城市交通运输地理发展趋势

从城市交通运输地理研究的核心概念入手,在对具有代表性的交通运输地理著作及刊物的研究进行综述基础上,对城市交通运输地理的发展进行分析,揭示城市交通运输地理目前研究的主要内容及发展趋势,丰富和发展城市地理学及交通地理学的研究内容。

Development Tendency of Urban Transport Geography

Starting from the introduction and comparison of the two most classic English textbooks and two Chinese ones in the field of urban transport, we explored, in the first section, the core definitions accessibility, mobility, equity, residential pattern, and employment pattern, etc. Any approach to measurement of demand for personal travel usually rests upon the closely interrelated concepts of mobility and accessibility. Mobility levels and constraints upon the extent to which particular journeys are made depend upon personal factors such as health and financial resources and upon the range of transport facilities that are available. Any person will experience a life cycle with quite different opportunities and requirements for travel at each stage. We focused our discussion of the second part upon the topic of the linkage between urban transport and urban spatial transition, including that between urban transport and urban morphology & spatial structure, and that between urban transport and land use. Land use and transportation are mutually dependent. The characteristics of the transportation system determine accessibility, or the ease of moving from one place to another. Accessibility in turn affects the location of activities, or the land use pattern. The location of activities in space, together with the transportation resources connecting them, affects daily activity patterns, which in turn result in travel patterns. Land use and transportation are part of the larger urban system: the collection of people, institutions, and infrastructure that together form the urban space economy. We discussed the urban travel research in the third section, including the aggregate and disaggregate travel models, studies of urban logistics and urban freight transport. Facilities for the transport of people and freight within urban area vary widely. The greater share of personal travel is now carried out by private means of transport although public passenger rail and bus undertaking are still of importance for commuter movements. In the next part we reviewed the study of urban transport policy and other involved research. Urban transport is part of the daily rhythm of life. Mobility is a fundamental human activity and need, but is restricted by the friction of distance. As a complex industry in terms of land use, employment and functions, urban transport is a major factor interlinked with the environment and with the spatial distribution and development of all other forms economic and social activity. Geographical theories, methods and perspectives contribute significantly towards an understanding of transport problems and their eventual solution. We compared the urban transport research in domestic and outside China before the conclusion. There are two main reasons explain why urban transport geography important. First, urban transport industries, facilities, infrastructures and networks occupy substantial areas of geographical space, constitute complex spatial systems and provide substantial numbers of widely spread jobs. Second, urban geography is concerned with interrelationships between phenomena in a spatial patterns, and transport is frequently one of the most potent explanatory factors.