Role of the Built Environment in the Recovery From COVID-19: Evidence From a GIS-Based Natural Experiment on the City Blocks in Wuhan, China

Frontiers in Built Environment

Built Environment

Hui Guo¹  Fan Xue¹  Yijie Wu¹  Jinying Xu¹  Weisheng Lu¹  Anthony G. O. Yeh²  Maosu Li²  Yi Peng³  Tan Tan⁴ 

[1]Department of Real Estate and Construction, The University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam, Hong Kong, China

[2]Department of Urban Planning and Design, The University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam, Hong Kong, China

[3]School of Public Administration, Zhejiang University of Finance and Economics, Hangzhou, China

[4]The Bartlett School of Sustainable Construction, University College London, London, United Kingdom

关键词: built environment;    post-disaster recovery;    COVID-19-free community;    natural experiment;    GIS;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fbuil.2021.813399

 received in 2021-11-11, accepted in 2021-12-24,  发布年份 2022

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

The built environment closely relates to the development of COVID-19 and post-disaster recovery. Nevertheless, few studies examine its impacts on the recovery stage and corresponding urban development strategies. This study examines the built environment’s role in Wuhan’s recovery at the city block level through a natural experiment. We first aggregated eight built environmental characteristics (BECs) of 192 city blocks from the perspectives of density, infrastructure supply, and socioeconomic environment; then, the BECs were associated with the recovery rates at the same city blocks, based on the public “COVID-19-free” reports of about 7,100 communities over the recovery stages. The results showed that three BECs, i.e., “number of nearby designated hospitals,” “green ratio,” and “housing price” had significant associations with Wuhan’s recovery when the strict control measures were implemented. At the first time of reporting, more significant associations were also found with “average building age,” “neighborhood facility development level,” and “facility management level.” In contrast, no associations were found for “controlled residential land-use intensity” and “plot ratio” throughout the stages. The findings from Wuhan’s recovery pinpointing evidence with implications in future smart and resilient urban development are as follows: the accessibility of hospitals should be comprehensive in general; and the average housing price of a city block can reflect its post-disaster recoverability compared to that of the other blocks.

【 授权许可】

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Copyright © 2022 Li, Peng, Wu, Xu, Tan, Guo, Lu, Yeh and Xue.