The technology for determining the geographic location of cell phones and other handheld devices is becoming increasingly available. It is opening the way to a wide range of applications, collectively referred to as location-based services (LBS), that are primarily aimed at individual users....

Understanding and predicting human mobility is a crucial component of a range of administrative activities, from transportation planning to tourism and travel management. In this paper we propose a new approach that predicts the location of a person over time based on both individual and...

New techniques to measure 2D and 3D visibility over urban spaces are presented in this paper. The concept of the isovist, that is, the visible space from a vantage point, could help in providing a quantifiable basis for Lynch’s urban analysis, as outlined in his book [Lynch, 1960 <i>The Image of...</i>

Several attempts have already been made to use telecommunications networks for urban research, but the datasets employed have typically been neither dynamic nor fine grained. Against this research backdrop the mobile phone network offers a compelling compromise between these extremes: it is both...

Some questions about space syntax -- a well-known technique of urban analysis developed over the past decades by Bill Hillier et al -- were raised by Ratti in this journal. Hillier and Penn produced a detailed rejoinder, rebutting most of the criticisms and restating the assumptions made by the...

This paper reports on a number of inconsistencies that appear in space syntax -- a well-known technique of urban analysis -- when dealing with certain geometrical configurations. At a simple level, the analysis of regularly gridded urban textures (such as Manhattan's) reveals the difficulty of...

A new paradigm for investigating the environment consequences of urban texture is proposed. Using raster-based models and software algorithms derived from image processing the authors develop efficient methods of measuring geometric parameters and predicting radiation exchange. The possibilities...

A number of shortcomings of spacesyntax -- a well-known technique of urban analysis -- were recently discussed in the scientific literature. They are mostly traceable to the reliance in space syntax on the 'axial map': a simplified line-of-sight description of the city, which is then analysed...