Tuyara Gavrilyeva (p), Nikita Bochkarev

Peter Novoszath

Authors study issues of regional spatial development since 2017 within the researches of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Geographically, the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) is a complex vast territory, crossed by natural obstacles, such as the Lena, Vilyuy, Aldan rivers, etc. As a matter of fact, the Arctic tundra is the biggest obstacle and separates the few remote communities in the absence of paved roads. The Arctic is a zone of temporary winter routes, extreme fragmentation of the populated space.
Significant natural and climatic differences within the region also lead to differences in transport schemes and schedules. For instance, November is a “dead season” for the Yakutsk agglomeration: in the absence of a bridge across the Lena River, the closure of navigation and the unavailability of ice crossings close connection with the right-bank regions and other regions of the country. Meanwhile, for the Arctic isolated communities, this is the time to open winter roads and resume communication with the outside world.
In addition, for a number of years we have been observing climate warming, which also complicates the overall transport model of the region.
First objection is to assess the dynamics of the spatial connectivity of all settlements of Yakutia over the past 20 years, using information on the calendar schedules for the operation of ferry, ice crossings and winter roads provided by the Ministry of Transportation of Yakutia. Further, this is an assessment of the influence of seasonality factors and the connectivity of the road network on the processes of concentration and polarization of economic activity.
Authors rely on the matrix of transport accessibility developed by themselves for 410 communities. In particular, we found that the integral connectivity over the past few years has a pronounced W-shape, fluctuating on average from a minimum value of 0.085 over 30 days from April 15 to May 24 to a maximum of 0.401 over 126 winter days.
The model also includes data on the capacity of the social infrastructure, the structure of economic activity, the level of prices and incomes, food habits in settlements against the background of temperature changes, natural disasters and road construction for 25 years.We proceed from the fact that the study of the above model will make it possible to understand the economic behavior of the local people, to assess the role of accessibility not only to transport, but also to an important life support infrastructure.

Estelle Mennicken (p), Geoffrey Caruso, Rémi Lemoy

Tuyara Gavrilyeva

In this research piece, we study the spatio-temporal distribution of congestion on road networks at the internal city scale. We identify the radial profiles of travel times by car with the aim of challenging transportation costs hypotheses in the urban scaling literature. Describing the profiles for an entire continent is completely innovative since it will show which function is best suited but also how it changes with city size. Scaling laws have already been established between average transport properties and city size but not yet on intra-urban radial profiles. Our radial-scaling perspective has the strong advantage of not summing up a spatial pattern into a single aggregate value but use a profile more directly related to the behaviour of people within cities.

In this study, urban form is described in accordance with the Alonso-Muth-Mills mono-centric city model. The radial profile of 303 European cities from the Urban Atlas, in terms of the Euclidean distance from all populated residential areas to the centre of the city, is examined and related to time distances after applying the Google Directions shortest path algorithm. We compute more than 7.5 million of simulated trips in total.

First, we build radial travel times profiles using the minimum average trip time at optimum traffic conditions to study the evolution of transport costs as we go further or closer to the city centers and to examine the best possible driving speed in European cities. Then, we account for traffic around-the-clock and build profiles for inbound and outbound congestion peaks during a typical weekday. We reveal a global travel time profile for Europe by estimating a concave power function that fits the relation between the travel time and the Euclidean distance to the city centre of European cities. This non-linear relation questions the persistence of linear transport costs in a majority of urban economic models.

Second, we compare cities and observe that the congestion effect is very likely linked to city size, population involves a dis-economy of scale in terms of time spent travelling on the road network, even a stronger one with the congestion considered. This scaling relationship still needs to be unveiled.

In conclusion, our very information-rich congestion database along with our empirical investigation linking the study of the internal city structure and the study of systems of cities allows a deeper understanding of road network travel times inside European cities.

Peter Novoszath (p)

Estelle Mennicken

Tourism in the countries of the Western Balkans and Central and Eastern Europe could face a major boom if the sector, which has been severely damaged by the epidemic crisis, is developed with an optimal combination of past experience and new opportunities. To this end, the relationship between transport and tourism in these countries should be re-launched. Using the results of the recent World Economic Forum study on the competitiveness of travel and tourism and the results of my own research, as well as the analysis of secondary data from scientific publications and journals, the presentation aims to assess the current level of infrastructure (aviation, land and port and tourism service infrastructure) in the countries of the Western Balkans and Central and Eastern Europe compared to other EU countries. Furthermore, this presentation also aims at the extent to which the development of transport infrastructure has contributed so far and could contribute in the future to the strengthening of European integration, the promotion of regional integration in the Western Balkans and Central and Eastern Europe and convergence with the European Union. How can the development of low-cost airlines (LCCs), super-railways, seaports and multimodal hubs promote mobility and regional cooperation and, ultimately, deeper integration?