Usually, knowledge spillovers (KS) are related to geographic proximity. In the present study, we measure KS on the basis of different proximity matrices, focusing on the relational, social, cognitive ...and technological preconditions for knowledge diffusion. In the light of previous studies on KS, we examine: (i) which types of proximity enhance or hamper knowledge flows, and (ii) whether local absorptive capacity favour such flows. Our results indicate that KS across European NUTS2 regions measured through geographic, relational, social, cognitive and technological proximity channels increase with local absorptive capacity. This finding points towards the emergence of large clusters of regions (absorptive capacity clubs) where relational, cognitive, social and technological proximity lock-in maximizes the returns to local investment in R&D.
Tourism is clearly a place-based activity, while in many advanced economies it is increasingly becoming a knowledge-based activity, with a high potential for the development of practice- and ...place-based innovation strategies. This study analyses whether and how regional systems of innovation influence the competiveness of tourism destinations in Europe. Impacts of both traditional production factors (physical and human capital), productivity, specialization and other contextual variables - related to the territorial capital of each region - on regional tourism performance of 237 European regions (NUTS 2) are analysed over a period of 8 years, using advanced techniques for spatial econometric analysis. The results reveal lower levels of productivity in those regions where tourism services are more labour intensive, while regions where education, innovation and productivity demonstrate higher levels are those where gross value added in tourism is less important for the regional economy. Policy implications are discussed, taking into consideration the principles for smart specialisation strategies in European regions and the possibility for cross-border regional cooperation. This work also confirms the research potential of spatial econometric analysis - and in particular spatial autocorrelation techniques - for tourism studies.
The present paper aims to assess the relative attractiveness of competing tourist destinations on the basis of individual visitors' perceptions regarding a holiday destination. Using the feeling of ...tourist well-being achieved by individual tourists we evaluate indirectly the competitive ability of the tourist area to offer a compound tourist site attractiveness. The methodology employed here uses individual survey questionnaires on the tourists' evaluation of the quality of tourist facilities and attributes in a given area (the ‘regional tourist profile’) as the basis for constructing an aggregate expression for the relative attractiveness of that area. Using various multidimensional statistical techniques an estimation of the competitive attractiveness of the Southern regions in Italy is pursued. We also compare our findings with quantitative results on tourist competitiveness values obtained in a related previous study on tourist competitiveness in Italian regions. Finally, the paper highlights the need to use micro and macro data to analyse tourist attractiveness and to identify policies for improving regional tourist competitiveness.
•The paper highlights new trends in smart decision support tools for cities in combination with big data.•It offers a systematic big data foundation for interactive policy dashboards for a smart ...city.•Operational i-dashboards support governance of complex urban dynamics in terms of functionalities and land use.•The paper illustrates the usefulness of i-dashboards as a navigation tool for effective decisions of stakeholders.
This study addresses the strategic governance challenges of modern smart cities from the new viewpoint of big data management. It seeks to develop and highlight a systematic methodological framework for handling multivariate big data in a smart urban decision support context in the ‘New Urban World’, so as to enhance the cities’ competitive performance through the design and development of operational urban management principles and strategies. The specific aim of this paper is to provide the critical and basic cornerstones for an applicable interactive dashboard architecture as a supporting tool in a structured process of innovative city strategies and consequent enhanced socio-economic performance. A core element in the present paper is formed by a smart urban dashboard system that acts as an interactive navigation tool supporting operational choices of all stakeholders involved. This dashboard is able to integrate complex and ever-changing big data bases serving as ‘signposts’ of city intelligence (or i-city smartness) for daily or strategic decisions of all urban stakeholders. This study thus outlines successively the concept of smart i-cities in our ‘urban century’, the great potential of digital technology for managing big data in governing i-cities, and the foundations of an urban dashboard on the basis of the so-called Pentagon model as a policy strategy vehicle. Starting from extensive data on a broad set of global cities, the potential of this approach is exemplified by means of an illustrative application of a smart urban dashboard for the city of Stockholm.
This article presents a structural modeling analysis of the performance determinants of urban attractiveness, in terms of resident population and international tourism demand, in 40 global cities. ...The analysis focuses on the impacts of a diverse set of innovative drivers of urban value creation and sustainable solutions for city development (urban functions), which are collectively subsumed under the heading of ‘sustainable smart city’. Recognizing that the dynamics and growth processes related to these urban functions may have different impacts on different types of stakeholders, potentially leading to the emergence of serious conflicts between guests/visitors and residents, we aim to derive model-based implications for urban and tourism management in the cities concerned in order to move towards the sustainable future city as ‘a place 4 all’. The results of our latent growth curve model confirm the existence of different impacts of urban functions on visitors' and residents' attractiveness. Cultural dynamics appears to be a major determinant for attracting new residents and supporting a strong international tourism industry. From an economic perspective, purely economic strength (in terms of absolute growth) appears to enhance city attractiveness for residents, while the dynamics observed in research and development activities influences the quality of employment instead of being a direct driver of population growth. While the social aspects of sustainability (framed under the concept of livability) and the urban environment typically exert higher impacts on urban attractiveness, accessibility appears mostly relevant for visitors. Our analysis suggests an uneasy balance between livability, environment, and population and visitor volume and growth.
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•Cultural dynamics appears as major determinant for attracting residents and tourists.•Social aspects and urban environment exert high impact on city attractiveness.•Economic strength appears to enhance city attractiveness for residents.•Accessibility appears mostly relevant for visitors.•Uneasy balance between livability and environment vs. population and visitor growth.
The use of mobile phone data provides new spatio-temporal tools for improving urban planning, and for reducing inefficiencies in present-day urban systems. Data from mobile phones, originally ...intended as a communication tool, are increasingly used as innovative tools in geography and social sciences research. Empirical studies on complex city systems from human-centred and urban dynamics perspectives provide new insights to develop promising applications for supporting smart city initiatives. This paper provides a comprehensive review and a typology of spatial studies on mobile phone data, and highlights the applicability of such digital data to develop innovative applications for enhanced urban management.
•Mobile phone data are a promising source to develop a wide range of smart city applications.•Space–time data form a way to better understand the urban environment and its dynamics.•A great part of the earth׳s population can be now used as agents for data collection.•CDRs are an excellent data sources to estimate the real-time presence and movement.•Urban applications need a full spectrum of information sources for the effective management.
Modelling spatial heterogeneity (SH) is a controversial subject in real estate economics. Single-family-home prices in Austria are explored to investigate the capability of global and locally ...weighted hedonic models. Even if regional indicators are not fully capable to model SH and technical amendments are required to account for unmodelled SH, the results emphasise their importance to achieve a well-specified model. Due to SH beyond the level of regional indicators, locally weighted regressions are proposed. Mixed geographically weighted regression (MGWR) prevents the limitations of fixed effects by exploring spatially stationary and non-stationary price effects. Besides reducing prediction errors, it is concluded that global model misspecifications arise from improper selected fixed effects. Reported findings provide evidence that the SH of implicit prices is more complex than can be modelled by regional indicators or purely local models. The existence of both stationary and non-stationary effects implies that the Austrian housing market is economically connected.
Tourism is not neutral with respect to local quality of life. With the transformation of traditional city roles and the boom of urban tourism in China, the interaction between tourism and local ...livability is increasingly important for sustainable development plans of urban areas. Our paper aims to address the complex interdependence of the emerging tourist industry and local livability in Chinese cities. Based on a conceptual model and a subsequent empirical statistical analysis of 35 large and medium-sized Chinese cities for the years 2003–2012, our study finds that urban livability and its related factors benefit tourism development, and that, in turn, tourism has a reverse impact on livability in urban areas; their performance appears to vary in different sub-regions and for different factors of livability; the geographic interdependence between livability and tourism development is also remarkable. Potential threats from excessive tourism development on urban livability, in particular in the Chinese Eastern and Central large and medium-sized cities, can be inferred from our empirical analysis. These conclusions may lead to important lessons to policy makers, while various suggestions based on our findings are provided as well.
•Interactions between urban livability and tourism development are complex.•Livability in cities and its determinants benefit the tourism sector.•Tourism is not always compatible with livability in China.•High tourism growth in Eastern and Central China may be a threat to livability.
N IJKAMP P. (2003) Entrepreneurship in a modern network economy, Reg. Studies 37 , 395-405. In this survey paper the literature on entrepreneurship is summarized from the perspective of geographical ...seedbed conditions and network constellations. We argue that in many cases urban areas offer favourable incubator conditions for innovative entrepreneurship, as a result of economies of density and the opportunities created by the city as a nucleus of a broader network, both local and global. Clearly, network participation by creative entrepreneurs does not necessarily need an urban base, although informal spatial networks among specific business segments (e.g. ethnic niches) may be favourable for economic performance. We conclude that a modern entrepreneur tends to become increasingly a creative network operator and manager. N IJKAMP P. (2003) L'esprit d'entrepise dans une économie de réseau moderne, Reg. Studies 37 , 395-405. Cet article cherche à résumer la documentation sur l'esprit d'entreprise du point de vue des conditions géographiques propices aux pépinières d'entreprise et des constellations de réseaux. On affirme que souvent les agglomérations urbaines fournissent aux pépiniè res des conditions qui sont favorables à l'esprit d'entreprise innovateur à cause des économies d'agglomération et des possibilités engendrées par la ville en tant que noyau d'un réseau encore plus grand, au niveau local ainsi que sur le plan mondial. Il est évident que la participation des entrepreneurs innovateurs dans des réseaux ne nécessite pas forcément une base urbaine, quoique des réseaux géographiques informels dans des secteurs commerciaux particuliers (p.e. créneaux éthniques) puissent s'avérer favorables à la performance économique. En guise de conclusion, on affirme qu'un entrepreneur moderne a tendance à devenir de plus en plus un opérateur de réseau et un manager créateurs. N IJKAMP P. (2003) Unternehmertum in einer modernen Netzwerkwirtschaft, Reg. Studies 37 , 395-405. In dieser Untersuchung wird die Literatur über Unternehmertum aus der Perspektive geographischer Brutstättenbedingungen und Netzwerk-konstellationen zusammengefaßt. Es wird der Standpunkt vertreten, daß in vielen Fällen Stadtgebiete günstige Brutkastenbedingungen für innovatives Unternehmertum bieten, die auf Wirtschaftlichkeit der Dichte und den Gelegenheiten beruhen, welche die Großstadt als Kern eines allgemeinen, sowohl örtlichen als auch globale, Netzwerks darstellt. Es ist klar, daß für schöpferische Unternehmer Teilnahme am Netzwerk nicht unbedingt eine Stadtbasis voraussetzt, obschon informale räumliche Netzwerke in spezifischen Geschäftssparten (z.B.) ethnischen Nischen) wirtschaftliche Leistung begünstigen mögen. Es wird der Schluß gezogen, daß ein moderner Unternehmer zunehmend dahin tendiert, ein schö pferischer Netzwerkoperator und -manager zu werden.
Cross-border flows of people, capital, and information along with inbound tourism flows can act as an important vehicle that benefits the innovation system in tourism destination areas. This study ...addresses the unintended but far-reaching impact of international tourism by focusing on the influence of inbound tourism on regional innovation in China. Data from 30 Chinese provinces for the years 2003–2012 are used for the empirical analysis, employing a spatial panel data model. The results show that inbound tourism may be a new and powerful driving force for regional innovation, while the effect of inbound tourism on technological innovation appears to be weaker than that on social innovation. Our findings also show that a higher market percentage of domestic tourism may weaken the impact of inbound tourism. Furthermore, the impact of inbound tourism on innovation tends to be relatively stronger in the richer and more internationally oriented provinces of China.
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