Innovation, institutions, and the importance of large land parcels: drivers of urban expansion in San Diego, CA, 1986-2017
Date
2019
Authors
Molder, Edmund Boyd, author
Leisz, Stephen, advisor
Laituri, Melinda, committee member
Johnson, Merrill, committee member
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Abstract
Urban expansion and its drivers are an increasingly important focus for land change scientists. Expansion of built-up land cover reduces native plant and animal habitat, increases surface water runoff, and impacts local and global climate. However, an increasing proportion of the world's population is moving to urban environments and the demand for housing, commercial services, and employment in these environments is rising. Understanding where urban expansion occurs and the underlying drivers responsible for it is thus critical for social and environmental policy. This thesis utilizes spatial analysis to quantify urban land use change in two case areas of San Diego County, California between 1986 and 2017. The first case study, focusing on the University of California, San Diego and surrounding communities, examines the economic drivers of urban expansion in the context of recent growth in the area's innovation economy. Sectors in the innovation economy are primarily research-driven, technology-based, and include industries like biotechnology, telecommunications, and aerospace engineering. This case study examines the role of the university in establishing this economy and quantifies the rapid urban expansion that occurred during the innovation economy's growth over the past 31 years. The second case, focusing on the Otay Ranch community of Chula Vista, has a long history of agricultural land use linked to the Spanish Alta California Rancho system, and rapid residential development in recent years occurred as a direct result of this land tenure system. Expansion of industrial districts in this case study occurred along the U.S.-Mexico border as a result of NAFTA and subsequent international trade relations, while planning efforts to encourage a research-based economy in the region have so far failed. The relative roles of land tenure, planning institutions, economic growth, and physical geography are discussed in both case studies, and the results of both case studies' spatial analysis indicate the differing power of proximate causes of urban land change in different places.
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Subject
innovation economy
Otay Ranch
CA
drivers of urban expansion
San Diego
land change science
urban expansion