Spatial variation of the relationship between transport accessibility and the level of economic development in Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, China

As an important component of China’ transportation systems, for a long time, the insufficient performance of transport in QinghaiTibet Plateau(QTP) was a bottleneck restricting the economic growth and social development in this area. Nevertheless, the implementation of the western development strategy has accelerated the preliminary construction of comprehensive transport network since 2000. Due to the large area and significant geographical heterogeneity, there is a growing need to understand the relationship between transportation and economic development based on the perspective of spatial difference. By using GIS-based raster analysis and Geographically Weighted Regression(GWR) model, we investigated the spatial-temporal distribution of highway, railway and airport accessibility, respectively, and estimated the correlation and heterogeneity between transport accessibility and the level of economic development. Results revealed that:(1) Transport accessibility in the QTP improved by 53.38% in the past 15 years, which is specifically embodied in the improvement of both highway and railway.(2) Accessibility presented prominent differentiation in the space, increasing from west to east and reducing with the rise of elevation, specifically, the best accessibility area of the highway is below 4000 m above sea level, while the area with an altitude of over 4000 m has the lowest aviation time cost.(3) In general, the long weighted average time cost to critical transport facilities posed significantly negative effect on county economic growth in QTP, more positively, the adverse effect gradually weakened over time.(4) Obvious heterogeneity exists at the influence of different transport accessibility factors on the level of economic development, reflecting both in the horizontal space and altitudinal belt. Therefore, region-specific policies should be addressed for the sustainable development of transport facilities as well as economy in the west mountain areas.

The decadal abrupt change in the global land vapor pressure deficit

The vapor pressure deficit(VPD) is an important variable used to characterize atmospheric aridity.This paper analyses the spatial and temporal characteristics of the decadal abrupt change(DAC) in the global land VPD after 1980 using monthly scale data from the Climatic Research Unit.The results show that 60.5% of the global land area underwent a significantly increased decadal abrupt change(IDAC) in the VPD,and the persistent IDAC of the VPD was obvious in the middle and low latitudes of Eurasia,Africa and parts of South America but not in central North America or Western Siberia.From 1980 to 2020,most regions experienced no more than two persistent IDACs,while more than two significant increases occurred mainly around the Mediterranean and in eastern South America.The persistent IDAC occurred relatively early in the middle and low latitudes of Eurasia,Africa,and eastern South America and after 2000 in the high latitude regions,Eastern Europe,and near the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.The regions where the persistent IDAC lasted longer than 10 years mainly included North Africa,West Asia,eastern South America,and parts of East Asia,indicating that the persistent increases in atmospheric aridity in these regions were obvious.In general,the persistent IDAC that began in 1993–2000 was significantly more than that occurred in other periods and lasted longer than that before 1990,suggesting that the land area experiencing an abrupt increase has an expansion after the 1990s and that the role of water limitation in this persistent IDAC in Central Asia and most of China strengthened.In addition,the VPD showed another large-scale persistent IDAC over the global land region in 2009,indicating that global atmospheric aridity intensified over the last decade.At the same time,in a few global regions,the VPD has exhibited decreased decadal abrupt changes(DDACs) with durations shorter than 2 years.