Lei Wang

Chinese Academy of Sciences | CAS · Nanjing Institute of Geography and Limology

Arid regions in Northwestern China, such as Ganzhou District, are crucial for agriculture but face challenges due to water scarcity. This study employs a coupling coordination model to analyse the environmental impact of agricultural water use in Ganzhou District and dissect the tension between agricultural development and ecological concerns. Desp...

With the rapid expansion of China’s high-speed rail network, numerous high-speed rail new towns have been established. While these new towns have brought about significant economic opportunities, they also impose pressure on local resources and environment. Accurately assessing the impacts of high-speed rail new towns on urban sustainable developme...

The safety, inclusivity, accessibility, and green communities emphasized in the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) play a vital role in the establishment of child-friendly cities. The governments are actively promoting the development of sustainable, child-friendly cities that prioritize people’s needs and aim to enhance the well-...

Since the new century, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has managed to sustain stable economic growth, drawing global attention due to its robust performance. Nighttime light (NTL) observations have been recognized as a useful tool for monitoring the long-term socioeconomic development trends over large areas. Therefore, this stud...

Clarifying the intrinsic mechanism of county carbon emission intensity (CEI) is essential for guiding the realization of a low-carbon economy as well as for the strategic goals of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality. However, at present, scholars mostly focus on provincial and city scales, with the identification of influencing factors and spatial...

Rural decline has become a global problem. To address this issue, the division of rural functions and identification of driving factors are important means of rural revitalization. Taking the town area as a unit, this study conducts a division and evolution analysis of rural regional functions in Jiangsu province in coastal China by constructing an...

Understanding how the built environment influences e-scooter sharing (ESS) travel behavior is essential for informing effective built environment modifications to promote ESS usage. This study introduces a novel approach by utilizing link flow data, a different type of data compared to previous studies that focused on trip origin or destination inf...

Rapid urbanization in China has led to inefficient use of urban land and spatial structure disorder, attracting attention from academia and society. Taking the Yangtze River Delta, China as an example, this study constructed an index evaluation system that quantitatively analyses the impact of new-type urbanization (NTU) on urban land use efficienc...

Rivers are among the most diverse, dynamic, and productive ecosystems on Earth. River flow regimes are constantly changing, but characterizing and understanding such changes have been challenging from a long-term and global perspective. By analyzing water extent variations observed from four-decade Landsat imagery, we here provide a global attribut...

Assessing the impacts and drivers of urban expansion on terrestrial carbon storage (TCS) is important for urban ecology and sustainability; however, a unified accounting standard for carbon intensity and research on the drivers and economic value of TCS changes are lacking. Here, urban expansion and TCS in the Yangtze River Delta were simulated bas...

Understanding the spatial variation of intangible cultural heritage (ICH) is essential for protecting and utilizing heritage resources but has rarely been investigated along the Grand Canal in China. Initially, we analyzed the spatial variation of ICH with different categories using GIS spatial analysis and other technologies. Subsequently, we used...

Following the rapid expansion of the high-speed rail (HSR) network in China, transit-oriented development (TOD) has been widely introduced in HSR station areas of both large and small cities. However, as most HSR stations are new construction, some problems have emerged, e.g., over-planned station areas, airport-like stations above local demand, la...

Over the past 20 years, China has experienced multiple economic transitions characterized by marketization, globalization, decentralization, and urbanization; as a result, urban land development intensity (ULDI) has become a significant issue for sustainable development. As China’s largest globalized urban area, the rapid socio-economic development...

Unlike most city centers in countries that pioneer European high-speed rail (HSR) lines, HSR stations in China have mainly been developed in suburban areas. The rationale for peripherally located HSR stations is due to development costs and intentions to speed up urbanization and develop new suburbs. However, it remains unknown whether the HSR-led...

Evaluating urban land use efficiency (ULUE) provides insights into the interactions between land use systems and their external environment. Specifically, changes in ULUE are important for monitoring urban transformation in developing countries. In this study, using a traditional input-output index model, we incorporated slack-based measurements an...

Lakes provide water-related ecosystem services that support human life and production. Nevertheless, climate changes and anthropogenic interventions remarkably altered lake and basin hydrology in recent decades, which pose a significant threat to lacustrine ecosystems. Therefore, assessments of lacustrine ecosystems require the spatial and temporal...

This study examines spatial shifts across Chinese cities between 2002 and 2018 in corporate control due to mergers and acquisitions (M&As), which are important for the Chinese urban system based on the command-and-control criteria. Descriptive results indicate that the spatial reallocation of corporate control in China has been largely dominated by...

Environmental regulation is an important factor affecting the relocation of polluting industries. This study explores the spatial pattern evolution of the chemical industry, regional differences in environmental regulation, and the corresponding pollution haven effect in the region along the Yangtze River from 2000 to 2013. We found that the distri...

Drawing on 185 cities in the northeastern region of China, this paper improves the radiation model by incorporating the accessibility index to characterize the asymmetric process of economic linkages before HSR in 2007 and after HSR in 2016. Then social network analysis is utilized to examine the impact of HSR on the spatial structure of economic n...

Having high spatio-temporal resolution data of pollutants is critical to understand environmental pollution patterns and their mechanisms. Our research employs the hourly average concentration data on the air quality index (AQI) and its six component pollutants (PM2.5, PM10, SO2, NO2, CO, and O3) in 336 Chinese cities from 2014 to 2019. We analyze...

In contrast to abundant research on population (re)distribution in China, the dynamics of intra‐urban employment concentration remain poorly understood. Drawing upon firm‐level employment data for 2008 and 2013 at a fine analytic scale, we utilize a two‐stage approach involving nonparametric estimating and proximity‐based threshold setting, persist...

This paper examined the use of navigation and point-of-interests big data in three urban planning tools: community detection, road importance assessment, and urban function pattern recognition. We revealed the community structure for the urban spatial organization, followed by identifying major transit corridors and the urban function pattern. We f...

In the context of rapid urbanization in developing countries, the spatial organization of cities has been progressively restructured over the past decades. However, little has been done to understand how the physical expansion affected the reorganization of socioeconomic spaces in cities. This study explores the association between various street n...

Background Population ageing and air pollution have become two major public health concerns in China. Longitudinal evidence on the body weight impacts of air pollution among older adults is rare. This study aims to investigate the impacts of ambient particulate matter with aerodynamic diameters ≤2.5 μm (PM2.5) on weight status of older adults in Ch...

As an economic pillar, major resource consumer, and polluter of cities, the chemical industry determines many cities’ transformation, prosperity, and decay. It is thus a major concern for achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals. In China, which is at the stage of accelerated industrialization that is varied across regions, the chemical indus...

China's rapid modernization has generated a vibrant online community over the past 20 years. While there is an established body of work on the impact of traditional media on political opinion in China, the patterns and political impact of media engagement among tens of millions of Chinese 'netizens' remain under-researched. Using data from the 2015...

The nexus between transport infrastructure and economic output has been subject to heated debates. Existing studies investigating their nexus between transportation and economic growth tend to focus on macroscales and utilize panel data but assume homogeneity across individual units. This paper aims to handle the problem of geographic heterogeneity...

Owing to rapid urbanization and industrialization over decades, nitrogen dioxide (NO2) has become a serious air pollutant in China. The Chinese government has proposed a series of strict strategies for the reduction of nitrogen oxides (NOx) emissions. This research studies the spatio-temporal characteristics of NO2 pollution over China from October...

In recent years, the increasing segregation and fragmentation of transport service provisions, evidenced between urban and rural areas, and between different administrative divisions, has been concerned in metropolitan areas. The analysis of the spatial configuration of urban bus networks is important to understand the spatial problems and relevant...

The waterfront along great rivers, located in water-land and human-nature interaction zone, is a type of rare resource, which is critical for urban and industrial development and eco-environmental protection. The development and protection of riverfronts is one of the key components of sustainable watershed development. Waterfront development contr...

China’s high-speed railway (HSR) network is the largest planned network operating globally. Compared to other HSR networks, it has a unique and complicated structure. Multiple studies explored the supply side network structure of HSR services through train frequency data. However, due to data collection difficulties, there is limited research that...

This paper examines the spatial pattern of the population flow network and its implications for containing epidemic spread in China. The hierarchical and spatial subnetwork structure of national population movement networks is analysed by using Baidu migration data before and during the Chinese Spring Festival. The results show that the population...

Land use in the Yangtze River Delta in 2000 and 2017 was classified by the visual interpretation of Landsat satellite images. Then, these images were overlain with economic and physical geographical data to analyze the urban spatial expansion pattern and its physical constraints and socioeconomic influence factors by employing a combination of tran...

Traditional dock-based public bicycle systems continue to dominate cycling in most cities, even though bicycle-sharing services are an increasingly popular means of transportation in many of China’s large cities. A few studies investigated the traditional public bicycle systems in small and mid-sized cities in China. The time series clustering meth...

Urban bus networks play an important role, when the capacity of urban public services is evaluated. With recent advancements in Internet and Communication Technologies, there is an emerging interest in building an urban bus network model through open big data. This has rarely been investigated and exposes several challenges in the provision of tran...

Mobile signaling data (MSD) have become important for studying the characteristics of transportation network structures and human socioeconomic activities. However, the conversion of MSD into datasets that are suitable for transportation network analyses remains challenging, because MSD cannot directly reflect the transportation flow patterns throu...

Equity has been a major concern of urban green space provision. Whether the urban green spaces are equitably provided for socially disadvantaged groups is an important issue in the field of social and environmental justice. This topic is particularly significant in fast-growing Asian countries like China experiencing widening income disparity. This...

Background Population ageing and air pollution have emerged as two of the most pressing challenges in China. However, little evidence has explored the impact of air pollution on obesity among older adults in China. Methods The China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study—a nationally representative sample of middle-aged and older Chinese was lin...

The rapid development of the high-speed rail (HSR) network in China has compressed intercity rail travel times. However, what is contentious is whether the expansion of HSR network has created a landscape of uneven accessibility, i.e. producing winners and losers regarding cities’ changing ability to access to the others. This paper uses the Yangtz...

PM2.5 is a main source of China’s frequent air pollution. Using real-time monitoring of PM2.5 data in 338 Chinese cities during 2014–2017, this study employed multi-temporal and multi-spatial scale statistical analysis to reveal the temporal and spatial characteristics of PM2.5 patterns and a spatial econometric model to quantify the socio-economic...

This chapter summarizes the major findings of this book research, discusses corresponding governance and policy implications, and presents the limitations and future research suggestions.

The JSYR plan is employed as a case study to review and reflect the spatial planning and governance mechanism in China’s provincial context, focusing on changing nature and function of the spatial planning in FYP system. This chapter also highlights the roles of provincial and municipal governments in the formation and implementation process of spa...

Based on the above literature review, this chapter develops a conceptual framework and methodology for this research. The governance approach is employed using a process-based analytical framework. First, the theoretical concepts of the state, market, governance institutions, planning administration and mechanisms are described in transitional Chin...

As a legacy of the socialist state, FYP is very important in regulating economic and spatial development in China. FYP’s full name is economic and social development five-year planning, which was evolved from socialist economic plan. Nowadays, not confined to economic field, FYP has been transformed with comprehensive characteristics. The FYP’s cur...

This chapter examines how the current planning administration and local political-economic context of land development have affected the role of the new spatial planning articulated in Suzhou municipal 11th FYP. It is shaped by both top-down regulations and, local discretion and manipulation. Subsequently, spatial planning is becoming a complicated...

The chapter lays the theoretical and analytical foundations for this research. After the introduction about how cities and regions are currently understood both from the analytical perspective and policy agendas in spatial development, this chapter provides a review of the existing literature on spatial planning and governance at the urban and regi...

Massive development of China's high-speed rail (HSR) network has resulted in unprecedented improvement in spatial accessibility. This paper uses the Yangtze River delta (YRD), one of the most populous and developed mega-regions in China, as a case study to examine the spatial impacts of the HSR network development. It uses official train timetables...

Many countries have planned to improve intercity links in megaregions by developing High-speed rail (HSR) projects. The development of HSR service network in megaregions can change accessibility landscapes and create advantaged and disadvantaged cities. This study investigates how HSR service development has restructured uneven regional accessibili...

Reasonable development and utilization of spatial resources in the coastal zone not only affects the development quality of the marine economy but also impacts the utilization efficiency of spatial resources, playing an important role in regional sustainable development. Depending on the natural, economic, and societal characteristics of a region,...

The paper presents the data that is related in the research paper entitled “High-speed rail network development and winner and loser cities in megaregions: The case study of Yangtze River Delta, China” (Wang and Duan, in press) [1]. This data article describes the modelling results of spatially continuous accessibility surfaces through transport mo...

Understanding the spatiotemporal heterogeneity of the housing market is critical for formulating land/housing policies and achieving sustainable urbanization. This study analyzes the housing transactions at the city, community, and apartment levels in Nanjing, focusing on the effects of government policy and amenity. We find that housing prices hav...

Using a door-to-door approach to integrate inter- and intra-city travel times, this paper simulates the changes in regional territorial and population accessibility, spatial equity, as well as the winner and loser cities resulting from High-speed rail (HSR) network development in the Yangtze River Delta, China. HSR network development has a minimal...

Since its economic reform and opening-up, China has undergone unprecedented urbanization, where massive areas of rural land have been converted into urban use. Urban land development plays an important role in dynamic urban economic development. This study aims to contribute to the understanding of urban land development and its mechanisms in China...

Many studies have employed the perspective of urban competitiveness to understand the development and restructuring of cities and regions in the context of economic globalization, while a few studies have made comparative analyses of urban competitiveness and competitive advantages in different regions. This paper makes a systematic comparison of u...

This paper presents a spatial analysis of likely/potential hotspots of sustainability issues in Mainland China through an empirical investigation of patterns of ecological vulnerability in and of China's megaregions. To be specific, this paper assesses the level of patterns of the ecological vulnerability of 16 megaregions through an indicator syst...

Most existing research examines the spatial patterns of manufacturing and producer services via separate investigations and from provincial and municipal perspectives. This paper, however, analyzes the co-location of manufacturing and producer services and their influencing factors from an intra-urban perspective. This empirical study is based in N...

There has been significant migration in China since the early 1980s and such migration has played an important role in the urban and regional development of China. The relationship between migration and development has been a tricky question as they affect each other. Many migration studies have attempted to identify the impact of social and econom...

Spatial planning is considered as an important governance instrument to cope with uncoordinated regional problems. This article explores the underlying rationale and mechanisms of spatial planning in provincial China through a case study of the Jiangsu region along the Yangtze River (JSYR) plan. It reveals that the practice of the JSYR plan reflect...

The fragmented and overlapped planning administration, evolved from the planned economy, is the institutional foundation of the spatial planning system in China. Together with the problems of development control, spatial plan coordination of FYP, land use planning and urban planning in urban China thus has been concerned for a long time. This paper...

The year 1995 has been widely identified as a watershed in China’s urbanisation process. The period before was deemed as ‘urbanisation from below’ with a focus on small cities and towns, whereas the period afterwards has been characterised by the ‘land-centred development’ of large cities. This paper argues that there have been further spatial and...

Suzhou is located at the center of lower Yangtze River Delta (YRD). With a history of more than 2500 years, it has been transformed from a famous national commercial city in history to a vanguard of globalization known as a modern industrial city in contemporary China. It was not until the reform and opening in 1978 that the traditional spatial str...

The five-year planning (FYP) system is very important in regulating economic and spatial development in China. By analysing the texts of five-year plans and corresponding spatial policies, as well as the primary governance issues since the foundation of the People’s Republic of China, this paper argues that market-oriented reform and decentralised...

The investigation of the process, pattern and mechanism of urban spatial expansion has become an effective method to recognize the stages of urbanization and explore the laws of urban development as the direct result of urbanization to geographic space is the spatial expansion of cities. Based on the satellite imageries data including Landsat TM or...