The Making of a Sustainable Wireless City? Mapping Public Wi-Fi Access in Shanghai

Sustainability

卷:8

Chengcheng Gu¹  Mingfeng Wang¹  Juan Lin¹  Li Huang²  Felix Haifeng Liao²  Yehua Dennis Wei³ 

[1] Center for Modern Chinese City Studies, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200062, China;

[2] Department of Geography, University of Idaho, Moscow, ID 83844, USA;

[3] Department of Geography, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT 84112-9155, USA;

关键词: Wi-Fi;    wireless cities;    GIS spatial analysis;    digital divide;    China;   

DOI  :  10.3390/su8020111

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

In the context of the global information economy, ready access to the Internet is critical to a city’s competitiveness, which has prompted a number of cities to launch plans to establish wireless networks. Most literature on the development of wireless cities focuses on cities in Western countries, and few have discussed how Chinese cities have adopted wireless technologies in their urban infrastructure development efforts. This paper examines recent development and spatial distribution of public Wi-Fi access in Shanghai, a leading business hub in China. We mapped Wi-Fi hotspots through the government sponsored “i-Shanghai” project and China Mobile Communications Corporation (CMCC). We find that while telecommunication providers have been proactively deploying WLAN (wireless local area network，a proxy of public Wi-Fi or wireless access) hotspots in Shanghai, neither government sponsored WLAN hotspots nor facilities established by CMCC could cover the old traditional neighborhoods in the central city and sub-districts in remote rural areas. We also address the development of a more sustainable wireless city in Shanghai with a particular focus on digital divide and social equity issues.

【 授权许可】

Unknown