[sustran] Re: densities

[Tamim Raad]

Wendle Cox wrote:
>There are problems with the Newman-Kenworthy data --- for example
>
>        The Greater Toronto region contains large expanses of unurbanized
>land (especially in the regional municipalities of York and Durham), which
>causes an understatement of density.

Like Paul, I also worked with Kenworthy, particularly on the Canadian data.
 As Paul mentioned in his email, we were careful to weed out all non-urban
land in the calculations of urban density (i.e., agricultural land, water,
regional-scale parks, etc.).  This was done for all the cities, to ensure a
high comparability.  The Toronto figure of 26 p/ha is quite accurate as the
unurbanized lands in Halton, Peel, York and Durham were already "weeded"
out.  If these were included, densities closer to 7-10 p/ha would be
achieved...clearly too low a density for Greater Toronto.  Metro Toronto
is, of course, more dense at around 41 p/ha.

Similar exclusions of non-urban land were made for the U.S. data.

>        The "tri-state" region of New York contains much unurbanized land
>- --- the urbanized area would have been  more appropriate.=20

Looks right...quite close to the Kenworthy, et al figure of 19 p/ha for the
New York region.

Tamim
------------------
Tamim Raad
Point Grey RPO, Box 39150
Vancouver, British Columbia  V6R 4P1
Tel: (604) 739-2146
Email: raad at unixg.ubc.ca