Spatial Clustering, Coupling Coordination and Its Influencing Factors of Urbanization in Shandong Peninsula Urban Agglomeration

Abstract

The study on the coordinated development of urbanization is currently a hot topic and frontier of research. Founded on the panel data of 17 cities in Shandong Peninsula Urban Agglomeration(SPUA) from 2006 to 2018 through the construction of population-land-economic-social urbanization evaluation index system, using spatial autocorrelation analysis, coupling coordination model and other analytical methods, the paper explored the spatio-temporal evolution characteristics, spatial agglomeration patterns and coupling coordination types, including their spatial distribution laws of the urban agglomeration, and by using the spatial econometric model, the paper made a quantitative analysis about the influencing mechanism of urbanization coupling coordination. The results showed that the gap between the urbanization levels of the cities in SPUA was rather clear and the urbanization level and coupling coordination degree of eastern coastal cities were generally higher than those of inland cities in central and western regions, presenting a "core-edge" structure with "Jinan-Qingdao" dual-core. The study also revealed that population size, economic base and consumption capacity had a significant positive impact on the coordinated urbanization in SPUA, while the impact of land development scale, financial level and social security level was remarkably negative.