Identifying Relationship between Regional Centrality and POI Facilities: A Case Study of Seoul Metropolitan Area

Abstract

While understanding the dynamic urban network through the concept of regional centrality has provided various implications on the structure and hierarchy of cities, the macroscopic focus of previous studies has largely overlooked the small-scale physical and social urban entities in central places. Meanwhile, recent advances in real-time Point-of-Interest (POI) data have quickly replaced much of traditional urban facility data, emerging as a new representation of urban activities and demands. Therefore, this study proposes a method to identify the relationship between regional centrality and the distribution of POI facilities, particularly focused on the Seoul metropolitan area of South Korea. To this end, this study conducts a correlation analysis between regional centrality results derived from social network analysis and POI indices obtained from POI distribution analysis. The results indicate that a statistically significant relationship exists between regional centrality and the distribution of urban facilities, with a particularly strong correlation exhibited in specific POI categories. The results also demonstrate the effectiveness of the method in capturing disparities in the provision of facilities concerning growing commuting centers. The findings of the study provide pragmatic implications for prioritization and planning of facility development, as well as making informed decisions in real estate and facility investment.