Alessandro Araldi

Distribution des commerces et forme urbaine : Modèles orientés-rue pour la Côte d'Azur: Cette thèse de doctorat analyse et discute la relation entre la distribution spatiale des activités commerciales et la forme urbaine. Plus précisément, dans ce travail, nous nous intéressons aux relations statistiques spatiales entre la localisation des activités commerciales de petite et moyenne taille et les propriétés physiques de la forme urbaine dans la région métropolitaine de la Côte d'Azur. L'hypothèse sous-jacente de cette recherche est que les caractéristiques physiques du paysage bâti pourraient influer la façon dont les humains perçoivent et utilisent l'espace urbain et, en définitive, sur la répartition et l'organisation des activités commerciales dans les villes. Au cours des deux dernières décennies, les spécialistes ont étudié de plus en plus cette relation. Néanmoins, les caractéristiques du tissu commercial et du tissu urbain sont souvent réduites aux notions simples de, densité de magasin et de configuration de réseau de rue. Plusieurs aspects, tels que la typologie d'agglomération morpho-fonctionnelle du commerce de détail, les caractéristiques géométriques du paysage à l'échelle de la rue et l'influence contextuelle du tissu urbain sont traditionnellement exclus de ces analyses. Ces aspects devraient être encore plus importants lorsque l'on étudie des zones métropolitaines très hétérogènes comme la Côte d'Azur, où l’on retrouve une combinaison de villes de tailles différentes et de régions morphologiques paradigmatiques : centres médiévaux, zones planifiées modernes et contemporaines et étalement suburbain. Pour surmonter ces limitations, des protocoles basés sur la théorie et assistés par ordinateur sont sélectionnés et développés dans cette thèse permettant l'extraction de mesures quantitatives de forme commerciale et urbaine. En particulier, partant des théories traditionnelles de la géographie du commerce et de la morphologie urbaine, deux procédures sont proposées et mises en œuvre, fournissant une description détaillée des tissus urbains et commerciaux à l’échelle de la rue. Ces méthodologies se basent sur des combinaisons innovantes de protocoles de géo-traitement et sur des approches d’IA (Réseaux Bayésiens). Les relations statistiques entre les descripteurs morphologiques urbains et de distribution commerciale sont étudiées à travers la mise en œuvre de plusieurs modèles de régression statistique. La décomposition de la zone d'étude dans les sous-régions morphologiques à la fois à l'échelle méso et macro, ainsi que la mise en œuvre de procédures de régression pénalisées, permettent d'identifier des combinaisons spécifiques de caractéristiques morphologiques urbaines avec les caractéristiques de distribution spatiales du commerce. Dans le cas de la Côte d'Azur, les résultats de ces modèles confirment la relation statistique entre les propriétés de configuration du réseau de rues et de la distribution spatiale du commerce. Néanmoins, il a été également démontré que le rôle de certaines variables morphométriques de paysage à l'échelle de la rue constitue également un aspect pertinent de la forme urbaine lors de l’enquête sur la distribution du commerce. Enfin, il a été démontré que le contexte morphologique à la fois à moyenne et à grande échelle est un facteur clé pour expliquer la répartition des petites et moyennes activités commerciales dans une grande région métropolitaine.

Multiple fabric assessment (MFA) is a computer‐aided procedure designed for identifying and characterizing urban fabric types (morphotypes) from a street‐based perspective. Nonetheless, the original MFA presents some limitations: it relies on surface‐based descriptors, conceived as proxy variables for the pedestrian perspective in urban form analysis, rather than direct sight‐based measurements. It also uses building footprint classes as proxies for building types. The spatial statistics on the street network concentrate on patterns of over‐ and under‐represented values, which often results in a limited number of morphotypes. Furthermore, the morphotypes are typically valid only for a specific study area. This article presents the latest methodological advancements in MFA overcoming these four limitations. Its implementation over the eight largest French metropolitan areas successfully distinguishes approximately 20 distinct place‐specific morphotypes, which are further aggregated into a comprehensive multi‐level nested taxonomy. The new MFA procedure allows a nationwide comparative analysis of contemporary urban forms, laying the groundwork for a comprehensive understanding of morphologically regionalized metropolitan areas. Through detailed algorithmic improvements and nationwide implementation, integrating traditional urban morphology with streetscape analysis, MFA provides insights into the analogies and differences of the urban fabric in contemporary metropolitan areas, enabling interoperability with other domains of urban research.

Urban development of Turkish cities has been strongly influenced by their fast-changing socioeconomic and political framework. In their turn, inherited morphological elements and their spatial organization influence today’s cities, their functioning, and their socioeconomic organization. This paper aims at identifying building and urban fabric types and at studying their spatial organization in Karşıyaka, Izmir, through MFA, an innovative computer-aided protocol. The outcomes are analyzed and interpreted regarding Turkish urban development history. The eight identified fabrics show a close correspondence to specific periods of Turkish urbanization. The model observed in Karşıyaka can be representative of many urban landscapes of Turkish metropolitan coastal regions. The paper contributes to the discussion and research on the identification of urbanization models for Turkish cities and their current development trends. Moreover, it represents a first step for future research on the relationship between urban morphology and environmental psychology, as well as urban planning and urban design guidelines.

The spatial organization of stores plays a crucial role in the production and development of the urban form while, at the same time, being strongly influenced from the physical constraints of the latter. Yet the connection between retail distribution and the physical form of cities remains underexplored. This paper aims to unify the perspectives of two distinct disciplines—retail geography and urban morphology—rooted in the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries. Retail geography, tracing its origins to classical works in American and German regional economics, and urban morphology, emerging from the convergence of architectural and geographical schools in England, Italy and France, have evolved independently since the late '60s. This paper reviews their development, highlighting theoretical and empirical studies elucidating the interrelationship between retail distribution and urban form. While both disciplines acknowledge the mutual influence of retail and cities, they have progressed independently, with retail geography focusing on the evolution of the retail sector and urban morphology emphasizing the impact of physical form on socioeconomic functions. Identifying common ground, this paper underscores spatial affinities and organizational aspects often overlooked. The paper concludes by encouraging a unified understanding, recognizing the potential for a more nuanced comprehension of the intricate dynamics between retail distribution and the physical features of cities. This approach paves the way for future interdisciplinary research, fostering collaboration in unravelling the complexities that shape urban environments.

This paper investigates the relationship between urban form and the spatial distribution of micro-retail activities. In the last decades, several works demonstrated how configurational properties of the street network and morphological descriptors of the urban built environment are significantly related to store distribution. However, two main challenges still need to be addressed. On the one side, the combined effect of different urban form properties should be considered providing a holistic study of the urban form and its relationship to retail patterns. On the other, analytical approaches should consider the discrete, skewed and zero-inflated nature of the micro-retail distribution. To overcome these limitations, this work compares two sophisticated modelling procedure: Penalised Count Regression and Machine Learning approaches. While the former is specifically conceived to account for retail count distribution, the latter can capture non-linear behaviours in the data. The two modelling procedures are implemented on the same large dataset of street-based measures describing the urban form of the French Riviera. The outcomes of the two modelling approaches are compared in terms of prediction performance and selection frequencies of the most recurrent variables among the implemented models.

Over the last two decades, a growing number of works in urban studies have revealed how micro-retail distribution is significantly related to specific properties of the urban built environment. While a wide variety of urban form measures have been investigated using sophisticated analytical approaches, the same attention has not equally been found in statistical procedures. Several essential features of micro-retail statistical distribution and modelling assumptions are frequently overlooked, compromising the statistical robustness of outcomes. In this work we focus on four main aspects: (i) the discrete, non-negative and highly skewed nature of store distribution; (ii) its zero-inflation; (iii) assessment of the contextual effect; and (iv) the multicollinearity generated by the inclusion of highly related urban descriptors. To overcome these limitations, we propose an integrated methodological framework for both modelling and variable selection assessment based on generalized linear models (GLMs) and elastic-net (Enet) penalized regression (PR), respectively. The procedure is tested via a real case study of the French Riviera, which is described using a large dataset of 105 street-based urban form measures. The outcomes of this procedure show the superiority of the zero-inflate negative binomial count regression approach. A restricted number of urban form properties are found to be related to the micro-retail distribution depending on the specific scale and morphological context under analysis.

The Japanese city presents a certain number of peculiarities in the organization of its physical space (weak zoning regulations, fast piecemeal destruction/reconstruction of buildings and blocks, high compacity, incremental reorganization). Compared to countries where urban fabrics are more perennial and easily distinguishable (old centers, modern planned projects, residential areas, etc.), in Japanese metropolitan areas we often observe higher heterogeneity and more complex spatial patterns. Even within such a model, it should be possible to recognize the internal organization of the physical city. The aim of this paper is thus to study the spatial structure of the contemporary Japanese city, generalizing on the case study of Osaka and Kobe. In order to achieve this goal, we will need to identify urban forms at different local scales (building types, urban fabrics) and to analyze them at a wider scale to delineate morphological regions and their structuring of the overall layout of the contemporary Japanese city. Several analytical protocols are used together with field observations and literature. The results, and more particularly the building and urban fabric types and their location within the Osaka-Kobe metropolitan area, are interpreted in the light of Japanese history and model of urbanization. A synoptic graphical model of an urban morphological structure based upon Osaka is produced and proposed as an interpretative pattern for the Japanese metropolitan city in general.