Spatial Simulation Model of Urban Retail System (WIP)

摘要

The paper introduces a dynamic spatial model of urban retail systems in which the 'retail units' of different sizes and types compete with each other and the households continuously re-evaluate their shopping orientation. The model is currently at "work-in-progress" stage and needs still more work on calibration methodology. The goal of the model is to show the serial evolution of spatial distribution of retail units. The simulation model has been built within Gabriel Dupuy's (1991) three level model of urban networks. In the model, the spatial approach is emphasised through morphological types of retail units and the transportation network which defines the spatial framework for the whole model. The model enables observation how different boundary conditions - set by the typology and transportation networks - affect the spatial organisation of retail units in urban environments. The simulation model utilises both modern agent based modelling techniques and methodologies of traditional spatial interaction models (e.g. Wilson-Bennett 1985). The interest lies in the process in which the competing retail units form generations of spatial distributions. The case study has been executed in the Helsinki city region in Finland.