Tracking the industrial growth of modern China with high-resolution panchromatic imagery: A sequential convolutional approach

Due to insufficient or difficult to obtain data on development in inaccessible regions, remote sensing data is an important tool for interested stakeholders to collect information on economic growth. To date, no studies have utilized deep learning to estimate industrial growth at the level of individual sites. In this study, we harness high-resolution panchromatic imagery to estimate development over time at 419 industrial sites in the People's Republic of China using a multi-tier computer vision framework. We present two methods for approximating development: (1) structural area coverage estimated through a Mask R-CNN segmentation algorithm, and (2) imputing development directly with visible & infrared radiance from the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS). Labels generated from these methods are comparatively evaluated and tested. On a dataset of 2,078 50 cm resolution images spanning 19 years, the results indicate that two dimensions of industrial development can be estimated using high-resolution daytime imagery, including (a) the total square meters of industrial development (average error of 0.021 $\textrm{km}^2$), and (b) the radiance of lights (average error of 9.8 $\mathrm{\frac{nW}{cm^{2}sr}}$). Trend analysis of the techniques reveal estimates from a Mask R-CNN-labeled CNN-LSTM track ground truth measurements most closely. The Mask R-CNN estimates positive growth at every site from the oldest image to the most recent, with an average change of 4,084 $\textrm{m}^2$.Comment: Fixed typo

Shrinking Suburbs in a Time of Crisis

The Routledge Companion to the Suburbs provides one of the most comprehensive examinations available to date of the suburbs around the world. International in scope and interdisciplinary in nature, this volume will serve as the definitive reference for scholars and students of the suburbs. This volume brings together the leading scholars of the suburbs researching in different parts of the world to better understand how and why suburbs and their communities grow, decline, and regenerate. The volume sets out four goals: 1) to provide a synthesis and critical appraisal of the historical and current state of understanding about the development of suburbs in the world; 2) to provide a forum for a comprehensive examination into the conceptual, theoretical, spatial, and empirical discontents of suburbanization; 3) to engage in a scholarly conversation about the transformation of suburbs that is interdisciplinary in nature and bridges the divide between the Global North and the Global South; and 4) to reflect on the implications of the socioeconomic, cultural, and political transformations of the suburbs for policymakers and planners. The Routledge Companion to the Suburbs is composed of original, scholarly contributions from the leading scholars of the study of how and why suburbs grow, decline, and transform. Special attention is paid to the global nature of suburbanization and its regional variations, with a focus on comparative analysis of suburbs through regions across the world in the Global North and the Global South. Articulated in a common voice, the volume is integrated by the very nature of the concept of a suburb as the unit of analysis, offering multidisciplinary perspectives from the fields of economics, geography, planning, political science, sociology, and urban studies.https://scholarworks.wm.edu/asbookchapters/1069/thumbnail.jp

A critical knowledge pathway to low-carbon, sustainable futures: Integrated understanding of urbanization, urban areas, and carbon

Independent lines of research on urbanization, urban areas, and carbon have advanced our understanding of some of the processes through which energy and land uses affect carbon. This synthesis integrates some of these diverse viewpoints as a first step toward a coproduced, integrated framework for understanding urbanization, urban areas, and their relationships to carbon. It suggests the need for approaches that complement and combine the plethora of existing insights into interdisciplinary explorations of how different urbanization processes, and socio-ecological and technological components of urban areas, affect the spatial and temporal patterns of carbon emissions, differentially over time and within and across cities. It also calls for a more holistic approach to examining the carbon implications of urbanization and urban areas, based not only on demographics or income but also on other interconnected features of urban development pathways such as urban form, economic function, economic-growth policies, and other governance arrangements. It points to a wide array of uncertainties around the urbanization processes, their interactions with urban socio-institutional and built environment systems, and how these impact the exchange of carbon flows within and outside urban areas. We must also understand in turn how carbon feedbacks, including carbon impacts and potential impacts of climate change, can affect urbanization processes. Finally, the paper explores options, barriers, and limits to transitioning cities to low-carbon trajectories, and suggests the development of an end-to-end, coproduced and integrated scientific understanding that can more effectively inform the navigation of transitional journeys and the avoidance of obstacles along the way