Nature Cities最新文献_第9页

The importance of a dynamic approach to urban color conservation 动态方法对城市色彩保护的重要性

Nature Cities Pub Date : 2025-04-11 DOI: 10.1038/s44284-025-00231-z

引用次数: 0

Sustaining the local color of a global city 保持全球城市的地方色彩

Nature Cities Pub Date : 2025-04-10 DOI: 10.1038/s44284-025-00225-x

Xuan Xue, Zihui Tian, Yaotian Yang, Junqi Wang, Shi-Jie Cao

{"title":"Sustaining the local color of a global city","authors":"Xuan Xue, Zihui Tian, Yaotian Yang, Junqi Wang, Shi-Jie Cao","doi":"10.1038/s44284-025-00225-x","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s44284-025-00225-x","url":null,"abstract":"Color plays a significant role in shaping the urban environment as well as serving as a vivid expression of the culture of its people. Sustaining the local color through urban heritage conservation has proven to be an effective means. Yet, these strategies often rest on the assumption that each heritage site has its color palette remaining unchanged over time. As cities become more cosmopolitan, with increasingly diverse and migrating populations, we question how this shift might influence the local color and its conservation strategies. In this study, we examined the chromatic reconstruction of 3,103 heritage buildings in Singapore using a combination of computational machine learning techniques and non-computational archival and fieldwork methods. Our analysis of text and image data spanning over 40 years before and after heritage conservation in Singapore reveals that for those heritage sites that are still inhabited, local color is not always constant but ongoing and imbued with diverse cultural meanings over time. Historicization, ethnicization and commercialization serve as the key trends in expressing meaning throughout conservation, manifesting in five dimensions, namely, dominant colors, color complexity, color harmony, average saturation and average value. The dynamic change in local color bears significant implications for heritage conservation. We argue that color should be seen as an indispensable part of the sociocultural ecology, rich in meaning and continuously evolving, rather than merely an objective attribute of the material artifact to be preserved in isolation. Urban heritage embodies the tension between preservation and dynamism. Focusing on historic sections of Singapore and using archives, fieldwork and machine learning, this study finds that color is an evolving part of the sociocultural ecology of a city and its heritage.","PeriodicalId":501700,"journal":{"name":"Nature Cities","volume":"2 5","pages":"400-412"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-04-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145123608","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Grid connections and inequitable access to electricity in African cities 非洲城市的电网连接和不公平的电力获取

Nature Cities Pub Date : 2025-04-08 DOI: 10.1038/s44284-025-00221-1

Jessica Kersey, Civian Kiki Massa, June Lukuyu, Judith Mbabazi, Jay Taneja, Daniel M. Kammen, Veronica Jacome

{"title":"Grid connections and inequitable access to electricity in African cities","authors":"Jessica Kersey, Civian Kiki Massa, June Lukuyu, Judith Mbabazi, Jay Taneja, Daniel M. Kammen, Veronica Jacome","doi":"10.1038/s44284-025-00221-1","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s44284-025-00221-1","url":null,"abstract":"As the Global South rapidly and inequitably urbanizes, cities are at the forefront of efforts to address energy-related dimensions of poverty. In many African cities, electricity via a connection to a grid—the gold standard of electrification—has not substantially displaced smoky, polluting fuels. Among low-income communities, connections tend to be based on improvised, informal arrangements with local intermediaries. The nature and level of access these connections provide is not well understood and cannot be easily measured using existing energy access metrics such as the Multi-Tier Framework. This study provides a grounded, empirical analysis of grid connections across 25 informal settlements in the Ugandan capital city of Kampala. Using a mixed-methods approach that incorporates surveys, interviews and remote power quality monitoring, we trace electrical and financial flows between the utility, supply intermediaries and end users. We identify 29 unique configurations of these flows—which we term service arrangements—that provide electricity of varying and overall limited levels of affordability, reliability, voltage stability, precarity, autonomy and safety. Our evidence suggests that the grid delivers highly inequitable electricity services that fall short of aspirations of modern energy for the city’s most vulnerable communities. To investigate inequalities in energy access, Kersey and co-authors conducted a mixed-method study with 25 informal settlements in Kampala, Uganda. They found that despite the expansion of electrical grids in Sub-Saharan Africa, users are connecting to the grid through a range of service arrangements that are highly differentiated and provide inequitable levels of electricity access.","PeriodicalId":501700,"journal":{"name":"Nature Cities","volume":"2 5","pages":"413-421"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-04-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145123598","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

An AI analysis of zoning reforms 分区改革的人工智能分析

Nature Cities Pub Date : 2025-04-04 DOI: 10.1038/s44284-025-00230-0

Catherine Brinkley

引用次数: 0

An AI-based analysis of zoning reforms in US cities 基于人工智能的美国城市分区改革分析

Nature Cities Pub Date : 2025-04-04 DOI: 10.1038/s44284-025-00214-0

Arianna Salazar-Miranda, Emily Talen

{"title":"An AI-based analysis of zoning reforms in US cities","authors":"Arianna Salazar-Miranda, Emily Talen","doi":"10.1038/s44284-025-00214-0","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s44284-025-00214-0","url":null,"abstract":"Cities are at the forefront of addressing global sustainability challenges, particularly those exacerbated by climate change. Traditional zoning codes, which often segregate land uses, have been linked to increased vehicular dependence, urban sprawl and social disconnection, undermining broader social and environmental sustainability objectives. This study investigates the adoption and impact of form-based codes (FBCs), which aim to promote sustainable, compact and mixed-use urban forms as a solution to these issues. Using natural language processing techniques, we analyzed zoning documents from over 2,000 United States census-designated places to identify linguistic patterns indicative of FBC principles. Our findings reveal widespread adoption of FBCs across the country, with notable variations within regions. FBCs are associated with higher floor to area ratios, narrower and more consistent street setbacks and smaller plots. We also find that places with FBCs have improved walkability, shorter commutes and a higher share of multifamily housing. Our findings highlight the utility of natural language processing for evaluating zoning codes and underscore the potential benefits of form-based zoning reforms for enhancing urban sustainability. Zoning reform has become a widespread push across US cities to improve social and environmental sustainability, but it has been difficult to quantify the implications of adoption of new codes. Using natural language processing to analyze a large body of zoning documents, Salazar-Miranda and Talen find that form-based codes exhibit clear themes connected to sustainability outcomes.","PeriodicalId":501700,"journal":{"name":"Nature Cities","volume":"2 4","pages":"304-315"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-04-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145123453","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Using artificial intelligence to analyze zoning reform in American cities 用人工智能分析美国城市分区改革

Nature Cities Pub Date : 2025-04-04 DOI: 10.1038/s44284-025-00218-w

引用次数: 0

Measuring sustainability, beauty and inclusiveness towards a shared vision for cities and urban projects 衡量可持续性、美观性和包容性，以实现城市和城市项目的共同愿景

Nature Cities Pub Date : 2025-04-02 DOI: 10.1038/s44284-025-00228-8

Dimitra Siatitsa

引用次数: 0

Resisting wetland gentrification in African cities 抵制非洲城市的湿地高档化

Nature Cities Pub Date : 2025-03-21 DOI: 10.1038/s44284-025-00219-9

Lewis Abedi Asante, Beverly Akomea Bonsu, Ilse Helbrecht

引用次数: 0