Abstract
Core and peripheral contrasts in journey-to-work trip length can be interpreted as imputing the relative value of origin and destination accessibility (yielding theoretical proxies for rent and wages). Because the main variables are shown to be critically dependent on spatial structure, they may be interpreted as showing the shadow prices due to comparative location. There is also a unifying connection between these results and the existing literature on many dimensions: rent gradients, accessibility, and emissivity. In an empirical example, the advantages of a panoramic view of national commuting statistics are shown, using an Irish data set. Variations in the rates of participation in trip making by location, occupation, and gender are examined. Places that emit more trips than would be expected from their relative location are identified. Further, examining ways in which such emissivity is sensitive to a change in trip length highlights the regions where trips could possibly be adjusted to produce a shorter average trip length or which might be especially sensitive to reduction in employment. A careful reinterpretation of one of the key outputs from a calibrated spatial interaction model is shown to be consistent with the declining rent gradient expected from Alonso’s theory of land use.
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Notes
In the case of the POWCAR data, imagine several hundred origin communities (towns) and the main destination aggregations being the 34 county level jurisdictions. The external zones are in fact special cases of the destinations—overseas, in multiple workplaces, at home, or without a clear indication on the data of the actual work place. Locations of towns and counties are simply determined from the centroids of the points with these ID values.
There are analogous measures on the destination side but these are omitted in the interests of concise results.
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Acknowledgments
Paper presented at the AAG, Washington DC 2010. Thanks to NIRSA for travel support to Maynooth and for data tables. We are very pleased to acknowledge an especially detailed data set (the POWCAR Place of Work Data) provided courtesy of Central Statistics Office, Ireland. Rob Kitchin, NIRSA, NUI Maynooth, Ireland provided comments and support for this research. The referees’ comments are acknowledged with thanks.
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Appendix: Sensitivity analysis
Appendix: Sensitivity analysis
Connecting the model notation:
Differentiating the second and third expressions with respect to β k
Recognizing that \( T_{ijk} = \exp (\lambda_{ik} + \mu_{jk} - \beta_{k} C_{ij} ) \) and after rearranging:
Given that \( O_{ik} = \sum\nolimits_{j} {T_{ijk} } , \) we can restate as:
which gives the key result for the interpretation of the sign of the origin effects shown in the maps:
Similarly, in the case of destinations, connecting the model notation:
Differentiating the second and third expressions with respect to β k
Rearranging as before:
Given that \( D_{jk} = \sum\nolimits_{i} {T_{ijk} } , \) we can restate as:
which gives the key result for the interpretation of the sign of the destination effects:
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O’Kelly, M.E., Niedzielski, M.A. & Gleeson, J. Spatial interaction models from Irish commuting data: variations in trip length by occupation and gender. J Geogr Syst 14, 357–387 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10109-011-0159-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10109-011-0159-3