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Influence of Transportation Accessibility on Urban-rural Income Disparity and Its Spatial Heterogeneity

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Abstract

Transportation accessibility has been treated as an important means of reducing the urban-rural income disparity. However, only a few studies have examined the effects of different types of transportation accessibility on urban-rural income disparity and their spatial heterogeneity. Based on data from 285 prefecture-level (and above) Chinese cities in 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020, this study uses spatial econometric models to examine how highway accessibility and railway accessibility influence the urban-rural income disparity and to identify their spatial heterogeneity. The result reveals that highway accessibility and railway accessibility have ‘coreperiphery’ ring-like circle structures. The urban-rural income disparity exhibits strong spatial clustering effects. Both highway accessibility and railway accessibility are negatively associated with urban-rural income disparity, and the former having a greater effect size. Moreover, there is a substitution effect between highway accessibility and railway accessibility in the whole sample. Furthermore, these associations differ in geographic regions. In the central region, highway accessibility is more important in reducing the urban-rural income disparity, but its effect is weakened with the increase of railway accessibility. In the western region, railway accessibility has a larger effect on narrowing the urban-rural income disparity, and this effect is strengthened by the increase of highway accessibility. We conclude that improving transportation accessibility is conducive to reducing the urban-rural income disparity but its effect is spatial heterogenetic. Highways and railways should be developed in a coordinated manner to promote an integrated transport network system.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Northwest Land and Resources Research Center, Global Regional and Urban Research Institute, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi’an, 710119, China

    Xiaoyan Huang & Chenchen Kang

  2. School of Resource and Environmental Sciences, Wuhan University, Wuhan, 430079, China

    Chun Yin

  3. International Institute of Spatial Lifecourse Health (ISLE), Wuhan University, Wuhan, 430079, China

    Chun Yin

  4. School of Urban Planning and Design, Shenzhen Graduate School, Peking University, Shenzhen, 518055, China

    Junqing Tang

  5. Key Laboratory of Earth Surface System and Human-Earth Relations of Ministry of Natural Resources of China, Shenzhen Graduate School, Peking University, Shenzhen, 518055, China

    Junqing Tang

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Contributions

HUANG Xiaoyan: conceptualization, writing-original draft preparation, writing-review and editing, funding acquisition, resources, supervision. KANG Chenchen: methodology, formal analysis and investigation, writing-original draft preparation, writing-review and editing. YIN Chun: methodology, writing-original draft preparation, writing-review and editing, funding acquisition, supervision. TANG Junqing: writing-review and editing.

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Correspondence to Chun Yin.

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Foundation item: Under the auspices of National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 42371214, 42101184), Chenguang Program of Shanghai Education Development Foundation and Shanghai Municipal Education Commission (No. 22CGA27), Funded Projects for the Academic Leaders and Academic Backbone, Shaanxi Normal University (No.18QNGG013)

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Huang, X., Kang, C., Yin, C. et al. Influence of Transportation Accessibility on Urban-rural Income Disparity and Its Spatial Heterogeneity. Chin. Geogr. Sci. (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11769-024-1427-8

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