The newest edition of Cityscape: A Journal of Policy Development and Research discusses methodologies for measuring urban blight. This issue was guest edited by Alexander Din. Across the United States, communities struggle with blighted urban environments and associated negative outcomes, including reduced property values, increased criminal activity, and poor health of residents. Historically, blight has been difficult, labor-intensive, and expensive for researchers to measure.
Eric Fesselmeyer and Kiat Ying Seah examine the relationship between inner-city blight and urban sprawl in the United States. Their study finds that city-center vacancy rates positively correlate with levels of urban sprawl, suggesting that policies that limit sprawl may also work to mitigate blight.
Jim DeLisle, Hye-Sung Han, Duy H. Ho, Yugyung Lee, Brent Never, and Ye Wang present a system of detecting abandoned houses using deep learning techniques for image classification. Their approach requires fewe