Whitehead Tim, Simmonds David, Preston John
Transport Studies Unit, School of Geography and the Environment, University of Oxford, 11 Bevington Road, Oxford, England, OX2 6NB, UK.
J Environ Manage. 2006 Jul;80(1):1-12. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2005.01.029. Epub 2006 Mar 31.
This paper is concerned with the link between urban quality improvements and economic activity. A key question is whether improvements in the urban environment which might be achieved, for instance, through pedestrianisation, will affect business location choices--for example, are office or retail businesses particularly keen to locate in more pleasant urban places? The paper outlines the current state of development of the literature with respect to the influence of urban quality on economic activity, and proposes a framework for forecasting economic impacts based on three communities of reference: customers, employees, and the businesses themselves. The results from original modelling of a case study area in Manchester, England are reported and suggest that the positive uplifts that may be expected from environmental improvement programmes may well be on a scale which is significant. The research is obviously important for the urban regeneration and renaissance agendas which posit attractive and well-designed environments as a way to create the right conditions for promoting economic growth.
本文关注城市品质提升与经济活动之间的联系。一个关键问题是，例如通过行人专用区建设等方式实现的城市环境改善，是否会影响企业的选址决策——例如，办公或零售企业是否特别热衷于在环境更宜人的城市区域选址？本文概述了关于城市品质对经济活动影响的文献发展现状，并提出了一个基于三个参考群体（客户、员工和企业自身）来预测经济影响的框架。文中报告了对英国曼彻斯特一个案例研究区域进行原始建模的结果，这些结果表明，环境改善计划可能带来的积极提升很可能规模可观。这项研究对于城市更新和复兴议程显然很重要，这些议程将有吸引力且设计良好的环境视为创造促进经济增长合适条件的一种方式。
