Evaluating Sustainable Development of Land Resources in the Yangtze River Economic Belt of china

The Yangtze River Economic Belt (YREB) is one of the most economically active regions in China, where an imbalance between the demand for land and the non-renewable is increasingly prominent. We present the patterns of land use in the YREB, then construct an evaluation index based on the Pressure-State-Response model. The TOPSIS model is used to evaluate sustainable land development in the YREB, and the spatial deductive characteristics of sustainable development levels are analyzed using three aspects: global spatial correlation, local spatial correlation, and regional difference. The results about the YREB show that: (1) The comprehensive sustainable land development score is average, indicating moderate sustainability with a fluctuating upward trend and good prospects. (2) The sustainable development levels of land have strong positive spatial correlation and agglomeration; the agglomeration characteristics follow a pattern similar to that of the status of economic development. (3) Sustainable development levels of land in the provinces and cities show great spatial differences.

Multi-dimensional boundary effects and regional economic integration: Evidence from the Yangtze River Economic Belt

While the challenges posed by multi-dimensional boundary effects to global economic integration are studied widely, regional economic integration within a sovereign country requires additional analysis. The Yangtze River Economic Belt (YREB), a super-scale interprovincial area including three nested urban alliances, is a meaningful vision of regional economic integration in China. After building the producer services-based urban corporate network, this study investigates the influence of multi-dimensional boundary effects on regional economic integration by social network analysis and the exponential random graph model. The findings show that the fragmented reality of YREB’s economy is significantly different from the vision of the Chinese central government. More specifically, although the natural boundary restraints represented by distance have disappeared, multi-dimensional barriers to regional economic integration are still posed by administrative, policy, economic, and cultural boundaries. The estimation results pass the robustness test of the grouping sample of producer services. Therefore, we confirm that the multi-dimensional boundary effects, particularly the intangible ones, significantly impact regional economic integration even within a country with a top-down ‘strong’ governance.

Hybrid simulation model for navigation performance evaluation of the Three Gorges–Gezhouba Dams under novel regulations

As an important project on the golden waterway of the Yangtze River in China, the Three Gorges–Gezhouba Dams (TGGD) plays a pivotal role in the construction of the Yangtze River Economic Belt. To improve the efficiency and safety of ship traffic, some novel navigation regulations have been implemented that change the TGGD operation obviously. For example, a piecewise control strategy proposed in the regulations is applied to control the traffic flow of ships under a sectional manner. With the implementation of these regulations, how to understand the dynamic effects of new changes on TGGD has been an important problem. The purpose of this work is to evaluate the navigation performance of the TGGD via a data- and event-driven hybrid simulation model developed by multi-agent and discrete-event modeling theories. The model simulates the three significant navigable scenarios inherent in the actual operating environment: dry season, wet season, and flood season, reflecting the real situations. The input data come from the statistical analysis of the actual navigation data provided by the Three Gorges Navigation Administration. The validity and reliability of the model are verified by comparing the output results with actual data. Moreover, a set of test experiments are designed to explore the TGGD navigation limit and analyze the key factors that restrict the navigation capacity of the TGGD system. The work is expected to provide a certain decision support for the future cooperative scheduling optimization of the TGGD.