Differentiation regularity of urban-rural equalized development at prefecture-level city in China

The urban-rural equalized development (URED) as a definite measure and operating model is beneficial to gradually eliminating the dual-track structure of urban-rural development, bridging the gap of urban-rural development, and creating harmonious urban-rural interactions. This paper aims to explore the status quo of URED in China at prefecture level, and to reveal the spatio-temporal patterns of URED and its differentiation regularity. The results show that: (1) China's URED level can be categorized into two parts, i.e., the eastern and the western, according to the "HU Huanyong Line", presenting a pattern of "east high and west low" and the URED level improves on the whole with the increase of distance from the line; (2) China's URED level can also be categorized into the northern and the southern parts according to "Kunlun-Qinling-Huaihe Line", presenting a pattern of "north high and south low", and the URED level reduces on the whole with the increase of distance from the line; (3) At the national level, China's URED has a significant trend of spatial agglomeration, the high and low URED regions tend to be adjacent, namely, the URED level presents obvious regional unbalance; (4) The five sub-dimension indicators of the URED level in the geographical space also reveal similar regional differentiation pattern, and in the aspect of space a decreasing trend is found in the URED level from the eastern (northern coast, eastern coast and southern coast), the northeastern, the central (the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and the Yellow River) to the western (northwest and southwest); and (5) China's URED at prefecture-level city can be divided into five types of differentiation areas. This study contributes to promoting the integrative cognition of the status quo of China's URED and can serve as a scientific reference concerning the decision-making of coordinating urban-rural development and of pushing forward new-type urbanization strategy in China