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Urban Economic Development and Planning: Sustainable Development

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A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Sustainable Urban and Rural Development".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (24 February 2024) | Viewed by 4157

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Special Issue Editor

Prof. Dr. Chei-Chang Chiou

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Guest Editor

Department of Accounting, National Changhua University of Education, Changhua, Taiwan
Interests: capital market research; economic efficiency; ESG research; educational technology; teaching innovation; concept mapping; multimedia research

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue will present research findings addressing urban planning policies and experiences that originate from the interplay among environmental, social, and economic factors in a broad sense. A fundamental concept of sustainable development is achieving human development goals while simultaneously maintaining the capacity of natural systems to supply the natural resources and ecosystem services that are essential to human economies and society. The 17 sustainable development goals established by the UNGA address global concerns such as poverty, inequality, climate change, environmental degradation, peace, and justice. The goals would inspire a rethinking of urban development and planning in all nations, taking into account the social, environmental, and economic aspects of sustainable development in mind. Our focus in this Special Issue is to publish articles of scholarly merit on a wide variety of topics and apply a wide variety of methods to urban economics from a sustainable development perspective. This Special Issue encourages the submission of papers that contribute to urban economic development and planning for sustainable development through theoretical and empirical contributions.

Prof. Dr. Chei-Chang Chiou
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

sustainable development goals
sustainability
urban
urbanization
smart cities
economic growth
economic development

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

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16 pages, 8168 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Unveiling Transportation Socio-Economic Adaptability Using a Node–Place Model: A Case from Zhejiang Province, China

by Jianwei Shi, Shuwei Wang, Siyang Liu and Chenjing Zhou

Sustainability 2024, 16(10), 4009; https://doi.org/10.3390/su16104009 - 10 May 2024

Viewed by 375

Abstract

Effective investment in transportation infrastructure ensures sustainable urban development and high-quality economic development. Understanding transportation and socioeconomic relationships is crucial for developing investment strategies. Existing research focuses on analyzing the contribution of transportation to the economy or the contribution of economic development to transportation, neglecting the identification of transportation infrastructure weaknesses to initiate targeted investment and construction. In this study, we propose an assessment framework based on the node–place model to identify the shortcomings in transportation infrastructure. The framework encompasses the adaptability of the current transportation infrastructure and the stage of economic development, evaluating whether the current transportation infrastructure is ahead of or lagging behind the level of economic development. We conduct a case study on three kinds of transportation infrastructure, including railways, highways, and civil aviation, in Zhejiang Province, China. The results show that Zhejiang Province’s transportation infrastructure generally meets economic development requirements, and most cities have relatively advanced transportation systems. However, significant gaps in transportation facilities in certain areas still need to be targeted and supplemented. These findings help to explore the theoretical relationship between transportation and socioeconomics, providing a basis for economic investment decisions on transportation infrastructure. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Urban Economic Development and Planning: Sustainable Development)

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21 pages, 15299 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Vulnerability Assessment of a Highly Populated Megacity to Ambient Thermal Stress

by Aman Gupta, Bhaskar De, Anoop Kumar Shukla and Gloria Pignatta

Sustainability 2024, 16(8), 3395; https://doi.org/10.3390/su16083395 - 18 Apr 2024

Viewed by 803

Abstract

The urban ambient environment is directly responsible for the health conditions of millions of people. Comfortable living space is a significant aspect that urban policymakers need to address for sustainable planning. There is still a notable lack of studies that link the spatial profile of urban climate with city-specific built-up settings while assessing the vulnerability of the city population. Geospatial approaches can be beneficial in evaluating patterns of thermal discomfort and strategizing its mitigation. This study attempts to provide a thorough remote sensing framework to analyze the summer magnitude of thermal discomfort for a city in a tropical hot and humid climate. Spatial profiles of dry bulb temperature, wet bulb temperature and relative humidity were prepared for this purpose. A simultaneous assessment of various discomfort indices indicated the presence of moderate to strong heat stress to a vast extent within the study area. The central business district (CBD) of the city indicated a ‘danger’ level of heat disorder for outdoor exposure cases. Nearly 0.69 million people were vulnerable to a moderate threat from humid heat stress, and around 0.21 million citizens faced strong heat stress. Combing city morphology in the study showed that mid-rise buildings had the maximum contribution in terms of thermal discomfort. City areas with built-up cover of more than 68%, along with building height between 5.8 m and 9.3 m, created the worst outdoor discomfort situations. Better land management prospects were also investigated through a multicriteria approach using morphological settlement zones, wind direction, pavement watering, building regulations and future landscaping plans. East–west-aligned road segments of a total 38.44 km length were delineated for water spray cooling and greener pavements. This study is likely to provide solutions for enhancing ambient urban health. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Urban Economic Development and Planning: Sustainable Development)

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17 pages, 2227 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Global or Local Spatial Spillovers? Industrial Diversity and Economic Resilience in the Middle Reaches of the Yangtze River Urban Agglomeration, China

by Xiaojing Li and Jing Chen

Sustainability 2023, 15(14), 11376; https://doi.org/10.3390/su151411376 - 21 Jul 2023

Viewed by 1018

Abstract

A growing body of literature has studied the empirical relationship between industrial diversity and economic resilience since the 2008 Great Recession. However, many existing studies are based on a nonspatial perspective, and little is known about the local or global spatial spillover effect of industrial diversity on economic resilience. This paper employs Bayesian spatial econometric methods to investigate the roles of related variety and unrelated variety on economic resilience in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River urban agglomeration, China and explores the possible local or global spatial spillover effect in the diversity–resilience relationship. The empirical results from the spatial Durbin error model estimation show that: (1) regions with high levels of related variety are economically resilient to the external shock in the postcrisis era, whereas unrelated variety has no significant direct effect on recovery resilience; (2) both related and unrelated variety have local spatial spillovers with respect to the one-year resilience of 2008–2009, but these spillovers are negligible in longer study periods. These results confirm the role of industrial relatedness and immediate neighbors in promoting regions’ short-run capabilities of recovery from external economic shocks. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Urban Economic Development and Planning: Sustainable Development)

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Review

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17 pages, 510 KiB

Open AccessReview

Socio-Economic Dynamics Inhibiting Inclusive Urban Economic Development: Implications for Sustainable Urban Development in South African Cities

by Robert Mutemi Kajiita and Simon Murote Kang’ethe

Sustainability 2024, 16(7), 2803; https://doi.org/10.3390/su16072803 - 28 Mar 2024

Viewed by 927

Abstract

Globally, the need for sustainable urban development has never been more urgent than it is now. This is because estimates indicate that more than half of the global population will be living in urban areas by 2050, with South Africa estimated at 80%. This paper focuses on socio-economic nuances that impede sustainable urban development, as well as the strategies that can accelerate sustainable and inclusive urban development in South Africa. Through a literature-review methodology, the analysis identified the following issues as impediments to sustainable urban development in South Africa: informality, lack of consultations with urban citizens, unresolved apartheid legacies, crime and insecurity, and migration intricacies in South Africa. The paper also establishes prospective strategies to accelerate sustainable urban development, such as working with informality and not against it, promoting inclusivity and access to resources, accelerating policy reforms, investing in rural towns, and investing in superior technology and innovation. These findings imply that there is a need to seek alternative development models and approaches, to address poverty, unemployment, and poor housing, aspects that negatively impact urban development planning and sustainable development. The paper recommends inclusive urban housing as a remedy to address the challenges of access, affordability, and the quality of housing facilities in urban areas. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Urban Economic Development and Planning: Sustainable Development)

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