Spatial Distribution and Mechanism of Urban Occupation Mixture in Guangzhou: An Optimized GeoDetector-Based Index to Compare Individual and Interactive Effects

ABSTRACT

Numerous studies have been devoted to uncovering the characteristics of resident density and urban mobility with multisource geospatial big data. However, little attention has been paid to the internal diversity of residents such as their occupations, which is a crucial aspect of urban vibrancy. This study aims to investigate the variation between individual and interactive influences of built environment factors on occupation mixture index (OMI) with a novel GeoDetector-based indicator. This study first integrated application (App) use and mobility patterns from cellphone data to portray residents’ occupations and evaluate the OMI in Guangzhou. Then, the mechanism of OMI distribution was analyzed with the GeoDetector model. Next, an optimized GeoDetector-based index, interactive effect variation ratio (IEVR) was proposed to quantify the variation between individual and interactive effects of factors. The results showed that land use mixture was the dominating factor, and that land use mixture, building density, floor area ratio, road density affected the OMI distribution directly. Some interesting findings were uncovered by IEVR. The influences of cultural inclusiveness and metro accessibility were less important in factor detector result, while they were found to be the most influential in an indirect way interacting with other built environment factors. The results suggested that both “hardware facilities” (land use mixture, accessibility) and “soft facilities” (cultural inclusiveness) should be considered in planning a harmonious urban employment space and sustainable city.