ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book aims to design and apply GIS-based methods for detecting and analyzing intra-urban commuting patterns. It reviews existing commuting studies in four areas: measuring commuting lengths, explaining commuting by spatial factors, explaining commuting by nonspatial factors, and measuring wasteful commuting. The book describes the study area and data sources. It discusses simulation-based approaches and demonstrates their applications in measuring commuting patterns. The book demonstrates the analyses of measuring commuting lengths using the simulation methods. It deals with the commuting efficiency issue, another classic topic in commuting research. The book also discusses future possibilities of employing big data in commuting research. It describes several statistical analyses that investigate the relationships between commuting and each of three selected land use indices—distance from the central business district, jobs–housing balance ratio, and proximity to jobs.
