Author Archives: Elias Willberg

About Elias Willberg

Geographer at Digital Geography Lab in University of Helsinki. NECTAR 2019 conference secretariat. GIS specialist. Urban mobility. Big data.

Doctoral Defense of Henrikki Tenkanen 17.11.2017

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MSc Henrikki Tenkanen will defend his thesis “Capturing time in space – Dynamic analysis of accessibility and mobility to support spatial planning with open data and tools” in the Faculty of Science, University of Helsinki, on Friday 17th, November 2017 at noon.

The work consists of five scientific articles and a synthesis related to spatial and temporal patterns of accessibility and mobility.

Professor Rober Weibel from University of Zurich will serve as the opponent in the event.The defense is a public event, and dissertation is available online here.

Henrikki Tenkanen: Capturing time in space

Time: Fri 17.11.2017 12:00-14:00

Place: Kumpula Campus, Physicum-building, Auditorio D101, Gustaf Hällströmin katu 2 A

Master’s thesis focusing on cycling speed and travel times finished!

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AINOKAISA TARNANEN’S MASTER’S THESIS “GIS-based modelling of cyclists’ speed and travel times in Helsinki region” was examined in September. In her thesis Ainokaisa developed a travel time model for calculating cyclists’ travel times in Helsinki region and examined the effect of different factors to cycling and the spatial differences in cycling speeds. Another objective was to assess how realistic it is to model cyclists’ travel times with constant speed on a regional scale. GPS data of cycling was collected from volunteers who had been tracking their cycling in Helsinki region with mobile sports applications. Road network for cycling and walking by Helsinki Region Transport was used as the modelling network.

The results show that slope, traffic lights and other junctions affect cycling speeds on an individual level but not on the regional scale. In general, the effect of signalized junctions is the greatest, whereas steep uphill slopes have the greatest effect on route-based mean speeds. The cycling speeds vary by cycling frequency: the more frequent cyclists have greater mean speeds. Spatial examination shows that mean cycling speeds in parts of central Helsinki are 0.8 times slower than in rest of the area.

A travel time model based on the constant speeds corresponding to the different median speeds of frequent and less frequent cyclists was implemented on the network. According to the results constant speed can be seen as an adequate assumption to model comparable cyclists’ travel times in Helsinki region. However, personal and spatial differences in cycling speeds should be taken into account. Travel times calculated with this model can be combined to the Helsinki region travel time matrix providing information on cycling alongside car, public transport and walking travel times and distances.

Thesis is available here:

You can find more information on Digital Geography Lab’s ongoing biking projects here: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/researchgroups/digital-geography-lab/biking-as-part-of-sustainable-urban-mobility-2017-2018

Kalle Numminen’s and Joona Repo’s master’s theses are done!

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Our project members Kalle Numminen ja Joona Repo have both finished their theses, which have now been examined.

KALLE’S EXCELLENT WORK, which title was “The effect of transport pricing on retail accessibility – examining public transport fare reform” examined accessibility of the major shopping centers in the Helsinki region from the cost perspective. He compared the cost-accessibility between car and public transport and analyzed the effect of the coming public transport fare reform.

According to the results, there are clear differences by travel mode in cost-accessibility in the Helsinki region. The shopping centers in the city center have poor accessibility by car encouraging to out-of-town shopping. The fare reform will change cost-accessibility particularly near municipality borders but taken all together the reform will not have a dramatic effect on the balance of modal accessibility in the region.

Link to the work: https://helda.helsinki.fi/handle/10138/175829

JOONA’S LIKEWISE EXCELLENT WORK titled “Long-Term Accessibility Change of Services: Public Library Network in Helsinki Region as a Case Study” studied long term accessibility by travel mode in the Helsinki region taking into account changes in the urban structure. The study focused on accessibility of library services and modelled how it will change by 2050.

The results show that the accessibility of the library services is relatively good in the region and the effect of the changes in the urban structure that were modelled in the study will have a rather small effect. The forecasted change in population would increase the number of people accessing the nearest library in half an hour, but the proportion of this group to the total population in the area would be smaller than before. Even though excluding some of the smallest libraries from the service network would have relatively small effects on accessibility in the aggregate, could the effects be on the individual level and for sustainable accessibility significant. Based on the study results more significant than the changes in the transport system or the attraction of the facilities seem to be how the population and the services are linked.

Link to the work: https://helda.helsinki.fi/handle/10138/221337

Congratulations for both once again!

NECTAR conference in Helsinki in 2019 as part of the “Science workshops”-project!

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The Digital Geography Lab research group will host the international NECTAR (Network on European Communications and Transport Activities Research) conference in June 2019 in Helsinki!  The previous NECTAR-conference was held in Madrid this June and Tuuli was there to welcome all to Finland in two years’ time. Though there is still time before the conference, we are starting gradually to organize the event this autumn.

The conference will be a part of the “Science workshops on novel and open data sources and approaches to study urban accessibility and mobility” project funded by Finnish Cultural Foundation. The project started this year and our group’s new member, Elias Willberg, will take care of the it’s practical realization together with the other group.

As part of this project we will also organize several smaller accessibility and mobility related workshops both national and international during the next year. These workshops aim to bring together researchers working with these topics in different places and thus enhance networks and collaboration between these people.

See the NECTAR Conference 2019 website here: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/conferences/towards-human-scale-cities-open-and-happy