An enhanced ecological network for spatial planning considering spatial conflicts and structural resilience

Abstract

The digital transformation of territorial spatial planning has underscored the urgent need to integrate ecological network into spatial planning practices. In response, we developed two innovative new tools, the Ecological Linkage Tool (ELT) and the Relative Spatial Conflict Index (RSCI), to enhance ecological networks applications by addressing spatial conflicts and structural resilience. The ELT identified ecological corridors within and outside irregular ecological sources, activation points, and stepping stones in parallel, and then constructed an intact ecological network. By integrating the RSCI and complex network metrics, the spatial conflicts and structural resilience were evaluated. The framework was implemented in the Hohhot-Baotou-Ordos-Yulin (HBOY) urban agglomeration, identifying a total of 5,814 corridors, of which 67 % were classified as intra-patch and 33 % as inter-patch. The number and distribution of these corridors were determined by the size and shape of the ecological sources, and the connectivity of intra-patch corridors was 34 % higher than inter-patch corridors. According to the RSCI, 60 % of the corridors experienced spatial conflicts, with 21 % involving production spaces or composite production-related conflicts. Moreover, Yulin served as a key hub in the ecological network, and Baotou had the highest network efficiency. Compound conflict corridors (involving production, living, and open spaces) had a greater impact on overall ecological network efficiency compared to those with single or dual conflicts. Meanwhile, the failure of 40 % of corridors without spatial conflicts would directly result in a 96.9 % decline in network efficiency, highlighting their critical role in maintaining network functionality. This study provides an enhanced ecological network application solution for the China Spatial Planning Observation Network (CSPON), supporting spatial planning practices.

Keywords

Ecological network / Ecological corridor / Spatial conflict / Structural resilience / Spatial planning

Code availability

The code used for analysis is available on GitHub: https://github.com/HaoweiGis/Ecological-Linkage-Tool.

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Haowei Mu: Writing - original draft, Visualization, Methodology, Investigation, Data curation. Shanchuan Guo: Writing - review & editing, Validation, Formal analysis, Data curation. Xingang Zhang: Writing - review & editing. Bo Yuan: Writing - review & editing. Xiaoquan Pan: Writing - review & editing. Zilong Xia: Writing - review & editing. Xin Pan: Writing - review & editing. Shangwu Zhang: Writing - review & editing, Formal analysis. Peijun Du: Writing - review & editing, Validation, Funding acquisition, Data curation, Conceptualization.

Declaration of competing interests

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Acknowledgements

This research was funded by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (Grant No. 2022YFC3800802).

Supplementary materials

Supplementary material associated with this article can be found, in the online version, at doi:10.1016/j.geosus.2026.100420.

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