Study On The Evolution Of Urban Spatial Structure Of Guangdong Province

Urban spatial structure research has been one of the major research issues of regional structure and economic geography both at home and abroad. As early and pilot implementation of the reform and opening up, the evolution of urban spatial structure of Guangdong Province has gone through an unusual road for decades. But the systematic study of this evolution has not yet been involved, especially the quantitative and systematic study. In addition, all kinds of new development element appeared in recent years will have what kind of impact to Guangdong Province also need to make some discussion. Based on the above considerations, this paper makes a quantitative analysis of the evolution of the spatial structure of Guangdong Province from1990to2010. The calculation is based on the statistical data of every County of Guangdong Province.The article is divided into six chapters and the main content of each chapter is as follows. The first chapter is an introduction which mainly introduces the research background, significance, research ideas, research methods and research data sources.The second chapter is research review. This chapter is divided into four parts. The first part is research review of the theory of urban spatial structure. This paper provides an overview of the approximate course of its development and describes several classic theoretical model generated in the course of development of urban spatial structure in order to make an elaborate description of the empirical research. The second part is review of the urban spatial structure research methods. This paper analyzes the existing calculation method to prepare for the selection of research methods in this paper. The third part is the empirical research of urban spatial structure to provide appropriate reference for this paper. The fourth part is selection and construction of measure methods that will be used in this paper. This part is building the framework of the research methods mainly based on the actual need.The third chapter is the empirical analysis of the evolution of urban spatial structure in Guangdong Province. After review of the historical evolution of the spatial structure of Guangdong Province, this paper analyzes the degree of concentration of urban space, space type classification, degree of spatial differentiation, space interaction and so on quantitatively from1990to2010. The content mainly includes the spatial and temporal evolution of the degree of economic concentration, spatial and temporal evolution of the level of urban development, changes in the pattern of urban space, spatial pattern of the pace of economic development, coefficient of variation of economic development, contact strength of the urban space, spatial correlation and so on. Based on these studies,1find the following conclusions. Firstly, the degree of economic concentration in Guangdong Province is high and mainly concentrates in the Pearl River Delta region. Secondly, the urban development presents the core-edge mode. Thirdly, the difference is large in the evolution of urban spatial pattern in different periods. Forthly, the pace of economic development of each region are quite different. Fifthly, the coefficient of variation of the economic development first expands and then shrinks. Sixthly, urban space is closely linked within the Pearl River Delta region and the link among peripheral cities and the Pearl River Delta cities are generally stronger than that among its surrounding cities.Seventhly, the spatial correlation analysis further verifies the phenomenon that the polarization effects are more obvious in the first decade and diffusion effects begin to appear in the second decade.Overall, the dynamic evolution of urban spatial structure of Guangdong Province generally presents two characteristics. First, there is an obvious core-edge mode (Pearl River Delta-the outlying areas). Second, polarization effects are obvious in the Pearl River Delta in the first decade and diffusion effects begin to appear in the second decade. The main reasons that leading the status quo of urban spatial structure in Guangdong Province include natural and geographical factors, historical and traditional factors, transport factors, policy factors, globalization factors and so on.The fourth chapter is the view of China’s urbanization strategy based on empirical research. After reviewing the course of the evolution of China’s urbanization strategy since the reform and opening up, this paper compares it with the evolution of urban spatial structure of Guangdong Province in the past two decades and finds two conclusions. One is our national urbanization policy is somewhat failure from1990to2000, the other is the policy is making adjustment to meet the need of evolution of urban spatial structure from2000to2010.The fifth chapter is the urban spatial structure evolution trends and coping strategies of Guangdong Province in the new period. The article mainly analyzes the new development elements in the new period and they will have what impact to the urban spatial structure evolution of Guangdong Province. Then, the paper gives the corresponding measures at the same time.The sixth chapter is the conclusion and discussion. It mainly summarizes the main content and perspectives of the paper.Futhermore, it analyzes the lack of this paper and points out what we can do in futher research.