnered considerable public and academic interest. However, a comprehensive understanding is lacking on the drivers of urban village redevelopment in China. This study aims to fill this gap through a comprehensive survey of existing literature on redevelopment of urban villages. A total of 167 papers have been retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection database. A bibliometric analysis and a critical content analysis are conducted on the bases of these papers. We found at least three main processes which have driven urban village redevelopment in China. First, the growth of urban population and their income level has created a strong emerging demand to improve urban living conditions, which has triggered the restructuring of urban villages with sub-standard built environment into high-quality urban spaces. Second, from the production side, the market-oriented land reforms and the developers' pursuit of land-related investment returns from land rent gap is also a strong driving force for demolition and redevelopment of urban villages. Lastly, the states and local governments have played a critical role in promoting urban village redevelopment and integrating informal urban spaces into formal urban areas. This research concludes with an evaluation of current studies on urban village redevelopment and provides suggestions for further research in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper delves into the critical issue of youth suitability in the public primary school campuses in Shenzhen Central District, China. Youths constitute a crucial part of the urban population, contributing greatly to social wealth; thus, considering their needs and well-being is imperative in the urban planning and development process. The paper employs a comprehensive Python script tool, based on ArcGIS, that is augmented with an empirical investigation and data from the statistical yearbook in order to conduct a meticulous evaluation of the youth suitability of primary school campuses. The results of the study reveal spatial differences in the youth suitability of primary school campuses, with the suitability diminishing from the district's inner areas to its outer regions. Additionally, the study unearths that primary school campuses in the Shenzhen Central District are generally stratified, and that the campus service space could be appropriately categorized into several groups based on the dual criteria of accessibility as well as youth suitability. Finally, this study provides illuminating decision-making suggestions for optimizing the youth suitability of primary school campuses in Shenzhen Central District, highlighting the crucial role of education policies, regional economic development, and campus infrastructure improvements in nurturing inclusive, vibrant, and sustainable urban environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Metropolises in China are undergoing rapid suburbanization processes, resulting in spatial differences in the built environment from the city centre to the outer suburbs. The continuous suburbanization has changed residents' subjective well-being and behaviours. The association between built environment and subjective well-being has been studied extensively, but there is scarce research on the influence of the built environment on both subjective well-being and behaviours with regards to the self-selection effect in the suburbanization process. This paper constructs an analytical framework to simulate the impacts of the built environment on subjective well-being and behaviours. The propensity score matching method is applied to questionnaire data from Hangzhou in 2018 to investigate these impacts. The results of this research show that in three selected districts, the mean score difference for fitness and social behaviour is quite significant (0.4 and 0.2, respectively), whereas the mean score for subjective well-being is 0.1. Both fitness and social behaviours are significantly and positively related to subjective well-being. Fitness behaviour has a greater impact than social behaviour. The four dimensions of built environment impact on both subjective well-being and behaviours after self-selection were controlled using the propensity score matching method. The results of the study can inform local governments; exurban development zones should be equipped with more high-end public facilities and public transportation in order to improve residents' quality of life in the suburbanization process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sensing urban vitality is a useful method for understanding urban development. However, the spatio-temporal characteristics of the association between the built environment and urban vitality in Shenzhen, the youngest mega-city in China, have not yet been explored. In this paper, we examined the effects of built environment indicators on urban vitality by using spatial regression models and multi-source geospatial data. The main research findings were as follows. Firstly, urban vitality displayed a consistent high–low pattern during both weekdays and weekends. Differences in the distribution of urban vitality with time between weekdays and weekends were more significant. Secondly, the effects of various built environment indicators on urban vitality exhibited significant temporal disparities. Within a day, population density, building density, bus station density, and distance to metro stations all exhibited positive effects, while distance to the central business district (CBD) exhibited negative effects, with pronounced diurnal differences. Moreover, the effects of road network density and functional mix on urban vitality were both positive and negative throughout the day. Thirdly, besides population density and building density, road network density, functional mix, bus stop density, and distance from metro stations exhibited positive and negative disparities within the study area. Overall, distance to the CBD had a negative effect on urban vitality. This concludes that planning for urban vitality should consider the spatio-temporal heterogeneity of the association between the built environment and urban vitality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Through interviews with older adults and professionals in Chongqing, China, this paper explores the challenges and opportunities faced by smart cities that undertake to better support ageing‐in‐place. Methods: We undertook a qualitative multi‐methods approach, engaging 46 professional stakeholders and 64 older people to examine the role of smart cities in enabling older people to age‐in‐place in Chongqing, China. Results: With the development of smart cities, technology has the potential to facilitate ageing‐in‐place by creating opportunities for heathy and active ageing. This study identified specific priorities in delivering age‐friendly smart cities, including the following: shaping smart environments around the everyday lives of older people, designing inclusive and equitable smart cities and ensuring strong forms of institutional governance, trust and relationship building with older people. Conclusions: The age‐friendly city and communities movement (AFCC) and smart city policy instruments have potential for realising active ageing by supporting mobility, access to services and civic participation. However, there exists a disconnect between smart city policy and practice in delivering tangible well‐being outcomes for older people. Addressing this requires greater cross‐sectoral working, reconciling smart city policy priorities with AFCC domains and creating the institutional and governance framework to enable socially sustainable cities to support ageing‐in‐place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the interrelationship between the built environment and spatial-temporal distribution of population density, this paper proposes a method to predict the spatial-temporal distribution of urban population density using the depth residual network model (ResNet) of neural network. This study used the time-sharing data of mobile phone users provided by the China Mobile Communications Corporation to predict the time-space sequence of the steady-state distribution of population density. Firstly, 40 prediction databases were constructed according to the characteristics of built environment and the spatial-temporal distribution of population density. Thereafter, the depth residual model ResNet was used as the basic framework to construct the behaviour-environment agent model (BEM) for model training and prediction. Finally, the average percentage error index was used to evaluate the prediction results. The results revealed that the accuracy rate of prediction results reached 76.92% in the central urban area of the verification case. The proposed method can be applied to prevent urban public safety incidents and alleviate pandemics. Moreover, this method can be practically applied to enable the construction of a "smart city" for improving the efficient allocation of urban resources and traffic mobility., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

With the transformation of China's industry and demographic structure, urban shrinkage, especially the resource-based cities due to their single industrial structure, tend to emerge gradually. Using empirical and quantitative methods, this paper explores the evolution mechanism of urban shrinkage in Hegang, a resource-based city in China. Our findings suggest that there are many correlations or cyclic relationships among variables, which provide an empirical confirmation for the complexity of urban shrinkage process. The result shows there is a time delay of about four to five years between the mining industry and the changes of demographic profile, economic performance and built environment variables. The development of Hegang has formed a path dependence on resource-based industries. Furthermore, the time lags between demographic profile and economic performance variables are not obvious, and the real estate market has a certain sensitivity to perceive population loss and economic change. Besides, market led public service facilities are more sensitive to the changes of population outflow and economic recession than government led public service facilities. The study findings could offer insights for other resource-based cities in developing countries to employ on the economic development policies issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Empirical studies undertaken in developed countries have shown that urban expansion may exert both positive and negative impacts on residents' health, depending on the planning strategy; however, the impact of rapid urban expansion on public health in developing countries is understudied. This paper takes Jiawang, China, as an example of rapid urban expansion and carries out a health impact assessment (HIA) on its regulatory detailed plan to better understand the interaction of the built environment and public health. We establish an HIA framework and select a series of indicators as health determinants. On this basis, we examine what impact the urban expansion will exert on the health equity of the residents by conducting a bivariate spatial autocorrelation. The finding shows that:1) Urban expansion produces positive health impact through the health determinants of public facilities, road transportation and land use. 2) Urban expansion will reduce health disparities between the old and new town and between the urban and suburban areas, especially between the old and new town. 3) The impact of expansion exerts on health equity will be generally positive. Low-income neighborhoods in the old town will significantly benefit from urban expansion in terms of road traffic and land use, but will not fully benefit in terms of public facilities. Low-income neighborhoods will no longer benefit from the accessibility to commercial facilities and will suffer from health inequities in terms of accessibility to healthcare facilities. 4) The government's development strategy of emphasizing on an even distribution of public resources will unintentionally contribute to improving health equity. The significant promotion of health equity will mitigate the negative impacts of the previous urban development., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2022 Ge, He. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

Driven by the emission peak and carbon neutrality targets, traditional cruising taxis are also under pressure to reduce emissions, and reducing taxi vacant time is an effective way to reduce emissions. This paper aims to examine the influence mechanism of built environment characteristics on vacant time of taxi trips from the supply-side perspective. To do so, the study uses a one week of taxi trajectory data of 2019 provided by a taxi company in Chongqing, a megacity in China. We take the divided square grid cell as the study units, calculate the taxi vacant time of 168 (7 × 24) hourly slots for each grid, and then calculate the built environment indicators of the grids with Point of Interest (POI) and vector road network data. A generalized additive model (GAM) based on panel data is constructed to investigate the influence mechanism of built environment on taxi vacant time. The results show that the time-varying trend of taxi vacant time is opposite to the time-varying trend of taxi trips and is similar to taxi trips in spatial distribution with significant spatial dependence. Taxi vacant time is negatively correlated with taxi trips. POI mixture, the number of enterprises, governmental agencies, and shopping services are negatively correlated with vacant time, while the number of sports and leisure services, hotel services, healthcare services, financial and insurance services, and living services are positively correlated with vacant time. An interesting finding is that metro stations significantly increase the vacant taxi time in the region. Average traffic flow speed, road density, the number of bus stops, catering services, residence communities, and motor vehicle services show strong nonlinear relationships with taxi vacant time, and their influence effects are alternately positive and negative. The study provides useful insights for understanding mechanisms of the role of built environment on taxi vacant time and has important implications for driver searching strategy improvement, taxi management measures development, spatial and temporal scheduling of taxi capacity resources, and urban transportation facilities layout planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The New Silk Road, also called China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), is the largest single infrastructure project since the Marshall Plan and an exemplar of infrastructure‐led development of a scope and scale with no precedent in modern history. The project is estimated to cost up to US$8 trillion, involve 130 countries and impact more than 65% of the world's population. Through novel combinations of infrastructure and industrial projects with investments in the urban built environment, the BRI is transforming urban space across the global South and North altering the social and urban geographies of cities at a historically unparalleled scale. Nonetheless, its role in driving global urban transformation remains fundamentally underexplored. Relevant geographical research is scarce and comparative approaches focusing on cities are in their infancy, leading researchers to talk about an 'anti‐urban' bias in contemporary BRI scholarship that prevents an in‐depth understanding of the initiative's true scope. This paper introduces the novel concept of Silk Road urbanisation and puts forward the need for a new research agenda that has the potential to transform geographical and urban research on infrastructure‐led development, urban transformation and inequality. The New Silk Road, also called China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), is the largest single infrastructure project since the Marshall Plan and an exemplar of infrastructure‐led development. Through novel combinations of infrastructure and industrial projects with investments in the urban built environment, the BRI is transforming urban space across the Global South and North altering the social and urban geographies of cities at a historically unparalleled scale. Nonetheless, its role in driving global urban transformation remains fundamentally underexplored. This paper introduces the novel concept of Silk Road urbanization and puts forward the need for a new research agenda that has the potential to transform geographical and urban research on infrastructure‐led development, urban transformation and inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is very common that taxi is used as a feeder mode to/from a metro station especially in third-tier cities of China. But research on taxi-metro integrated use is rather limited. This paper investigates the relationship between feeder-related built environment and taxi-metro integrated use by using taxi trajectory data in Lanzhou, China. Firstly, regression models are developed to explore the transfer distance of access/egress trips during peak hours. Then, the catchment area is delineated for collecting feeder-related environment variables. Finally, several negative binomial regressions are employed to examine the relationships between feeder-related built environment and taxi-metro integrated use during peak hours on weekdays. The results reveal that (a) people prefer to use taxi as feeder mode for metro access during morning peak hours and for metro egress during evening peak hours; (b) the transfer distance of taxi-metro integrated use is about 3.8 km; (c) higher mixed land use generates more taxi-metro integrated use during evening peak hours. Higher proportion of residential land use attracts more taxi-metro integrated use for metro access during morning peak hours. Those findings will help transport planners to develop tailored land-use interventions to improve transit accessibility and promote the sustainable multimodal travel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the reform and opening up of China, the rural built environment has changed dramatically. There is a need to understand how such changes have impacted rural children's school travel mode choice to design the built environment and plan schools accordingly. This paper combines field measurement methods and questionnaires to obtain data on rural children's school travel behavior and uses the multinomial logit (MNL) model to investigate the impacting factors. The results show the following insights: Age has a significant positive impact on children's choice of bicycles and buses. The improvements in road layout and facility conditions are significantly and positively associated with children's choice of electric bicycles for school. There is a significant positive correlation between a good and safe public environment and children's choice of cycling. Furthermore, distance from home to school has a significant impact on the choice of children's school travel mode: the greater the distance to school, the higher the probability that children will choose motorized modes of travel such as buses and private cars. This study provides empirical data and evidence in designing rural transport systems for school children based on their preferences concerning built environment factors.

Over the past decades, China has built a large number of superblocks and gated residential areas, which have contributed to increased congestion on urban road traffic. Although some studies have found a correlation between residential environments and travel convenience, there is little quantitative evidence to explain which factors influence the connectivity of road networks. This paper aims to clarify the indicators of built environments in Chinese residential areas that affect travel accessibility and their correlation proportions through a more quantitative method and to provide a basis for planning and design decisions. To this end, this study took 204 residential areas in the three districts of Nanjing, China as a sample and calculated 16 built-environment indicators. The path distance (D) and pedestrian route directness (PRD) from the center of these residential areas to the nearest urban intersection were measured by GIS as outcome variables. First, correlation analysis was used to screen for significant variables, and multiple linear regression models were used to examine the significant influencing factors of D and PRD. Then, a binary logistic regression analysis was performed to provide a model that could determine whether the built environment of the residential area met the requirements for convenient travel. The results revealed that the length of the long side, the area size, and the total road length of the residential area were significantly related to D, and the number of entrances and exits, the intersection density, and the X ratio were significantly related to PRD. The indicators that were positively correlated with D were the size, network complexity, and the boundary shape of the residential area according to the degree of correlation. Meanwhile, other indicators such as the density and connectivity of the residential road network were negatively correlated with D. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Background: Researchers have demonstrated that the built environment is associated with mental health outcomes. However, evidence concerning the effects of street environments on mood in fast-growing Asian cities is scarce. Traditional questionnaires and interview methods are labor intensive and time consuming and pose challenges for accurately and efficiently evaluating the impact of urban-scale street environments on mood., Objective: This study aims to use street view images and machine learning methods to model the impact of street environments on mood states in a large urban area in Guangzhou, China, and to assess the effect of different street view elements on mood., Methods: A total of 199,754 street view images of Guangzhou were captured from Tencent Street View, and street elements were extracted by pyramid scene parsing network. Data on six mood state indicators (motivated, happy, positive-social emotion, focused, relaxed, and depressed) were collected from 1590 participants via an online platform called Assessing the Effects of Street Views on Mood. A machine learning approach was proposed to predict the effects of street environment on mood in large urban areas in Guangzhou. A series of statistical analyses including stepwise regression, ridge regression, and lasso regression were conducted to assess the effects of street view elements on mood., Results: Streets in urban fringe areas were more likely to produce motivated, happy, relaxed, and focused feelings in residents than those in city center areas. Conversely, areas in the city center, a high-density built environment, were more likely to produce depressive feelings. Street view elements have different effects on the six mood states. "Road" is a robust indicator positively correlated with the "motivated" indicator and negatively correlated with the "depressed" indicator. "Sky" is negatively associated with "positive-social emotion" and "depressed" but positively associated with "motivated". "Building" is a negative predictor for the "focused" and "happy" indicator but is positively related to the "depressed" indicator, while "vegetation" and "terrain" are the variables most robustly and positively correlated with all positive moods., Conclusion: Our findings can help urban designers identify crucial areas of the city for optimization, and they have practical implications for urban planners seeking to build urban environments that foster better mental health., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Among cancers, lung cancer is the most common cause of death in China. For the prevention and control of lung cancer, it is necessary to investigate the spatial and temporal distribution of lung cancer mortality, as well as the changes in the trend and the affecting mechanism. Based on statistics and auto-correlation analysis, this paper studied the spatial and temporal distribution of lung cancer mortality in Yuhui District, Bengbu, Huaihe River Basin, from 2017 to 2020. In addition, Spearman's Rank Correlation Assessment Model and Geographic Detector Model were used to examine the relationship between environmental factors and lung cancer mortality to identify impact factors and their mechanisms. The findings indicated that: 1) from the characteristics of temporal distribution, the number of lung cancer deaths exhibited a linear growth tendency, with the highest mortality in winter; 2) from the characteristics of spatial distribution, lung cancer mortality showed a strong spatial agglomeration form, concentrating on two clustering areas, located in the old city and the central city of Bengbu, near the Huaihe River; 3) from the point of view of the whole research area, there were 15 impact factors with significant correlation in the built and natural environment factors. The significant impacting factors in the built environment included land use, road traffic, spatial form and blue-green space, which could indirectly affect lung cancer mortality, while air pollution and temperature constituted the significant impacting factors in the natural environment; 4) the influence of screened environmental factors on lung cancer mortality was different. Spatial stratified heterogeneity assessment, the interaction among environmental factors demonstrated statistical significance, it was found that the interaction between environmental factors in pairs had a significant enhancement effect on lung cancer mortality. To some extent, urban planning and policies could reduce lung cancer mortality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The essence of sustainable urbanization is to take a holistic approach to the harmonious development of economic, social, cultural and environmental protection. This paper applies the urban sustainability assessment system to analyze the characteristics of indicators related to the quality of the built environment and environmental pressure of 91 cities in four major megalopolises in China from 2010 to 2018. It also combines statistical methods to summarize the general features of urban development through a comprehensive urban performance evaluation by comparative and classification analysis for the purpose of scientific guidance on sustainable urbanization. The comparative results showed that in terms of urban sustainability, the Yangtze River Delta performed best, followed by JingJinJi, Pearl River Delta and Shandong Peninsula. Of which, the quality of built environment in JingJinJi and the environment pressure in the Shandong Peninsula require particular attention to improve and decrease, respectively. Moreover, cities can be grouped into six development types through performance clustering including three positive and three negative types. The characteristics of all types are summarized, and the performance of the specific indicators are detailed compared to serve as a guiding basis for making generic recommendations of sustainable urbanization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After 40 years of reform and opening-up policies, urbanization in China has significantly improved residents' living standards; however, simultaneously, it has caused a series of health problems among Chinese citizens. Communities' built environment is closely related to their residents' health. However, few studies have examined the spatial differences in the health effects of community-built environments. Based on a 2013 health survey of residents in 20 communities in Wuhan, this study uses multilevel linear models to explore the effects of the built environment on residents' health, analyzing the differences in its health-effect within different types of communities. The results showed that there were significant differences in the self-rated health status of residents in different communities, with those in high-end communities reporting a higher self-rated health status. The effect of the built environment on the health of residents in different communities was found to be inconsistent. For instance, the effect of the built environment on low-end community residents was very significant, but it was not obvious for residents in high-end communities. There are significant community-specific differences in the health- effect of the built environment: in high-end communities, residents' health status was mainly restricted by travel accessibility, while in low-end communities, residents' health status was mainly restricted by the accessibility of health facilities. Therefore, this paper proposes a built-environment optimization strategy for different types of communities to provide valuable insights for healthy community planning from a policy perspective.

Located in the southwest of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, Tibet is characterized by high cold, high radiation, and large differences in temperature between day and night. Tibetan residential buildings are famous for adapting to the harsh ecological environment and maintaining durability. Based on the residential buildings in Tibet, this paper extracts the technical process and color decoration culture in the construction process in order to adapt to the harsh natural environment. This paper first analyzed the four ecological construction modes of Tibetan residential buildings, analyzed the interior layout characteristics and cultural customs connotation, and introduced the architectural decoration characteristics and decorative color painting. The results show that the ramming type of adobe mainly includes the selection of building foundation, wall laying, floor and roof construction and so on, and its insulation effect is better. The rubble masonry type mainly adopts irregular gneiss, supplemented by clay, which has strong compressive capacity. Logs dry type using log masonry, heat preservation. and shock resistance is better. Concrete-infilled wall frame is composed of horizontal and vertical load-bearing system, which has stronger seismic performance. Tibetan residential buildings generally have two or three floors. The first floor is the enclosure and sundry room, the second floor is the rest place, and the third floor is the Sutra hall and sun terrace. The overall outdoor color of Kangba Tibetan buildings is mainly red and black, while the indoor color is mainly blue and red, with wood carvings and furniture. The layout of Tibetan villages can be divided into centripetal layout and scattered layout. Tibetan residential buildings provide a new sustainable development direction for the current global urbanization process at the expense of the ecological environment. It can alleviate the crisis of global resource shortage, climate warming, and biodiversity degradation., (© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

To reexamine the relationship between leisure-time physical activity (LTPA) and the built environment (BE), this paper takes advantage of the massive amount of data collected by an accelerometer and GPS-based fitness mobile app. Massive LTPA data from more than 3 million users were recorded by Codoon in 500m by 500m grid cells and aggregated to 742 natural cities in mainland China. Six BE indicators were quantified using GIS at the city scale. Robust regression analysis was used to estimate the correlation between LTPA and BE. Five of six BE indicators-connectivity, road density, land use mix, points of interest density, and density of parks and squares-were significantly, positively, independently, and linearly related to LTPA in the regression analysis. The study obtains findings that are consistent with the previous literature but also provides novel insights into the important role of POI density in encouraging LTPA, as well as how the relationship between LTPA and BE varies by time of day. The study also sheds light on the embrace of new technology and new data in public health and urban studies., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Car dependency and its negative consequences have created the urgent need for a better understanding of the determinants of car ownership and use. To get people out of their cars, great importance has been attached to the connection between the built environment and travel behaviour. However, the mediating effect of car ownership is ignored in most studies of the relationship between the built environment and travel mode. The aim of this paper is to contribute to our understanding of the influence of the built environment on commute mode choice by considering the intermediary nature of car ownership based on a nationally representative sample from China. A recursive simultaneous bivariate probit model, which allows the analysis of the mediating effect of car ownership while modelling the relationship between the built environment and commute mode choice behaviour, is employed. Results indicate that the built environment attributes at the neighbourhood level do have both direct and indirect effects on commute mode choice. For most environmental attributes, their effects on commute mode choice are greater than their effects on car ownership. Residents may be less dependent on the car if their neighbourhoods are well-designed with more balanced land use and more attractive local job opportunities are available. The research findings suggest that land use policy should be given enough consideration in strategies for car use reduction, while more case studies are needed to examine whether results from this study can be extended to other cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The health and welfare of older adults have raised increasing attention due to global aging. Cycling is a physical activity and mode of transportation to enhance the mobility and quality of life among older adults. Nevertheless, the planning strategies to promote cycling among older adults are underutilized. Therefore, this paper describes the nonlinear associations of the built environment with cycling frequency among older adults. The data were collected from the Zhongshan Household Travel Survey (ZHTS) in 2012. The modeling approach was the eXtreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost) model. The findings demonstrated that nonlinear relationships exist among all the selected built environment attributes. Within specific intervals, the population density, the land-use mixture, the distance from home to the nearest bus stop, and the distance from home to CBD are positively correlated to the cycling among older adults. Additionally, an inverse "U"-shaped relationship appears in the percentage of green space land use among all land uses. Moreover, the intersection density is inversely related to the cycling frequency among older adults. These findings provide nuanced and appropriate guidance for establishing age-friendly neighborhoods.

Global aging has raised increasing concerns on the health and well-being of older adults. Public transport is a viable option to improve the mobility and quality of life among older adults. However, policies that promote the public transport use among older adults are rare. This study utilizes the eXtreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost) decision tree to explore the non-linear associations of the built and social environment with bus use among older adults in China. The bus use of older adults was obtained from the Zhongshan Household Travel Survey (ZHTS) in 2012. Results show that non-linear relationships exist among all built environment and social environment characteristics. Within certain thresholds, the percentage of green space land use, land use mixture, bus-stop density, and dwelling unit density are positively related to bus use among older adults. Likewise, one social environment variable, the proportion of older adults in a neighborhood, is the key social environment variable. Furthermore, the dwelling unit density and proportion of older adults appear to have an inverse U-shaped relationship. Additionally, age, ownership of motorcycles, and distance from home to the nearest bus stop also show non-linearity. The findings presented in this paper facilitate effective planning interventions to promote bus use among older adults.

At present, there is less attention paid to the relationship between the frequency of travel and built environment, especially in households. In this paper, some of the determining factors in the frequency of daily cycling per household were explored based on the data from 2018 Daily Trip Survey in Xianyang, China. Then a two-level linear model was construct to identify the determining factors in the frequency of per capita daily cycling of household. According to the research results, 22.8% of the differences in the per capita cycling frequency of household are due to the differences between communities. In terms of community factors, the densities of road networks and educational facilities delivered a significantly positive impact on the per capita daily cycling frequency of family; on the contrary, the densities of medical facilities, intersections and POI delivered a significantly negative impact. Per capita cycling frequency varies considerably between households. For instance, the number of bicycles owned and the number of school-age children have a significantly positive impact on the per capita daily cycling frequency of family. However, car ownership, household income and occupation composition impose a significantly negative impact. The findings of this study would benefit the transportation engineers and planners who are keen to boost the use of active means of transportation for residents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The 15-minute community life circle (15min-CLC) strategy is one of Shanghai's important methods for building a global city and facing a society with a more diverse population structure in the future. In the existing research, the balance between the construction of the life circle and the needs of the people in the life circle still needs to be further fulfilled. This paper is based on the city's multi-source large data set including 2018 AutoNavi POI (Point of Interests), OSM (OpenStreetMap) road network data and LandScan population data set, and evaluates the current status of Shanghai's 15min-CLC through the fusion of kernel density estimation, service area analysis and other statistical models and proposes relevant optimization suggestions. The results show that there are the following shortcomings: (1) From the perspective of different types of infrastructure service facilities, the spatial construction of Shanghai's overall life service facilities and shopping service facilities needs to be optimized. (2) From the perspective of comprehensive evaluation, the comprehensive service convenience of infrastructure service facilities in the downtown area is relatively high, while the comprehensive service convenience of urban infrastructure service facilities in the suburbs and outer suburbs is relatively low; The diversity of basic service facilities in the 15min-CLC in the downtown area is more consistent with the population distribution; However, in the peripheral areas of the urban area, too many infrastructure service facilities have been constructed. Based on the above shortcomings and the perspective of supply and demand matching, relevant optimization strategies are proposed in different regions and different types of infrastructure service facilities: (1) focus on the construction of basic service facilities in the urban fringe and urban-rural areas, improve the full coverage of the basic service facilities, and appropriately reduce the number of basic service facilities in the downtown area. (2) The development of community business models can be used to promote the development of new life service facilities and shopping service facilities. (3) Improve community medical institutions through facility function conversion, merger and reconstruction, etc. (4) Optimize the hierarchical basic service facility system and improve the population supporting facilities of basic service facilities in the 15min-CLC. This paper incorporates people's needs and concerns on the living environment into the 15min-CLC evaluation model, and uses Shanghai as an example to conduct research, summarizes the existing shortcomings, and proposes corresponding optimization strategies based on the matching of supply and demand. This article attempts to explore a replicable 15min-CLC planning model, so that it can be extended to the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration, to provide reference for further research on the 15min-CLC, and to promote urban construction under the concept of sustainable development., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

• The construction of nostalgia is no longer predicated upon the existence of original historical environments. • A cyclical place-making process in an interdisciplinary discourse is revealed by a co-creation model. • The assessment of authenticity should go beyond the subject-object dichotomy in a post-modern society. In order to shape a nostalgic atmosphere, recreating traditional built environments has emerged as a new spatial typology in China's urban development, termed in this paper as "new nostalgic space". Although scholars have extensively discussed this spatial phenomenon from various perspectives, a comprehensive and dialectical understanding has yet to be fully formed, particularly at the level of place-making. Taking Lane 1192 in Shanghai as a case study, this paper employs qualitative research methods to illustrate how different roles shape a nostalgic atmosphere and stimulate emotional resonance, aiming to explore the process, approach, and logic of place-making while discussing the academic debate on authenticity. The findings reveal a dynamic and interactive place-making logic involving four core elements: filtering, construction, landscaping, and imagination. It creates a sense of place through cyclic practice, ultimately resulting in place identity. It demonstrates that beyond materiality, everyday life and experiences equally hold an indispensable role in shaping the authenticity and meanings of places. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the attraction of international students makes a direct impact on the host city and the education institutions, retention (or reattraction) of them after their graduation can generate wider, indirect impacts on the local labor market. The link from international study to the labor market means the role of a gateway played out by the host city that offers university education and various urban attributes. This paper presents the relationship between international tertiary students, and the key factors for their attraction and re-attraction in the context of China. The case of the Dushu Lake Higher Education Town in Suzhou is investigated for how international students have interacted with the local built environment and whether this affects their plans to remain locally for work. This research found that the place based offer was generally less significant than the quality of academic institutions and economic prospects in attracting and re-attracting international students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding charging vehicles, charging stations, and built environment concerning idle connection times significantly guided the management of charging infrastructure. However, the interplay between these factors had remained incompletely understood. This study addressed this gap by investigating public charging stations in Changshu, Suzhou, China, as a case study. The random forest regression and partial dependence plots were employed to explore the nonlinear relationships between idle connection times of vehicles at public fast-charging stations and the built environment, charging stations, and charging vehicles. The exploration encompassed two typical scenarios: workdays and weekends. The findings reveal the distinct influences of various factors in different scenarios. Notably, catering service points of interests in the proximity of charging stations, significantly impact the idle connection time on both workdays and weekends. Furthermore, government groups and residential areas have a notable influence on idle connection times during workdays. Shopping service and Leisure sport have a significant impact on idle connection time during the weekends. Variables such as the charging start time and charged energy also exhibit significant effects. Importantly, these influencing factors demonstrate heterogeneity and exhibit different threshold effects. This research can offer valuable insights to planning authorities and charging facility operators for formulating strategies to enhance charging infrastructure utilization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Residential satisfaction has been heavily discussed worldwide amid the increasing emphasis on the social dimension of sustainability. However, consensus has not been reached regarding its determinants, and little research has focused on the subsidized housing estates (SHEs) in post-reform China. Using data collected from field observations in Guangzhou, this study developed a conceptual framework on the basis of the ACSI and Campbell's models and employed structural equation modeling to investigate what and how factors pertaining to both the built and social environments influenced residential satisfaction of SHEs. Generally, SHE residents were moderately satisfied with their housing estates, although challenges persisted in estate management and security, suggesting that the performance of China's subsidized housing policies were acceptable. Echoing existing arguments, this empirical investigation revealed the substantial positive roles played by both the built and social environments in shaping residential satisfaction. Specifically, the livable built environment characterized by large housing size and well-equipped neighborhoods, coupled with the friendly social environment marked by intimate neighborly relationships and diverse community activities, correlated with an elevated level of residential satisfaction of SHEs. Importantly, residents' subjective perceptions of the built environment emerged as the most influential factor, which acted a significant mediating role, linking both objective attributes and individual expectations to residential satisfaction. This underscored the necessity of integrating public opinions into the planning process to meet SHE residents' actual desires. These findings not only extended the scholarly discourse on residential satisfaction, especially among disadvantaged groups in low-income housing estates, but also advanced urban sustainable development by providing references for enhancing SHE performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bacteria in built environments are profoundly affected by indoor thermal conditions. In China, continuous and intermittent heating modes give rise to distinct thermal environments in winter. However, the quantitative relationships between bacterial concentration and thermal conditions in the context of heating modes remain unclear. To this end, we recorded the temperature and relative humidity (RH) in 15 intermittently and 15 continuously heated residences in 27 cities across China and obtained the bacterial concentrations via the quantitative polymerase chain reaction technology. For the intermittently heated residences whose temperatures were lower than 18°C, the bacterial concentration negatively correlated with RH while the correlation was positive for those with T > 18°C. For the continuously heated residences, a quadratic correlation was found between temperature and the bacterial concentration which was highest at 23°C. For lower bacterial risk, we suggest that (1) RH in the intermittent heating region should be in the range of 40%–60% and (2) temperature in the continuous heating region should not exceed 22°C. The bacteria-adjusted thermal zones for intermittent and continuous heating are 66% and 77% of the original thermal comfort zone, respectively. Our study provides insights into the set-points of indoor thermal environments based on the microbial perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Livability is pivotal when planning human habitations. Sustainable planning strategies have been gradually adopted to enhance the livability of built environments, especially in the context of developing countries with a continuously improving planning system. Unlike other spontaneously developed low-income housing estates (e.g., urban villages) in China, subsidized housing estates (SHEs) are entirely planned and dictated by local governments and that may be significantly affected by urban planning policies and practices. However, the role of urban planning in achieving the livability of SHEs has yet to be fully investigated. By focusing on a pilot project of SHEs in Guangzhou, this study attempts to identify the extent and rationale of planning impacts on the livability of the SHEs. The study concludes that, although the updated planning policies and schemes encouraged public participation and livability, their achievements still hinged on the institutional environment in Socialist Marketized China. Consequently, the implementation of SHE plans encountered several challenges, resulting in insignificant improvements in livability from planning. This study provides an in-depth understanding of urban planning and its impacts on livability in the context of developing countries with a continuously developing planning system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Residential historic areas are currently the main focus of urban renewal efforts in China, primarily consisting of traditional residential buildings with similar characteristics. Hence, the visual coherence of buildings (VCoB) plays a crucial role in such areas, not only pertaining to the visual quality of the urban landscape but also regarding the preservation of historic features. The accurate measurement of the VCoB is a prerequisite for undertaking optimization efforts. However, discussions of the VCoB in the built environment are limited and seldom address residential historic areas, and methods for measuring the VCoB have yet to be refined. Therefore, taking the Xiaoxihu Historic Area in Nanjing as a case study, this work aimed to develop a more refined method for measuring the VCoB in residential historic areas based on objective physical features. The method is mainly based on the human-level perspective, identifying three key visual elements within this perspective as the objects of measurement. It collected visual data through photography, with deep learning and computer graphics processing tools being utilized to identify and extract the visual elements. Then, the study established a corresponding framework of indicators for different visual elements and optimizes the methods for indicator calculation. Through an assessment involving professionals, we validated the high accuracy of the measurement method proposed in this study. Furthermore, the study discusses factors affecting the VCoB, methods to enhance the VCoB, and the required degree of the VCoB based on the results of the measurement. The method developed in this research will provide support for the visual analysis of the urban built environment and urban renewal practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the commodification process initiated through a series of state-led programs and questions the sustainable public goods provision in rural China. We challenge the unilateral understanding of spontaneous commodification by the profit-seeking community, and argue that the influence exerted by the Chinese government cannot be ignored. It is found that a preliminary partnership among the state, private investors and villagers was formed to create a hot-spring village called Tangjiajia in suburban Nanjing. The reconstruction was the result of a state-led renovation of the built environment, but it also catalyzed villager entrepreneurship and boosted community consensus. Regarding the public goods provision, stakeholders in the village now enjoy high-quality facilities and services provided by the government for free but have failed to foster reciprocal cooperation to replenish the subtractability of the rural commons. We claim that state intervention is temporal but not a cure-all. A pricing mechanism for the sustainable delivery of public goods is urgently needed in the community. The state-led commodification has undermined the previous low-level equilibrium of rural governance. From the stance of rural sustainability, only self-organization of the rural community can solve the dilemma. • Government wields built environment programs to revitalize the countryside. • The state-private-farmer partnership is initially established. • Stakeholders fail to replenish subtractability of rural commons. • Sustainable provision of rural commons is still in question. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effective resistance and rapid recovery from external environmental risks has risen to be a social challenge in the accelerated urbanization process of China. However, the current measures for urban high-rise and high-density core area with high-volume pedestrians and high pollution are often focused on one-dimensional means, which cannot meet the multi-objective demands simultaneously. Therefore, this paper is aimed to explore a prevention-oriented route - a vertical pedestrian system for high-rise buildings based on scheme phase, with multiple objectives optimization of strengthening the ability of ecological order restoration and assisting occupants in recovering psychological and physiological injury from high-density environment in a relative fast speed. The feasibility and effectiveness have been verified by a complete technology route of scheme selection, numerical simulation and field measurements. The results show that, first, after the integration of secondary ground pedestrian system (SGPS) basic unit, the average predicted mean vote (PMV) improves 75.45%, the average air temperature declines 2.75 °C, and the average spatial integration increases 35.35%. Second, the optimal range of unit height difference in SGPS under hot-humid climate condition is suggested to be 6–9 storeys. Third, compared with single-sided "E-type" connection, the thermal comfort improves 70.49% and the indoor average PMV is optimized by 2.56%, with a more stable wind speed by using bilateral alternating "S-type" connection. Finally, compared with connections among low-integrated secondary ground units, the average integration is up to 6.98% with visual and path links of high-integrated-orientation. This paper objectively answers the question of whether and to what extent the combination of vertical greening and walking system contributes to ecological order restoration, which provides a new orientation for exploring the routes of maintaining urban ecological stability and optimizing environmental structure. • It evaluates the effect of SGPS on the high-rise and high-density environment. • It analyzes SGPS's effects from a multi-objective perspective. • The SPGS plays a positive role in environmental regulation and health promotion. • The union of walking system and ventilating shaft effectively integrate resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the worsening environmental pollution and China's carbon peak and carbon neutrality goals, it is imperative to study the low-carbon travel behavior of urban residents. Previous research has mainly focused on objective environmental factors, subjective behavioral factors, and low-carbon travel behavior. However, the evolving decision-making of local governments, community residents, and individuals within the low-carbon travel system still needs to be explored. Tripartite evolutionary game theory is an effective method for studying the dynamic changes in strategies among limited rationality multiple actors in long-term repeated games, making it applicable to this study. Therefore, this paper simulates participants' behavior using evolutionary game theory, conducts stability analysis of equilibrium points of the replicator dynamic system using the Lyapunov first method, derives evolutionarily stable strategy combinations under different conditions, and finally performs simulation analysis using Matlab. The simulation results indicate: (1) By implementing reasonable incentive mechanisms, Local governments can encourage citizens to adopt low-carbon travel and community transformation. They should pay attention to their expenditures and subsidies, manage their spending to reduce consumption, maximize efficiency, and strive to achieve carbon emission reduction goals. (2) The likelihood of residents choosing low-carbon travel is mainly influenced by direct advantages such as health and economy in the initial stages, and later, it is more affected by the indirect benefits brought about by subsequent objective environmental changes. (3) The cost of renovation significantly affects the built environment of communities, leading to a reduction in renovation costs and the adoption of uniform standards and, consequently, stimulating enthusiasm for community transformation. The research findings suggest that the government can collaborate with the public to reduce carbon emissions by implementing specific environmental changes and providing incentives to encourage citizens to participate in low-carbon transportation. Simultaneously, the government can cooperate with the public, considering the quality of environmentally friendly transportation for citizens, formulating uniform regulations, reducing renovation costs, and achieving the highest low-carbon goals with minimal financial expenditure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the early stage of architectural design, addressing the challenges posed by negative spaces in high-density urban environments is crucial for enhancing spatial efficiency and building sustainability. Multiple studies employed digital methods and tools to address these issues, such as parametric design, simulation, and genetic algorithms, to investigate architectural generation approaches for urban negative spaces. This article proposes an integrated design process that involves finding the location and form of negative spaces, generating solutions using slime mold and wasp algorithms, and optimizing and analyzing solutions using the Wallacei plugin in Grasshopper. This comprehensive approach underscores the potential of parametric design to yield a multitude of solutions while also acknowledging the convergence challenges encountered during simulations, particularly in optimizing for optimal sunlight exposure during the winter solstice and minimal solar radiation in the summer. Analyzing the optimization goals and parameter values of the 15th Pareto optimal solution in the 100th generation reveals: (1) a higher number of units leads to positive correlation growth in both objectives; (2) within a certain number of units, parametrically generated solutions facilitate the convergence of optimization goals, yielding optimal outcomes. Therefore, factors such as the range of unit quantities and proportions need consideration during early-stage parametric design and simulation. This study explores a design methodology for negative spaces in high-density urban cities, validating the feasibility of various mainstream generation methods and offering insights for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: The shifting living and working conditions have profound impacts on the residents' mental health. However, current research in this field has not remarkable investigated. Methods: This study used the China Labor-force Dynamic Survey (CLDS) dataset from 2018 and relied on a regression model to examine the effects of the built environment, work environment, and subjective perception on the mental health of Chinese citizens. It also considers the circumstances of both migrants and local residents. Results: This study revealed significant correlations between mental health and greening space rate, road network density, commuting time, work feelings, community trust, economic satisfaction, and other factors. Additionally, the mental health of local residents was shown to be significantly affected by community security, while it shows no significance in migrants. Furthermore, a significant spatial autocorrelation was found in terms of mental health within the central and eastern regions of China. Discussion: The findings of this study offer valuable insights that can be used to facilitate measures aimed at improving the mental health of residents and promoting the development of healthy cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's salt lakes contain an abundance of magnesium resources as high-magnesium brine, a by-product of potash fertiliser production is often discharged into salt lakes, causing environmental damage. Magnesium oxide from salt-lake brine can be used to produce magnesium oxychloride cement (MOC), but the calcium impurities present in salt lakes affect the properties of MOC. To investigate the effects of these impurities, magnesium oxide was produced by calcining a magnesium hydroxide precursor. By adding calcium hydroxide or calcium chloride, the incorporated calcium impurities were 0, 5 and 10% by mass of magnesium oxide. The compressive strength, heat of hydration, composition of the hydration product phases and the pore structure development of MOC samples were evaluated. It was found that Ca2+ ions increased the early strength and the rates of setting and hardening of the MOC. However, the presence of calcium impurities did not change the hydration phase composition. This is primarily because the Ca2+ ions promoted the participation of magnesium oxide in the hydration reaction and enhanced the early strength of the MOC. The findings of this study demonstrate the technical feasibility of utilising magnesium resources from salt lakes to prepare magnesium oxide and apply it in the production of MOC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The metro has developed rapidly in the past two decades and has become one of the crucial patterns of transportation for urban residents in China. Many studies have explored the factors affecting metro ridership, but few have focused on the metro usage of specific groups, such as the elderly and students. This paper uses the negative binomial regression model to explore the relationship between the built environment and the metro ridership of three types of people (adults, the elderly, and students) by using the metro smart card data of Qingdao. We also used the fractional response model to discuss the factors that influence the ridership share for the elderly and students. The results show that most variables promote the metro usage of the three groups of people but have a significantly different effect on the market share of those groups. Specifically, the number of schools, hospitals, supermarkets, squares, parks, and scenic spots near metro stations significantly increases the proportion of the elderly metro usage. The number of bus stops and schools substantially increases the share of metro ridership by students. The research results can provide valuable insights for promoting the metro's overall ridership and minimizing the gap in allocating public transport resources among different groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, research on the relationship between the built environment and usage pattern of public bikesharing has attracted some attention. However, studies that focused on the exploration of spatial-temporal heterogeneity of free-floating bike-sharing (FFBS) usage pattern were less common. To this end, based on the collection of GPS (Global Positioning System) data from the devices embedded on the Mobike shared bikes in Xi'an, China, this paper analyzed the spatial-temporal heterogeneity of built environment and FFBS usage pattern during the morning (7-9 am) and evening (5-7 pm) rush hours. The goals were to identify which variables would have an impact on FFBS trip due to different geographic locations, and analyze the impact of the same variable affected by geographic location on FFBS trip during morning and evening peaks. Geographically weighted regression (GWR) model was developed, and was found to achieve much better performance at the spatial location than the global models. GWR helped to better identify variables with temporal and spatial heterogeneity. The result showed that there was a high degree of spatial heterogeneity, which indicated the leading factors could be significantly different in various zones during rush hours. Cycling facilities were found to have a more significant impact on the trip generation in the morning rush hours than the evening rush hours, but had little impact on the trip attraction during the morning rush hours. In addition, when cycling facilities, land use and public transportation were used as explanatory variables, more evident relationships were observed between them and FFBS usage in evening rush hours than morning. In particular, the amount of transfer demand between bikes and subway was more obvious in evening rush hours. The results indicated that the policies and interventions should be more targeted to improve the rebalance of FFBS in the spatial-temporal geographical context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban regeneration in the historic core of Chinese cities largely follows one of two possibilities – 'demolition-reconstruction,' by tearing down old houses to make room for new development, and 'frozen protection,' designating no-growth areas around certain historical sites and neighborhoods. While these approaches have the potential to preserve recognized cultural values, they can lead to fragmented and uneven built environments as well as limited historic preservation and infrastructure development achievements. In this paper, we discuss the institutional constraints faced by the transformation of regeneration approaches using the cases of Shanghai's historic Old Town area and propose a theoretical framework for analyzing the 'structure-discourse-tools' interactions in the urban regeneration dilemma from the lens of sociological institutionalism. Our analysis reveals that discourse plays the role of problem framing through the operation of the power structure, while institutional tools are responsible for materializing the discourse. We argue that innovative approaches in urban regeneration should step outside of the conventional 'control' and 'design' tools but seek a more inclusive governance structure that prioritizes and materializes new discourse. Our study provides a transferable theoretical framework for better understanding complexity and institutional dilemma in global urban regeneration cases and guiding creative transformation in historical area's regeneration projects. • This paper proposes a theoretical framework to explore the combined relationships among institutional arrangements. • The governance transformation depends on the overall transformation of the power structure, tools, and discourse. • Land, planning, and administration institutions are compatible and constitute the routine approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]