The case for heterogeneity of cities

The general similarity of the results of comparative statics in a semiclosed and in a fully closed city have been demonstrated by Pines and Sadka (Journal of Urban Economics 20, 1–20, 1986). The objective of this paper is to determine if the consequences of different forms of public regulation of the urban land market are also invariant with respect to the type of city. The conclusion is that while there are well-defined consequences of such controls on metropolitan area and land values in a semiclosed city, the impacts in a fully closed city are generally ambiguous. Therefore, proposals for the introduction of zoning and density regulation have to be city-specific and take into consideration the pattern of land ownership and the extent of leakage of urban land rent income.     

重庆主城区的合理建筑量测算

随着国内城市对容积率宏观研究与控制的加强,合理确定城市建筑量成为城市发展中的一个重要环节。国内外大城市的实际发展情况,可以从城市的毛容积率、人均建筑量、人均商业建筑量以及居住建筑量、工业仓储建筑量、行政办公建筑量的比例等方面总结相关的经验数据。在总结相关经验数据的基础上,尝试对重庆主城区的合理建筑量进行测算。测算结果显示,到2020年,按照1200万人计(其中含300万流动人口),重庆市主城区建筑总量宜控制在7.4亿平方米左右。在规划建筑量的基础上,居住建筑量、商业建筑量需要进行较大的调减,工业仓储建筑量维持不变,行政办公建筑量则需较大调增。     

Existence and description of housing market equilibrium

A rental housing market with finite numbers of non-identical consumers and indivisible housing units, each composed of a vector of attributes, is studied. A partial equilibrium, open city analysis is presented in which all other commodities are perfectly divisible and elastically supplied on national markets. Sufficient conditions for the existence of an equilibrium are rigorously established using a fixed point argument that is based on a bidding arrangement between agents. It is then shown that, although the set of equilibria is not a singleton, all equilibria are similar enough to ensure a strong resemblance between open and closed cities.     

Systems of cities in closed and open economies

This paper investigates the equilibrium properties of the system of cities in an economy. First, for a closed economy, the numbers of each type of city, their capital-to-labor ratios and their wages and costs of living, are solved for. Then the characteristics of international trade between open economies composed of systems of cities are examined, through an evaluation of standard trade theorems. This leads into topics in regional economics, such as migration and regional specialization.     

Residential density functions: An alternative to Muth's negative exponential model

A “base-price” model of a consumer is described and shown to be consistent with a variety of empirical results for United States cities. Each consumer, in a heterogeneous population, is assumed to trade a range of nonhousing goods and employment at locations not necessarily near the city center. A negative exponential function of distance from the city center is shown to be a reasonable approximation to a city's net residential density function. Differences in the relative shares, rather than absolute levels, of expenditure on housing and nonhousing goods are identified as a possible cause of spatial segmentation of a population.     

The effects of city size and moving costs on public project benefits

This paper uses a simulation model to investigate the benefits of an urban public project when the size of the system of cities (or regions) in which migration occurs can vary and when moving costs impede migration. The model captures the range of possibilities between the perfectly open and closed city cases. We find that the total number of households migrating between cities declines sharply as moving costs rise. Also the level and distribution of project benefits between renters and landowners in the project city and other cities is sensitive to both the level of moving costs and the size of the urban system. The total benefits of the project fall by half or more when moving costs are introduced, even when moving costs themselves are netted out.     

从居住者角度看高容积率

容积率是控规中主要的控制性指标,但当前我国规划管理落入了将低容积率与高居住品质完全对等的误区。对比西方国家,我国对于容积率的上限控制过于严格。而在现实的房地产市场中,不同需求层次的居民根据其所选物业类型,对容积率的高低需求也不尽相同,高容积率的住区也往往受到市场认可。在关于容积率控制的议题讨论中,应尊重不同居民的心理感受。根据笔者的调查研究与设计实践,适度提高容积率的做法是可行的。     

Prejudice, exclusion, and compensating transfers: the economics of ethnic segregation

Prejudiced groups self-segregate and exclude others. This is observed in South African apartheid, in the exclusion of Eastern European or Muslim immigrants from Western Europe and in ghettos formed by immigrants in many countries. In the United States, minorities (mostly African Americans) are segregated in central cities and wealthier European Americans reside predominantly in the suburbs. A fully closed general equilibrium model of the last case is presented. The model treats land, labor and product markets. Most whites flee the inner city for white-dominated suburbs. This benefits blacks by lowering inner city rents relative to wages. When whites are weakly prejudiced, exclusion from the suburbs hurts whites as well as blacks. But when whites are strongly prejudiced, a lump sum endowment transfer from whites to blacks can split the gains-from-trade: whites can pay transfers to blacks in exchange for blacks accepting exclusion. The transfer needed to compensate blacks is large if blacks are strongly hurt by exclusion and small if they are only slightly hurt. How much transfers to US central cities and to the poor compensate American blacks for the effects of exclusion is an open question.     

旧城改造开发项目的容积率问题研究

随着我国城市化进程的加速推进,不断增长的城市人口与持续升级的功能需求,对现代城市的建设与发展提出了新的要求。旧城改造是提升城市形象和改善人民生活的有效手段。本文在阐述容积率相关概念的基础上,根据投入产出理论,提出了旧城改造容积率测算模型,分析了容积率与利润率之间的具体关系。旧城改造实施人员可据此提出适宜的旧城改造方案。最后,本文以重庆市某旧城改造地块为例,对其容积率进行了重新测算,提出相关规划改造方案。     

The short-run comparative statics of a rental housing market

This paper examines the short-run effects of changes in exogenous variables (including several government policies) on the schedule relating market equilibrium rent to quality level. The basic model differs from Sweeney (Econometrica, 42, 147–167 (1974)) by use of a bid rent closed city approach rather than a supply and demand (partially) open city approach. The mathematics changes completely, the analytics simplify, and the results change somewhat. Housing is treated as a durable quality differentiated good, but frictional forces and the multidimensionality of the housing package are ignored. The exception is an extension to a monocentric city context, so that housing units vary in both quality and location.     

城市住区容积率的确定方法

回顾了城市住区容积率形成与控制的相关研究,总结了城市住区容积率确定的五种方法。在此基础上,指出了目前相关研究存在的不足,提出了建立多学科框架、合理确定住区容积率数值和引入智能计算方法的建议。     

Housing-choice hindrances and urban spatial structure: Evidence from matched location and location-preference data in Chinese cities

In a monocentric city with a well-functioning residential market, Pareto-efficient spatial equilibrium entails the sorting of residents according to their bid–rent gradient in descending order away from city center. Violation of this sorting condition creates opportunities for Pareto-improving trading of locations and can be sustained only if the market is hindered. We propose a simple ordered-location-choice model using matched location and location-preference data of individual households to examine violations of the Pareto-efficient spatial sorting condition. In so doing we are able to identify population groups facing housing-choice hindrances. We find in a sample of Chinese cities undergoing housing market liberalization that poor marketability of the previously state-provided homes, inadequate provision of housing finance, and spatial mismatch between job-market and housing-market opportunities contribute to a Pareto-inefficient spatial structure.     

高铁时代的城市经济增长路径与效益机制研究

本文基于综合的分析框架，探讨高铁对城市经济增长的影响及内在机制，并在不同规模城市之间进行比较；使用列车数作为城市高铁建设与运营水平的指标具体考察两种连接方式的不同影响，结合随机森林方法和样本划分进行了机制验证。结果显示，高铁的城市经济效益主要是一种间接影响，作用路径的不同解释了高铁对不同规模城市影响程度的差异性；随着城市规模的扩大，高铁在提高服务业生产效率和促进产业升级方面作用显著，而对于规模较小的城市，高铁的影响主要在于加速产业结构调整；从连接方式看，外向型交通网络的发展能够从多个方面提升大城市的经济绩效，而与邻近城市联系的加强对于中、小城市的发展显示出了积极的影响。     

The significance of digital data systems for smart city policy

Our planet is gradually moving towards an urbanized world. Modern urban agglomerations tend to turn nowadays into advanced information hubs supporting a smart management of dynamic urban systems. The currently popular notion of ‘smart cities’ aims to provide a new perspective for sustainable and high-performance strategies of city stakeholders in our ‘urban century’. In this context, digital information technology provides a new tool for efficient and effective management and planning of urban space, inter alia in the field of transportation, environment, public facilities or advanced service provision to citizens. This paper aims to offer, first, a concise overview of the emerging opportunities of information and communication technology (ICT) for smart urban policy; digital technology in particular, appears to provide novel pathways for modern planning strategies in smart cities. Against this background, the paper sketches out the complex force field of global urbanisation phenomena and highlights the data and information needs for strategic planning of cities (using inter alia as a framework the so-called ‘urban piazza’ strategy framework). Secondly, various new decision support tools that are currently emerging and that offer a new promising scope for handling complex urban management issues (for instance, on accessibility, congestion, safety or sustainability) are briefly presented. And finally, the potential of such digital data systems for urban management and policy is concisely illustrated by means of some recent applications in the area of smartphone data systems. The paper concludes with a discussion of the challenges ahead for urban policy, inter alia by paying attention to institutional and governance aspects of ‘big digital data’ management in urban systems.     

An open-city model with nonmalleable housing

Previous city and housing models are extended to allow for the nonmalleability of housing and two classes of residents. The model, which is framed in the context of a monocentric circular city, assumes an individual housing unit to be defined in terms of attributes (quality and residential density). The quality of a given housing unit can be varied without adjustment costs, but changes in residential density on a particular site require prior demolition of the existing structure on the site. Producers of housing and consumers are assumed to be myopic. By assuming that the city is in short-run equilibrium at each point of time, it is shown that the pattern of land use observed at any stage depends on the past history of the city and the current rates of population growth. The possibilities for filtering of houses from one income group to another are also discussed briefly.     

Alternative Methods of School Finance: An Empirical Analysis of Cities in San Diego County

. Two alternatives to the local school property tax are explored using a simulation model: a power equalizing property tax and a state-wide property tax. The effects on residents’tax burdens and service levels are estimated and compared for residents of 13 cities in San Diego County. Under each of the available options shifts in tax burdens would occur. One high income city is a major beneficiary. Three others which would be required to contribute more to education are otherwise dissimilar; one is already taxing itself heavily. When tax effort is considered, cities intended to be prime beneficiaries do benefit but not greatly. The principal gainer is a city with high income and high property values. This analysis does not indicate that these alternative programs are more equitable than the present property tax.     

Factor substitution,employment density and suburbanization

A model of an urban area producing one good for export is presented and solved to yield the employment density function. The production technology is a constant elasticity of substitution (σ) production function, unlike other models which use a Cobb-Douglas function. The shape of the employment density function proves to be sensitive to the elasticity of substitution and can diverge markedly from the usually assumed negative exponential form. The employment density function is a constant when σ = 0; always declines for positive σ but at an increasing rate if $\text{σ ≤}\text{1}\text{2}$; at either an increasing rate near the city center and decreasing thereafter or always at a decreasing rate if $\text{1}\text{2}\text{< σ < 1}$; and at a decreasing rate if σ ≥ 1. When the employment density function is differentiated with respect to σ, the sign of the derivative is positive near the city center and generally negative in the outer regions; the city seems to centralize. A decline in transport costs does not always suburbanize employment; it is contingent on the nature of the production technology.     

基于灰色综合评价的资源型城市主导产业选择研究

资源型城市如何选择主导产业关系到产业结构的调整和未来的可持续发展。本文从区域比较优势、资源优势、竞争优势、产业优势、可持续发展五个方面构建资源型城市主导产业的评价指标体系,利用层次分析法确定各指标权重,并使用基于关联度的灰色综合评价法对典型资源型城市大庆市主导产业进行实例分析,为其主导产业选择提供依据。     

Alternative transportation modes in an urban land use model: A general equilibrium approach

This paper presents and analyzes a general equilibrium transportation demand model. The model was applied to hypothetical cities with populations of 1 and 2 million. Data and coefficients for those cities were obtained from existing metropolitan areas of equivalent sizes. A subway system is found to be uneconomical in the hypothetical city with one million population and with an average population density of 4400 per square mile. However, it is found to be economical and desirable for the hypothetical city with two million population and with an average density of 6900 per square mile.     

Housing-choice hindrances and urban spatial structure: Evidence from matched location and location-preference data in Chinese cities

In a monocentric city with a well-functioning residential market, Pareto-efficient spatial equilibrium entails the sorting of residents according to their bid–rent gradient in descending order away from city center. Violation of this sorting condition creates opportunities for Pareto-improving trading of locations and can be sustained only if the market is hindered. We propose a simple ordered-location-choice model using matched location and location-preference data of individual households to examine violations of the Pareto-efficient spatial sorting condition. In so doing we are able to identify population groups facing housing-choice hindrances. We find in a sample of Chinese cities undergoing housing market liberalization that poor marketability of the previously state-provided homes, inadequate provision of housing finance, and spatial mismatch between job-market and housing-market opportunities contribute to a Pareto-inefficient spatial structure.