Identification Of Physical Urban Shrinkage And Its Spatial Characteristics And Influencing Factors In Hubei Province

Shrinking city is a realistic challenge that most of our present and future areas face regardless of the level of economic development.Urban development is unique in our country,and there are many differences between regions while closely related.The shrinking city research can enrich relevant theories,provide the basis for city adjustment planning policy,and play a positive role in promoting the new urbanization and realizing sustainable development.Taking Hubei Province,where the pressure of population structure is prominent and typical,as the study area,this study considers the uniqueness of urbanization development and the limitations of administrative division on the basis of the experience at home and abroad,and chooses physical cities as the research unit.Firstly,the spatial pattern of population change in Hubei Province was analyzed;Secondly,physical cities in Hubei Province were extracted through land use data;Then,the spatial distribution data of population was used to calculate the change rate of physical city population during the study period,and the city with negative population growth was identified as shrinking city;Then,the shrinking cities were classified according to the shrinkage degree,i.e.,the population change rate,and the spatial characteristics of the shrinking cities were classified according to the spatial differences of the night light brightness changes,and the distribution pattern of the shrinking cities was analyzed accordingly.Finally,indicators are selected from the three perspectives of city location,size and development,and correlation analysis and MGWR model are used to explore the common and individual factors of urban shrinkage in Hubei Province,and countermeasures and suggestions are provided from the three perspectives of coping attitude,region and shrinking city individual.The main conclusions are as follows:(1)During the study period,the population growth in Hubei Province mainly occurred in urban areas such as Wuhan and individual mountainous areas,while the population decline occurred in the vast areas of central and northern Hubei Province,and the population distribution tended to be centralized.(2)82 physical cities were identified through land use data,all of which could better cover the actual urban built-up areas;The total area of physical cities in Hubei Province in 2010 and 2020 is 4966km2 and 7333km2 respectively,accounting for2.67% and 3.94% of the total area of Hubei Province,with an average area of 61km2 and 89km2.(3)46 shrinking cities were identified,existing in all prefecture-level cities except Wuhan and Enshi,with an average population decline of 12.40%;From the north-central part of Hubei Province,the shrinkage degree gradually increased,and from the south-central part to both sides,the global type,local type,side type,and the non-obvious shrinkage type appeared successively.(4)The shrinkage of physical cities is the result of multiple factors,and the effects of different factors are different in different regions;Physical cities in the early and middle stages of urbanization or less affected by the siphon effect of neighboring developed cities are less likely to shrink.To deal with shrinking cities,we should first have a comprehensive understanding and positive attitude;For regions,we should strengthen the connection and coordinated development,and for shrinking cities,we should optimize the planning and orderly development.