2026-09-22

96 journals· 277 candidates — 4 worth your time· 70 without an open abstract

no arXiv arXiv answered and returned nothing this day, so this issue covers the rest. The papers below are real — what is missing is the other half of the scope, not the reading.

Headline

NYC Open Streets traffic impacts, and Chinese infrastructure inequality and economic outcomes

Today, together

tag shift
no tag ran above its 30-day average
shares references
The impact of New York City's Open Streets Program on local traffic shares 3 references with Optimizing loading space locations for walkable city centers (2026-06-19)
3 of them
  • Livable city: An approach to pedestrianization through tactical urbanism
  • Exploring traffic evaporation: Findings from tactical urbanism interventions in Barcelona
  • A walker's paradise ain't a driver's hell: Evaluating the causal effect of temporary road pedestrianization on traffic conditions of surrounding roads
counted over the 4 papers published above
on the same shoulders
no foundation work was cited by four of the day's papers counted over the 72 of this day's 74 named papers whose reference lists we have — standing on the same older work is not the same as being about the same thing
first appearance
Brown University; Cornell University none of them on a paper we published in the 102 days before this issue

Two counts, not one counted twice: every row here but “on the same shoulders” counts the papers published above, and that one counts every paper this day named — those and the ones under Also published today, whose abstracts we could not read.

An analysis of 342 Chinese cities used spatial error modeling and geographical convergent cross mapping to examine how infrastructure supply intensity and spatial inequality associate with economic development. Another study utilized GDELT event data and spatial econometric models to map the spatiotemporal patterns and drivers of conflict risk in Pakistan from 2015 to 2024 at both national and provincial scales. Finally, researchers investigated the Finnish concept of "talkoot" through archival and case-based research in Helsinki to identify five place- and situation-specific characteristics of urban commoning.

published: Cities

Sabah Usmani, Wu Xiao, Darby Jack, et al.
Cities

Columbia University

Urban Transport and Accessibility · Smart Parking Systems Research · Transportation Planning and Optimization · census data · New York City · Columbia University

The impact of New York City's Open Streets Program on local traffic

Using a propensity score-matched difference-in-differences analysis at the census tract level, this study evaluated the traffic impacts of New York City's Open Streets Program. Comparing crowdsourced monthly average daily traffic data from 2019 to 2021, the analysis found an average 13.4% reduction in traffic within tracts containing Open Streets, with an additional 0.42% reduction for every percentage point increase in contiguous treated tracts.

Why it matters — The study provides empirical evidence that pedestrian-focused road space reallocation can actively reduce local traffic volumes rather than simply displacing vehicles to adjacent streets, especially when the interventions are clustered together.

Caveat: The analysis relies on crowdsourced traffic data as a proxy for comprehensive local traffic volumes, which may introduce unmeasured spatial or temporal biases.

Cities · doi

published: Applied Geography

Xianmin Ye, Chenyang Shuai, Xi Chen, et al.
Applied Geography

Chongqing University

Regional Economics and Spatial Analysis · Fiscal Policy and Economic Growth · Economic and Technological Innovation · spatial econometrics · China · Chongqing University

Associations of infrastructure supply intensity and spatial inequality with economic development across Chinese cities

This study analyzed infrastructure supply intensity and spatial inequality across 342 Chinese cities using spatial error modeling and geographical convergent cross mapping. It mapped regional patterns, finding that supply intensity increases from west to east, while high spatial inequality is concentrated in northern and southwestern China. The analysis reveals that higher infrastructure supply intensity is associated with lower economic inequality, whereas higher internal infrastructure inequality correlates with greater economic disparity, especially in the eastern region.

Why it matters — It establishes a dual-directional predictive relationship between infrastructure distribution and economic outcomes, demonstrating that infrastructure inequality itself is a key correlate of regional economic disparity rather than just a byproduct of underdevelopment.

Caveat: The study relies on cross-sectional spatial modeling and predictive mapping, which may not fully capture long-term causal dynamics as infrastructure and economic conditions evolve.

Applied Geography · doi

published: Applied Geography

Gaoshaer WULAZI, Hui Liu
Applied Geography

Chinese Academy of Sciences

Transboundary Water Resource Management · Agricultural risk and resilience · Spatial and Panel Data Analysis · Chinese Academy of Sciences · Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research · University of Chinese Academy of Sciences

Spatiotemporal patterns and influencing factors of conflict risk in Pakistan: A multi-scalar analysis based on GDELT data

This study analyzed conflict risk in Pakistan from 2015 to 2024 using GDELT event data and spatial econometric models to map spatiotemporal patterns and identify drivers at both national and provincial scales. The analysis reveals that conflict risk is highly unequal, concentrating in border regions, major urban centers, and political cores, and is driven by a non-linear gradient from borders to inland areas alongside population density and transport infrastructure.

Why it matters — It demonstrates that conflict risk mechanisms are highly localized, showing that proximity to conflict in neighboring countries specifically drives risk in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan, while transport and social factors vary in impact both across and within provinces.

Caveat: The study relies on GDELT data, which is based on media reports and may contain reporting biases regarding the location and frequency of conflict events.

Applied Geography · doi

published: City Culture and Society

Annika Airas, Meg Holden
City Culture and Society

Simon Fraser University

Multilingual Education and Policy · Urban Planning and Governance · Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies · Simon Fraser University

Talkoot commons: Advancing more-than-English commoning for sustainability transitions in cities

This paper analyzes the Finnish concept of 'talkoot' (voluntary communal work) through archival and case-based research in Helsinki to identify five place- and situation-specific characteristics of urban commoning. It examines how this cultural practice navigates tensions surrounding inclusion, surplus, hierarchy, technology, and radical alternatives in both historical and contemporary urban settings.

Why it matters — It demonstrates how non-English cultural concepts can reveal distinct, localized pathways for urban commons transitions, offering a framework to restore culturally meaningful collective practices that standard English-centric commons literature overlooks.

Caveat: The empirical evidence is restricted to a single cultural and geographical context in Finland, which may limit the direct translation of 'talkoot' principles to highly diverse or different institutional settings.

City Culture and Society · doi

Still cited

Mark Nieuwenhuijsen (2020), Urban and transport planning pathways to carbon neutral, liveable and healthy cities; A review of the current evidence 1 of today's items cite it · 17 of 3240 in the archive stand on it

Also published today

These appeared today in journals we track. Their abstracts are not openly available, so we cannot summarise them.