A recent body of research suggests that the spatial structure of cities might influence the socioeconomic characteristics and outcomes of their residents. In particular, the literature on neighbourhood effects emphasizes the potential influence of the socioeconomic composition of neighbourhoods...

This paper attempts to explain the spatial variation of the use of a bicycle for commuting to work at the level of the 589 municipalities in Belgium. Regression techniques were used and special attention was paid to autocorrelation, heterogeneity and multicollinearity. Spatial lag models were...

The built environment plays a key role in the strategy of “Aging in Place”. Here, we study the influence of the built environment on the health status of elderly people living in Brussels. Using census and geocoded data, we analysed if built environment factors were associated with poor...

Using Belgian microdata, we assess the impact, on a hedonic regression, of the distortions arising from the choice of either a specific zoning system or the delineation of the study area. We also evaluate the biases that arise when spatial effects are not accounted for. Given that the dependent...

A residential location model derived from urban economics is combined with the geometry of a multifractal Sierpinski carpet to represent and model a metropolitan area. This area is made up of a system of built-up patches hierarchically organised around a city centre, and green areas arranged in...

Comment expliquer l'existence de poches de chômage élevé au sein des villes ? La théorie économique identifie deux explications concurrentes : les effets néfastes sur le marché du travail associés à la ségrégation résidentielle, et l'éloignement de ces zones aux lieux d'emplois. Le...

What causes pockets of high unemployment within cities ? Economists point out at two alternative explanations : residential segregation as well as physical disconnection to jobs may have harmful labor-market effects. Our empirical work carried out on the Brussels metropolitan area supports the...

This paper investigates the causal effects of the spatial organization of Brussels on unemployment propensities. Using 1991 Census data, we estimate the unemployment probability of young adults while taking into account personal, household and neighborhood characteristics. We solve the...

The goal of this study is to propose a method for determining the limits of the Brussels urban agglomeration. The method is inspired by a review of the criteria used by national statistical institutes in several countries and based on a limited set of simple and easily available statistical...