ALBERT

Description: In honor of James P. LeSage Content Type Journal Article Category Introduction Pages 1-4 DOI 10.1007/s10109-011-0156-6 Authors Manfred M. Fischer, Institute for Economic Geography and GIScience, Vienna University of Economics and Business, Nordbergstr. 15/4/A, 1090 Vienna, Austria Journal Journal of Geographical Systems Online ISSN 1435-5949 Print ISSN 1435-5930 Journal Volume Volume 14 Journal Issue Volume 14, Number 1

Description:    In this paper, we extend the applicability of a previously proposed class of dynamic space-time models by enabling them to accommodate large datasets. We focus on the common setting where space is viewed as continuous but time is taken to be discrete. Scalability is achieved by using a low-rank predictive process to reduce the dimensionality of the data and ease the computational burden of estimating the spatio-temporal process of interest. The proposed models are illustrated using weather station data collected over the northeastern United States between 2000 and 2005. Here our interest is to use readily available predictors, association among measurements at a given station, as well as dependence across space and time to improve prediction for incomplete station records and locations where station data does not exist. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Article Pages 29-47 DOI 10.1007/s10109-011-0154-8 Authors Andrew O. Finley, Departments of Geography and Forestry, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA Sudipto Banerjee, Division of Biostatistics, School of Public Health, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA Alan E. Gelfand, Department of Statistical Science, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA Journal Journal of Geographical Systems Online ISSN 1435-5949 Print ISSN 1435-5930 Journal Volume Volume 14 Journal Issue Volume 14, Number 1

Description:    It is largely accepted among geographers and economists that the City Size Distribution (CSD) is well described by a power law, i.e., Zipf’s law. This opinion is shared by this community in a manner it could be treated as a paradigm. In reality, however, Zipf’s law is not always observed (even as an approximation), and we prefer to adopt a classification of the CSD into three classes. In this work, we present the characteristics of these classes and give some examples for them. We use the Israeli system of cities as an interesting case study in which the same ensemble of cities passes from one class to another. We relate this change to the urbanization process that occurred in Israel from the 1960s onwards. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Article Pages 87-100 DOI 10.1007/s10109-010-0132-6 Authors L. Benguigui, Solid State Institute and Physics Department, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, 32000 Haifa, Israel E. Blumenfeld-Lieberthal, The David Azrieli School of Architecture, The Yolanda and David Katz Faculty of the Arts, Tel-Aviv University, Ramat-Aviv, Tel-Aviv, 69978 Israel Journal Journal of Geographical Systems Online ISSN 1435-5949 Print ISSN 1435-5930 Journal Volume Volume 13 Journal Issue Volume 13, Number 1

Description:    In the literatures of regional science, urban economics, and urban development planning, a working assumption is that individuals respond to incentives and regulations, given their preferences. Models for planning and policy analyses are used to consider what might occur if the incentives or regulations were different. In these models, however, preferences are usually assumed to be given and stable, and agents are usually assumed to be homogeneous. This paper focuses on the implications of making preferences in models of policy implementation endogenously determined and time varying heterogeneous agents. We consider first the recent literature on intertemporal choice and preference change, which cuts across many disciplines, and more briefly the literature on norm-regarding behavior. We then elaborate a simple model of transportation demand—from a static to a dynamic orientation, from fixed and exogenously given preferences of strictly self-regarding agents to endogenously determined and policy-induced preferences of heterogeneous agents—and illustrate its characteristics with simple numerical examples. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Article Pages 17-30 DOI 10.1007/s10109-010-0129-1 Authors Kieran P. Donaghy, Department of City and Regional Planning, Cornell University, 106 West Sibley Hall, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA Journal Journal of Geographical Systems Online ISSN 1435-5949 Print ISSN 1435-5930 Journal Volume Volume 13 Journal Issue Volume 13, Number 1

Description:    We present a model that simulates the growth of a metropolitan area on a 2D lattice. The model is dynamic and based on microeconomics. Households show preferences for nearby open spaces and neighbourhood density. They compete on the land market. They travel along a road network to access the CBD. A planner ensures the connectedness and maintenance of the road network. The spatial pattern of houses, green spaces and road network self-organises, emerging from agents individualistic decisions. We perform several simulations and vary residential preferences. Our results show morphologies and transition phases that are similar to Dieletric Breakdown Models (DBM). Such similarities were observed earlier by other authors, but we show here that it can be deducted from the functioning of the land market and thus explicitly connected to urban economic theory. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Article Pages 31-48 DOI 10.1007/s10109-010-0131-7 Authors Geoffrey Caruso, Geography and Spatial Planning Research Centre, IPSE, University of Luxembourg, Campus Walferdange, BP2, Walferdange, 7220 Luxembourg Gilles Vuidel, UMR 6049 ThéMA, Université de Franche-Comté, Besançon, France Jean Cavailhès, UMR 1041 CESAER, Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA), Dijon, France Pierre Frankhauser, UMR 6049 ThéMA, Université de Franche-Comté, Besançon, France Dominique Peeters, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE), Université catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium Isabelle Thomas, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE), Université catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium Journal Journal of Geographical Systems Online ISSN 1435-5949 Print ISSN 1435-5930 Journal Volume Volume 13 Journal Issue Volume 13, Number 1

Description:    The space–time prism demarcates all locations in space–time that a mobile object or person can occupy during an episode of potential or unobserved movement. The prism is central to time geography as a measure of potential mobility and to mobile object databases as a measure of location possibilities given sampling error. This paper develops an analytical approach to assessing error propagation in space–time prisms and prism–prism intersections. We analyze the geometry of the prisms to derive a core set of geometric problems involving the intersection of circles and ellipses. Analytical error propagation techniques such as the Taylor linearization method based on the first-order partial derivatives are not available since explicit functions describing the intersections and their derivatives are unwieldy. However, since we have implicit functions describing prism geometry, we modify this approach using an implicit function theorem that provides the required first-order partials without the explicit expressions. We describe the general method as well as details for the two spatial dimensions case and provide example calculations. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Article Pages 327-354 DOI 10.1007/s10109-010-0139-z Authors Tetsuo Kobayashi, Department of Geography, University of Utah, 260 S. Central Campus Dr. Room 270, Salt Lake City, UT 84112-9155, USA Harvey J. Miller, Department of Geography, University of Utah, 260 S. Central Campus Dr. Room 270, Salt Lake City, UT 84112-9155, USA Walied Othman, Theoretical Computer Science Group, Department WNI, Hasselt University, Agoralaan, Gebouw D, 3590 Diepenbeek, Belgium Journal Journal of Geographical Systems Online ISSN 1435-5949 Print ISSN 1435-5930 Journal Volume Volume 13 Journal Issue Volume 13, Number 4

Description:    In this paper, we present a review of various computational experiments concerning neural network (NN) models developed for regional employment forecasting. NNs are nowadays widely used in several fields because of their flexible specification structure. A series of NN experiments is presented in the paper, using two data sets on German NUTS-3 districts. Individual forecasts are computed by our models for each district in order to answer the following question: How relevant are NN parameters in comparison to NN structure? Comprehensive testing of these parameters is limited in the literature. Building on different specifications of NN models—in terms of explanatory variables and NN structures—we propose a systematic choice of NN learning parameters and internal functions by means of a sensitivity analysis. Our results show that different combinations of NN parameters provide significantly varying statistical performance and forecasting power. Finally, we note that the sets of parameters chosen for a given model specification cannot be light-heartedly applied to different or more complex models. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Article Pages 67-85 DOI 10.1007/s10109-010-0133-5 Authors Roberto Patuelli, Institute for Economic Research (IRE), University of Lugano, Lugano, Switzerland Aura Reggiani, Department of Economics, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy Peter Nijkamp, Department of Spatial Economics, VU University Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands Norbert Schanne, Institute for Employment Research (IAB), Nuremberg, Germany Journal Journal of Geographical Systems Online ISSN 1435-5949 Print ISSN 1435-5930 Journal Volume Volume 13 Journal Issue Volume 13, Number 1

Description:    We analyze the consumption of non-life insurance across 103 Italian provinces in 1998–2002 in order to assess its determinants, in the light of the empirical literature. Using sub-regional data, we overcome an important limitation of cross-country analyses, i.e. the systemic heterogeneity due to country-specific characteristics. Individual heterogeneity is accounted for through panel data techniques. However, considering spatial units within a single market raises issues of cross-sectional or spatial dependence, either due to common nationwide and/or regional factors or to spatial proximity. We carefully assess spatial dependence, employing recent diagnostic tests, finding out that the regressors included in our specification successfully account for spatial dependence. Insurance turns out to depend on income, wealth and some demographics, as already established, but also on trust, judicial efficiency and borrowing conditions. These findings help in explaining the gap between Central-Northern Italy and the south of the country. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Article Pages 273-298 DOI 10.1007/s10109-010-0125-5 Authors Giovanni Millo, Generali Research & Development, Generali S.p.A., via Machiavelli 4, 34131 Trieste, Italy Gaetano Carmeci, Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche, Aziendali, Matematiche e Statistiche “B. de Finetti” (DEAMS), University of Trieste, Piazzale Europa 1, 34127 Trieste, Italy Journal Journal of Geographical Systems Online ISSN 1435-5949 Print ISSN 1435-5930 Journal Volume Volume 13 Journal Issue Volume 13, Number 3

Description:    A spatial tessellation is a set of regions that are collectively exhaustive and mutually exclusive except for the boundaries. In geographical analysis, it may represent such administrative units as census tracts, postal zones, and electoral or school districts. Spatial tessellations of a certain area are often closely related to each other. Areas of local communities are related to school districts, market areas of retail stores, and administrative units. Postal zones and census tracts are determined by collecting or dividing administrative units. Analysis of such relations among tessellations often reveals their underlying spatial phenomena. To this end, this paper proposes a new exploratory method for analyzing the relations among spatial tessellations. It aims to detect spatial patterns, especially those with a hierarchical structure, and to provide a tessellation classification scheme. Topological relations and similarity measures are introduced to evaluate the relations between tessellation pair. For more tessellations, tree representations are proposed. These not only visualize relations, but also provide a means of classifying tessellations. The method is applied to the analysis of two sets of spatial tessellations: one with five hypothetical tessellations, and another with 34 candidate plans for the new Doshusei administrative system in Japan. The application reveals the properties of the method and quantitative measures used in analysis. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Article Pages 373-391 DOI 10.1007/s10109-010-0127-3 Authors Yukio Sadahiro, Department of Urban Engineering, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1, Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-8656 Japan Journal Journal of Geographical Systems Online ISSN 1435-5949 Print ISSN 1435-5930 Journal Volume Volume 13 Journal Issue Volume 13, Number 4

Description:    The transportation of dangerous goods (DG) can significantly affect the human and natural environment if accidents occur during the transportation process. Hong Kong is a large city with high population density and narrow streets. Due to the land constraints, vehicles carrying DG inevitably have to pass through densely populated areas or their vicinities. Therefore, safe DG transportation is of paramount importance. There is thus an urgent need to review and improve the way trucks carrying DG are being routed on the road networks. Routing of such vehicles should consider not only the operating cost, but also the safety of travelers in the network, the population potentially exposed, and the possible damage inflicted to the surrounding properties and facilities in the event of a DG incident. This research develops a novel methodology for the determination of optimal routes for DG transportation under conflicting objectives by means of the compromise programming approach. With the support of geographical information system (GIS), a case study is carried out for the transportation of DG in the road network of Hong Kong. The experimental results confirm the effectiveness of the proposed approach. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Article Pages 249-271 DOI 10.1007/s10109-010-0124-6 Authors Rongrong Li, Department of Geography and Resource Management, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, N. T., Hong Kong Yee Leung, Department of Geography and Resource Management, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, N. T., Hong Kong Journal Journal of Geographical Systems Online ISSN 1435-5949 Print ISSN 1435-5930 Journal Volume Volume 13 Journal Issue Volume 13, Number 3