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Nighttime light data play an important role in the research on cities, while the urban centers over a large spatial scale are still far from clearly understood. Aiming at the current challenges in monitoring the spatial structure of cities using nighttime light data, this paper proposes a new method for identifying urban centers for massive cities at the large spatial scale based on the brightness information captured by the Suomi National Polar-Orbiting Partnership's Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (NPP-VIIRS) sensor. Based on the method for extracting the peak point based on digital elevation model (DEM) data in terrain analysis, the maximum neighborhood and difference algorithms were applied to the NPP-VIIRS data to extract the pixels with the peak nighttime light intensity to identify the potential locations of urban centers. The results show 7239 urban centers in 2200 cities in China in 2017, with an average of 3.3 urban centers per city. Approximately 68% of the cities had significant polycentric structures. The developed method in this paper is useful for identifying the urban centers and can provide the reference to the city planning and construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chen, L. and Wang, Y., 2020. Study on plant configuration and planning of landscape architecture in coastal cities. In: Bai, X. and Zhou, H. (eds.), Advances in Water Resources, Environmental Protection, and Sustainable Development. Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue No. 115, pp. 17-20. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208. The development and progress of society put forward higher requirements for the development of coastal cities. Strengthening the planning and construction of coastal cities has become an important task and work at present. Plant landscape is the most direct and only landscape that can make people feel the changes of life. Its richness and diversity will have a profound impact on people's life and spirit. It can directly show the beauty of plants, give people a feeling of being close to nature, and can coordinate with the surrounding coastal city environment to change the ecological environment. In this paper, the classification and characteristics of seasonal plants are summarized, and the design principles, common plant configuration forms and plant selection of coastal city landscape gardens are systematically discussed. On this basis, the design points of coastal city planning are put forward in order to promote the continuous improvement of ecological planning and design level of coastal cities in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

He, C.; Xiang, X.; Lin, J., and Yu, L., 2020. Study on urban design characteristics of new coastal "reclamation type" town. In: Gong, D.; Zhang, M., and Liu, R. (eds.), Advances in Coastal Research: Engineering, Industry, Economy, and Sustainable Development. Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue No. 106, pp. 363–367. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208. The construction of new coastal reclamation areas is an important decision in China, because it is a form of development and construction that must adapt to many problems in coastal areas, including rapid socioeconomic development, rapid population growth, and serious shortage of land resources. China has many coastal provinces, which will be limited by the shortage of land resources. Therefore, in the rapid economic development, coastal cities will be greatly restricted, which will limit the rapid process of urbanization. China has abundant beach resources. Therefore, reclamation and city building have become the main means to alleviate land resource shortages. In recent years, various coastal cities in China have carried out new reclamation-type town design, which has its own unique characteristics. These new city construction plans need to be improved, because the "reclamation type" city is an important part of urban construction planning in the future. This paper analyzes the current situation of the construction of the new coastal reclamation areas, presents the methods, and suggests improvements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the financial crisis in 2008, innovation has gradually become the orientation of global economic development and the strategic choice for China's urban development. With the transformation of the urban development mode from factor-driven and capital-driven to innovation-driven, many innovation spaces have begun to emerge in cities, which attract academic attention. A large number of studies on the relation between innovation activities and geographic space mainly focus on the phenomena at the regional level, and the city is only regarded as a target of innovation activities agglomeration. The study on the distribution of innovation space within the city is insufficient. In particular, there is a lack of studies on the spatial-temporal evolution of urban innovation space distribution. However, the study on the spatial-temporal evolution characteristics of urban innovation space distribution can provide planning countermeasures for the construction of innovative cities in China. Taking Nanjing as an empirical area, the spatial-temporal evolution of urban innovation space distribution was studied through methods such as average nearest neighbor, standard deviational ellipse, kernel density estimation, and exploratory spatial data analysis based on the data of high-tech enterprises identified from 2008 to 2019. The results showed the following: (1) the distribution of urban innovation space has significant spatial agglomeration characteristics, and the degree of agglomeration continued to rise; (2) regardless of the macro- or microperspective, the distribution of urban innovation space has shown the characteristic of diffusion at the initial, but the trend of polarization in recent years is significant; and (3) the distribution of urban innovation space exhibited diverse agglomeration modes and evolution trends in different regions, and it can be divided into three categories: grouped, banded, and scattered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Combined heat and power (CHP), an efficient heating method with cascades use of energy, accounts for approximately 50% of the heat sources in northern China. Many researchers have made significant efforts to improve its energy efficiency and environmental effects with important achievements. Given that the system produces heat and electricity at the same time, this study focuses on the role of CHP in the holistic urban energy system and points out the mismatch between the demand and supply sides of urban energy systems by using the heat-to-power ratio as a parameter. The calculation method and characteristics of the supply side heat-to-power ratio of eight heating methods and the maximum demand side heat-to-power ratio for 19 cities in northern China are displayed. After the analysis, it is concluded that (1) the maximum demand side heat-to-power ratio in the cities varies from 1.0 to 5.9, which is affected by the location and social, economic, and industrial structures. (2) In most of the cities, with the current energy structure, the demand side heat-to-power ratios are always larger than the supply side heat-to-power ratios. (3) The reduction in heating demand, surplus heat recovery, and the use of a highly efficient electric heating method, such as the heat pump, can help solve the mismatch of the heat-to-power ratio between the demand and supply sides. These conclusions can guide the urban energy planning and system construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]