Mapping History - What Historical Maps Can Tell Us About Urban Development: Digitisation Codes, 1800-1960

This project systematically processed high-resolution and manuscript historical maps to unlock a dormant body of information about the historical development of cities and regions during periods of structural economic transformation. The work was organised across six interlinked work packages, combining empirical and theoretical analysis in the UK, France, and Canada. Outputs included peer-reviewed publications and robust algorithms for extracting spatial data from historical sources, contributing valuable tools and insights to the fields of urban economics and economic history. This data package contains three segmentation codes designed to extract features and segment historical maps.<p>Little is known about the patterns of city development during the structural transformation of economies. This project will systematically process high-resolution and manuscript historical maps to make a dormant body of information about our cities' and regions' past accessible. The proposed research will advance our understanding of long-run urban growth through the development of three innovative methodologies, which will overcome practical limitations of historical data sources: 1) A technique to extract land use patterns from historical colour maps applied to France (1750-1950); 2) A recognition algorithm to detect, tag and geo-locate points of interest in historical high-quality maps of the 70 largest urban centre in England and Wales; 3) An algorithm to geo-locate address information from Micro-censuses and trade registers. We have identified four main research questions that will be developed in the following separate research projects. In Project 1, the main question is: what are the long-term empirical patterns of urban development, most notably the persistence of the spatial organisation of economic activity and the role of building infrastructure in shaping such persistence? In Project 2, the main question is: How do environmental disamenities and their unequal distribution within cities affect the spatial organisation of consumption amenities and production? In Project 3, the main question is: Do cities grow towards their bad parts, their neighbourhoods with the lowest environmental amenities? In Project 4, the main question is: How does vertical growth and advances in building technologies affect the spatial organisation of cities? To address these research questions, we will organise our workflow in six inter-connected work packages (WP): WP1--Classification of land use in France (1750-2015): The objective of WP1 will be to recover land use information at a fine scale from digitised maps using state-of-the-art machine learning techniques; WP2--Digitisation of micro-features embedded in Ordnance Survey (OS) city maps of England and Wales (1870-1960); WP3--Geo-localization of residents and production units in England and Wales (1851-1911); WP4--Dynamic model of city growth with persistent building stock: WP4 builds a general equilibrium model of spatial economic activity that embeds the durability of housing and infrastructure and exploits the three hundred years of population settlement data produced in WP1; WP5--Pollution and the long-run development of cities: WP5 builds on WP2,3 and proposes to study the joint dynamics of residential sorting and the location of production within cities to understand how a major environmental disamenity-industrial pollution-affects the spatial organisation of cities in the longer-run; WP6--Horizontal and vertical urban growth in Montreal and Toronto: WP6 will bridge between the previous working packages WP1, WP2, WP4 and WP5, and study--empirically and theoretically--horizontal and vertical urban growth. The project will be jointly led by three teams. The French team will be composed of Gobillon (PI), Combes (CoI) and Duranton (TM) who have contributed to the development of major theoretical approaches in urban economics. The Canadian team will be led by Heblich (PI), who is a lead researcher in urban economics/economic history, and Fortin (Co-I), a lead in GIS analysis. The UK team will be led by Zylberberg (PI), who is an economist specialist in data extraction form historical sources and remote sensing. Shaw-Taylor and Sch&uuml;rer, advisory board, will help design the analysis of the population micro-censuses between 1851 and 1911 (WP3). The collaboration partner, Redding (TM), involved in the design of WP3 and the implementation of WP6, is one of the World lead researchers in urban economics. Outputs will include articles in top economic journals, and detailed algorithms to extract relevant spatial information from manuscript maps.</p>本项目对高分辨率手绘历史地图进行系统性处理，旨在解锁经济结构转型时期有关城市与区域历史发展的沉睡信息宝库。 本研究依托六个相互关联的工作包（work packages）开展，结合了英国、法国与加拿大的实证分析与理论研究。研究成果包括同行评议期刊论文，以及从历史资料中提取空间数据的稳健算法，为城市经济学与经济史学领域提供了极具价值的研究工具与学术洞见。 本数据包包含三款分割代码，用于提取历史地图的特征并完成地图分割。当前学界对经济结构转型时期的城市发展模式知之甚少，本项目将通过系统性处理高分辨率手绘历史地图，使有关城市与区域过往的沉睡信息得以被发掘利用。 本项研究将通过开发三种创新方法论，加深我们对长期城市增长的理解，这些方法将克服历史数据源的实际局限性：1） 针对法国（1750-1950年）历史彩色地图提取土地利用模式的技术；2） 用于英格兰与威尔士70个最大城市中心的高质量历史地图中，检测、标注并地理定位兴趣点的识别算法；3） 从微观普查（Micro-censuses）与贸易登记册中提取地址信息并完成地理定位的算法。 我们已明确四项核心研究问题，将在后续独立研究项目中逐一展开。项目1的核心问题为：城市发展的长期实证模式是什么？具体而言，经济活动空间组织的持续性，以及建筑基础设施在塑造这种持续性中发挥的作用为何？项目2的核心问题为：环境不适设施（environmental disamenities）及其在城市内部的不均分布，如何影响消费型便利设施与生产活动的空间组织？项目3的核心问题为：城市是否会向其环境最差区域——即环境舒适度最低的街区——扩张？项目4的核心问题为：垂直增长与建筑技术进步，如何影响城市的空间组织？ 为解答上述研究问题，我们将研究流程划分为六个相互关联的工作包（简称WP）： WP1——法国土地利用分类（1750-2015年）：本工作包的目标是采用前沿机器学习技术，从数字化地图中提取高精度的土地利用信息； WP2——英格兰与威尔士军械测量局（Ordnance Survey，简称OS）城市地图内嵌微观特征的数字化处理（1870-1960年）； WP3——英格兰与威尔士居民与生产单位的地理定位（1851-1911年）； WP4——包含持续性建筑存量的城市增长动态模型：本工作包将构建空间经济活动的一般均衡模型，纳入住房与基础设施的耐久性特征，并利用WP1生成的三百年人口定居数据开展研究； WP5——污染与城市长期发展：本工作包基于WP2与WP3的研究成果，拟探讨城市内部居民择居与生产区位选择的联合动态，以解析工业污染这一核心环境不适设施如何从长期影响城市的空间组织； WP6——蒙特利尔与多伦多的水平与垂直城市增长：本工作包将衔接此前的WP1、WP2、WP4与WP5，从实证与理论双维度探究城市的水平扩张与垂直增长。 本项目由三个团队联合牵头。法国团队由Gobillon（首席研究员，Principal Investigator，简称PI）、Combes（共同首席研究员，Co-Investigator，简称CoI）与Duranton（TM）组成，他们均为城市经济学领域主流理论方法的重要贡献者。加拿大团队由Heblich（PI，城市经济学/经济史学领域顶尖研究员）与Fortin（共同首席研究员，Co-I，地理信息系统（GIS）分析领域权威）牵头。英国团队由Zylberberg（PI，专注于从历史数据源提取数据与遥感技术的经济学家）牵头。咨询委员会成员Shaw-Taylor与Schürer将协助设计1851-1911年人口微观普查（WP3）的分析框架。合作方Redding（TM）参与了WP3的设计与WP6的实施，是全球城市经济学领域的顶尖研究员之一。 本项目的研究成果将包括顶级经济学期刊论文，以及从手绘历史地图中提取相关空间信息的详细算法。