Urban Public Space Development in Harbin Driven by Music Culture Intervention

"Social event driving" has become a way to promote urban development, create urban public spaces and create a city image. As one of the important big cities in northeastern China, Harbin enjoys the reputation of "The Music City", and its public space development is inextricably linked with the driving of music culture. This paper started with the analysis of the correlation between the development of urban public spaces and the development of music culture in Harbin, and studied the influence and driving role of music culture on the construction and development of urban public spaces.     

Pricing Implications of Development Exactions on Existing Housing Stock

Research has found that development exactions are capitalized into the price of new housing. As the price of new housing increases, one would expect to see a price rise in existing housing as well, albeit lagged to some extent. This paper presents the results of an empirical study designed to measure how much impact fees affect the price of existing, single-family dwellings. Data for this study were obtained from county property appraiser files provided by the Florida Department of Revenue. The data represent 1,055 new and 3,135 existing home sales, respectively, in Dunedin, Florida, and 7,292 existing home sales in Clearwater, Florida, from 1971-1982. On June 3, 1974, the city of Dunedin began assessing impact fees of $1,150 against all new, single-family construction. The methodology used in this paper examines the price differential of new relative to existing housing and finds that the difference disappeared after six years.     

Progressive spaces of neoliberalism in Aotearoa: A genealogy and critique

In this article, we will argue that any investigation of the ‘progressive spaces of neoliberalism’ needs to maintain a critical stance on the neoliberal project. In particular, we suggest that it is important to see the ways ‘progressive spaces of neoliberalism’ are troubled by discourses of colonisation which in turn are themselves disrupted by genealogies of Indigenous struggles. Spaces of neoliberalism are embedded in discourses of colonisation, as space is ultimately grounded in somewhere, in a ‘place’. In Aotearoa, the discourses of colonisation and place are in turn entangled with a genealogy of Maori struggles to maintain and create political, economic and social structures and frameworks. These struggles are also productive, and have the potential to encourage, diverse political economies of production, trade and enterprise distinct from neoliberalism, its progressive spaces, and colonisation. We will investigate two cases to highlight that the ‘messy actualities’ of neoliberalism cannot be extracted from the genealogy of colonisation. Any attempts to start an analysis of progressive space as located in a neutral ‘now and here’ are therefore problematic.     

Popular music in a transnational world: the construction of local identities in Singapore

As an area of geographical inquiry, popular music has not been explored to any large extent. Where writings exist, they have been somewhat divorced from recent theoretical and methodological questions that have rejuvenated social and cultural geography. In this paper, I focus on one arena which geographers can develop in their analysis of popular music, namely, the exploration of local influences and global forces in the production of music. In so doing, I wish to explore how local resources intersect with global ones in a process of transculturation. Using the example of English songs by one particular songwriter and artiste whose works are part of the popular music industry mainstream, and that of Mandarin songs of the genre xinyao, I will show that, despite increasing globalising forces, music is still an expression of local/national influences. Indeed, I will argue that globalisation intensifies localisation.     

Music work: Traditional Cambodian music and state‐building under the Khmer Rouge

Recent scholarship has opened questions as to the everyday actions of the Khmer Rouge and those living under the regime which led to the Cambodian Genocide. Current work examines the critical cultural geographies of the Khmer Rouge: photography, poetry and music, for example. Music specifically has an interesting underpinning, as it was previously understood to be have been eradicated in the genocide as the standard narrative has us believe. This paper instead investigates the pieces of evidence that exist, which explain the use of music by the Khmer Rouge. I explore the geographies of music beyond the lyrics and look at the transformation and use of music in Cambodia and Democratic Kampuchea. What elements of traditional Khmer music were used during the regime? What modifications occurred to the music of Cambodia during the regime, and how did the Khmer Rouge modify existing Cambodian (and other) music to best fit their desired uses (state‐building and genocide)? This paper goes beyond traditional geographies of music, which rely on lyrical analyses, to bring an ethnomusicological perspective to the work of music and its role in shaping the idea of the Democratic Republic of Kampuchea.     

Strategies of salvation: Evangelical Christian praxis and sites of degradation in Sri Lanka

This paper demonstrates how disasters create sites of degradation – potent spaces of upheaval and engagement – that are readily filled and exploited by evangelical Christian groups. In doing so, it explores how disasters provide opportunities for evangelical groups to gain a foothold in localities where Christian presence, and evangelical praxis, may otherwise be restricted. Drawing on qualitative data collected in Sri Lanka throughout 2010–2011, two comparative case studies are presented that reveal the strategies of evangelical Christian praxis in and through sites of environmental and political degradation. Specifically, the case studies reveal how evangelical groups pursue ‘outside‐in’ and ‘inside‐out’ strategies of salvation, which, by blurring the boundaries of religion and relief, can lead to the formation of new hierarchies of power.     

The politics of water democracy: insights from grassroot struggles in the Ecuadorian Highlands

In the past two decades spaces for user participation have been opened within water governance structures at many scales. In this contribution, based on a case study of the Provincial Water Users Federation Interjuntas‐Chimborazo in the Ecuadorian Highlands, I explore how and why formal participation of water users in itself is problematic in terms of democracy. The case shows that for organised peasant water users to work on more democratic water governance, the creation of upscaled federations, alliances, networks and sometimes street protests is crucial to open up spaces in which their interests are represented. This suggests that democracy is not merely about participation, but more importantly, it is about the politics of how democracy is made through conflicts, protests, negotiations and the creation of strategic alliances that challenge the structures and processes through which decisions are taken.     

Urban poverty alleviation strategies in Yogyakarta,Indonesia: Contrasting opportunities for community development

A multidimensional understanding of poverty includes the access of poor groups to decision‐making processes based on their needs and aspirations. However, the realisation of this ‘right to make decisions’ faces multiple obstacles. Over the last 20 years in Indonesia, in a context of a more democratic political environment and policy decentralisation, poverty alleviation policies have followed institutional arrangements to provide communities with opportunities for greater participation in development projects. Poverty data show a clear improvement in the living conditions of urban poor citizens in Indonesia; however, it is unclear whether poor communities have become stronger and more independent from public grants and better able to make their own decisions. This research analysed two urban poor communities in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, and found that some communities working on participatory poverty alleviation strategies still face obstacles to becoming more independent and making their own decisions because they remain part of an historical legacy of top‐down approaches to poverty, highly dependent on government support and working only within ‘invited spaces’. Conversely, those communities with more limited access to government funding have been more innovative in their strategies and have created ‘invented spaces’ for collective action that allows them to be more independent and empowered.     

Innovation in suburban development zones: Evidence from Nanjing,China

While suburban areas have been typically related with urban sprawl, low density, cheap land price and low‐end manufacturing industries, relatively little attention has been paid to the spatial organization of innovation in suburban areas. In some Chinese cities, development zones (kai fa qu) in their suburban areas which are generally regarded as major spaces for traditional manufacturing industries have been transforming into spaces for innovation. This paper provides a case study of Nanjing, the capital of Jiangsu province in Eastern China by investigating and explaining the learning and innovation processes in suburban development zones. Drawing upon a unique database on 733 state‐certified high‐tech firms in Nanjing from 2008 to 2012 which contains detailed information on their addresses and number of patents, we observe strong spatial disparity in the distribution of innovation. Suburban districts of Nanjing where its three national‐level development zones and many provincial‐level development zones are located have become major spaces for innovation of the city. The planning of industrial clusters in development zones, the place‐based investment in the suburbs, and the suburbanization of universities are three major mechanisms behind the learning and innovation processes in Nanjing’s suburban development zones.     

A Creative Industry in Transition: The Rise of Digitally Driven Independent Music Production

This paper nuances our understanding of the ongoing transition within the North American music industry. It extends the existing analysis of the so‐called “MP3 Crisis” by exploring the ways in which digital technologies have challenged the entrenched power of the major record labels. In particular, new insights are offered based on interviews with music industry executives who have been active in shaping the industry's response to illegal file sharing. The paper also uses interview data from musicians to investigate the implications of restructuring at the macroscale on creative talent at the microscale. As such, it documents the structures and spatial dynamics of digitally driven independent music production in Canada for the first time.     

Trading places: Inclusive cities and market vending in the Pacific Islands

Rapid population growth in Pacific island cities far exceeds employment opportunities and is contributing to rising urban inequality and social exclusions. Livelihoods in the informal urban sector, such as market vending, provide much needed income, rural–urban connectivity and food security, but remain largely excluded from policy and planning frameworks. Spatial, economic and social exclusions limit vendors’ economic advancement, their influence over decision‐making, and their access to basic services. Local communities close to informal markets fill some of the gaps left by the policy neglect, but investment and strategic management remains inadequate when vendors do not have secure market places and recognised rights to work. This article reports on a study of three informal markets in Honiara, Solomon Islands. These markets lack legal status but make significant contributions to urban development and economic opportunities. Drawing on surveys and focus groups with vendors and urban decision‐makers we explore the impact of informal markets on urban economies, how social and institutional relationships hinder vendors’ economic advancement, and the opportunities to create more inclusive livelihoods that could contribute to equitable cities.     

Analysis of Sun-shading for the External Public Space

In this paper,we summarize outdoor sun-shading forms in public spaces and compare the shading effects of several shading measures.Then,taking a public square in the city of Chongqing,P.R.China as an example,we analyze thermal environmental designs with full application of various sun-shading forms so as to give a reference for the design of future urban public spaces and the reconstruction of existing urban public spaces.     

Resistance to insect pests: What do legumes have to offer?

Summary Insect pests are major problems for all crops, worldwide. In this review we will focus on legumes, which are attacked by a range of insect pests including pod/seed feeders, defoliators and sap feeders. We review the history of breeding for resistance to insect pests in legumes, which has had mixed success, and discuss further opportunities in this area. We also review the extraordinary array of direct and indirect mechanisms contributing to insect defence in legumes, the understanding and exploitation of which offer opportunities for both legume and non-legume crops. There is also good potential to improve insect resistance in legume crops through a detailed understanding of the signaling pathways that regulate induced responses to insect feeding, and recent progress in this area, primarily obtained from non-legume systems, is reviewed. The importance legumes play in farming systems, their wide range of novel chemistry and the emergence of model systems suitable for genomic approaches present opportunities for research in this area strongly linked to breeding programs to help develop legume crops with enhanced insect resistance. CSIRO’s right to retain a non-exclusive, royalty-free licence in and to any copyright is acknowledged.     

Gateways or backdoors to development? Filtering mechanisms and territorial embeddedness in the Chilean copper GPN’s urban system

This paper analyses the role played by different urban nodes in the Chilean copper mining Global Production Network (GPN), and how filtering mechanisms act in favour of the capital city, limiting the territorial embeddedness of extractive industry in resource peripheries. In doing so, we make three contributions to the literature. First, in addition to observing gateway cities (those connecting the mining hinterlands to the global economy), we propose an intermediate category in urban hierarchies which we label the “backdoor city” (those that can perform one or more functions of a gateway city but lack chances for value capture and sustainable development outcomes). Second, we analyse the filtering mechanisms that work to the detriment of resources peripheries. Third, we analyse how these mechanisms reduce the territorial embeddedness of mining activity across the Chilean urban hierarchy. Our main results show that the capital city of Santiago stands out as the only gateway city in the country, and Antofagasta acts as a backdoor city for the Chilean resource peripheries where the extractive activity is weakly embedded, limiting their development opportunities.     

Pacific Island children: The use of maps in helping better understand children's lives

Children's voices have been little heard in the Pacific research. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989 asserts the child's right to have a say on matters that affect them and for their views to be considered. There has been massive growth in technologically assisted participative research; however, we argue the value of hand drawn maps should not be underestimated in the rush to engage with more advanced techniques. We present data from 267 neighbourhood maps drawn by children in Fiji, Kiribati, Samoa and New Zealand. To better understand the social construction of knowledge in children's everyday lives, we propose two models to conceptualise the complexity of their world, a social connection and a spatial connection model. These models reveal how Pacific Island children negotiate different levels of social connection from home, family, and community through to transnational kinship relations. People, specifically family, provide the geographic basis on which their spatial encounters are overlaid. Irrespective of country or rural/urban/atoll setting, it is social space that is the strongest connector for children as displayed in their maps. Application of our models can be used to reveal how knowledge is socially constructed in Pacific children's everyday lives.     

Study on Landscape Restoration in City Memory Space: A Case Study of Temple of Lord Fan Wenzheng in Ancient Huishan Town

Against the background of rapid urbanization, city memories have been gradually lost. In view of this, historic blocks and ancient buildings are taken as the key points of restoring collective memory spaces of cities, and Temple of Lord Fan Wenzheng in ancient Huishan Town, Wuxi City as a typical case to define tangible landscape elements in memory spaces. By analyzing the process of restoring buildings, pavements, waters, stone layouts and plants in the temple, practical means of restoring tangible landscapes in city memory spaces were summarized, so as to provide references for protecting original town landscapes, repairing damaged memory spaces, and inheriting city memories.     

Urban Form and Household Activity‐Travel Behavior

ABSTRACT Cities and metropolitan regions face several challenges including urban sprawl, auto dependence and congestion, and related environmental and human health effects. Examining the spatial characteristics of daily household activity‐travel behavior holds important implications for understanding and addressing urban transportation issues. Research of this sort can inform development of urban land use policy that encourages the use of local opportunities, potentially leading to reduced motorized travel. This article examines the potential household activity‐travel response to a planned metropolitan polycentric hierarchy of activity centers. Behavioral observations have been drawn from an activity‐travel survey conducted in the Portland, Oregon, metropolitan area during the mid‐1990s. Evidence presented from exploratory analysis indicates an urban/suburban differential, with less daily travel and smaller activity spaces for urban households. Investigation of the travel reduction potential of the proposed land‐use strategy suggests that location effects could be offset by adjustments to household sociodemographic and mobility characteristics.     

Occupational health and safety of merchant seafarers from Kiribati and Tuvalu

Intensifying international competition in the shipping industry in response to global pressures makes seafarers' jobs increasingly difficult. Challenging conditions in ship employment are problematic, particularly in a development context where home communities' dependence on seafarers' income is high and social protection is low. Qualitative fieldwork revealed that seafarers from Kiribati and Tuvalu endure exceptionally lengthy work periods at sea to remain competitive. Absence from home while working in constrained and mobile spaces with multinational crews, frequent security controls and speedy turnarounds impacting on sleep deprivation and decreased shore time have implications for physical and emotional health and can become safety matters. Hence, there is a growing need to address mechanisms to protect seafarers from the physical and emotional effects of global demands in the shipping industry.     

Friendly Neighborhood Boundary Space Design

Residential area mode of China originates from "neighborhood unit" and "unit compound", they are isolated from the city and known as "islet" and "fragment". The isolation of residence from city breaks the urban structure, increases scale of blocks, and aggravates urban traffic and other problems. In view of this, it is imperative to explore the ways of designing "friendly neighborhood boundary spaces" between residential areas and the city, for example, by extending urban street spaces inward, opening boundary spaces of residential quarters to the city, constructing a boundary space network of residential areas harmoniously integrated into street life.     

深圳城市绿地土壤入渗性能及影响因素研究

研究深圳市城市绿地土壤水分入渗性能及其相关影响因素,以期为海绵城市建设,深圳市城市绿地水土保持提供参考。针对绿地不同植被类型（草地、乔木、灌木）及不同土层深度(0~30 cm、30~60 cm),利用Guelph入渗仪现场测定土壤饱和导水率,并分析土壤理化性质对土壤水分入渗的影响。结果表明：深圳绿地土壤入渗性能较差,饱和导水率不良及以下等级高达63.42%;乔木上层土壤及灌木上层土壤饱和导水率较高,均显著高于各自下层土壤饱和导水率(P<0.05);绿地土壤砂粒含量较高,平均达52%以上,土壤容重偏高,平均为1.62 g/cm ³。土壤质地可显著影响土壤入渗特性,砂粒含量越高,土壤渗透性越好(P<0.01),容重、含水率、砾石含量与土壤饱和导水率显著负相关(P<0.05)。深圳绿地土壤入渗性能较差,未来可考虑降低压实程度、提高土壤砂粒含量来改良土壤渗透性。