Spatial disparity of sports infrastructure development and urbanisation determinants in China: evidence from the sixth national sports venues census

Wang, Junneng, Li, Jianwei and Cheng, Jianquan ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9778-9009 (2023) Spatial disparity of sports infrastructure development and urbanisation determinants in China: evidence from the sixth national sports venues census. Applied Spatial Analysis and Policy. ISSN 1874-4621

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Official URL: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12061-023-09557-4

Abstract

The improvement of well-being of residents is the core of the people-centred urbanization. Inhabitants’ emphasis on healthy lifestyle draws attention to the provision of sports infrastructure. However, the spatial pattern of sport infrastructure development and in particular the driving forces from urbanization across China have not been examined yet in the literature. This paper aims to explore how the national sports infrastructure in mainland China is driven and scaled by urbanization, using data from the sixth National Sports Venues Census and a multi-scale geographically weighted regression approach. The results revealed strong regional inequality in the development of sports infrastructure in the stage of accelerating urbanization in China, with better provision of sports infrastructure in eastern than in western regions. The three dimensions of urbanization (urban population, public financial expenditure and built-up area) significantly explained the spatial disparity between 289 cities at prefecture-city level. There should be a feedback loop between the accumulative developments of urbanization and sports infrastructure. The contributing driving forces and subsequent regional heterogeneity suggest that sports space theory, the inequality amplification model, and hysteresis effect are comparatively suitable for explaining the spatial inequality characteristics of sports infrastructure development in China. A Sport Inequality Alert was conceptualized as a policy instrument for monitoring regional inequality and governing the development of sports infrastructure. It is argued that sports infrastructure development should be integrated into the national strategy for sustainable New-type Urbanization.

Item Type:	Article (Article)
Peer-reviewed:	Yes
Date Deposited:	12 Dec 2023 15:43
Publisher:	Springer (part of Springer Nature)
Additional Information:	The version of record of this article, first published in Applied Spatial Analysis and Policy, is available online at Publisher’s website: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12061-023-09557-4
Divisions:	Faculties > Science and Engineering
Subject terms:	0909 Geomatic Engineering, 1205 Urban and Regional Planning, 1604 Human Geography
Data Access Statement:	Data on sports venues were sourced from the General Administration of Sports of China, available at [https://www.sport.gov.cn]. Urbanization-related data were obtained from the National Bureau of Statistics of China. The raw datasets utilized in this study can be provided upon request. For analysis, the software ArcGIS Pro was used, along with the freeware MGWR, accessible at [https://sgsup.asu.edu/sparc/multiscale-gwr].
URI:	https://e-space.mmu.ac.uk/id/eprint/633490
DOI:	https://doi.org/10.1007/s12061-023-09557-4
ISSN	1874-4621

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