The experience of calculating distances between different types of settlements in Russia to assess the range of population migration

Abstract

The problem of measuring distances in migration is not trivial, but important, for example, for delimiting the concepts of population migration and housing mobility. In conditions of limited access to detailed spatial data, researchers solve this issue in different ways. Only a few countries, such as Sweden, have the ability to calculate migration distances between point locations using Euclidean distance (in a straight line). In this article, as applied to Russia, the measure of correspondence between Euclidean distances and real distances along transport routes is investigated. For this purpose, 3407 pairs of distances were calculated for randomly selected 23 municipal districts of Russia directly and along transport routes — roads. Also, 411 pairs of distances were calculated for settlements with no auto connection, using air traffic. These distances give an idea of the migrations of different distances in Russia. As a result, for hypothetical resettlements within the selected municipal districts, real road distances exceed Euclidean distances by 51 %. For resettlements between the centers of districts and urban districts within the region, this indicator exceeds 40%, and for interregional resettlements, the differences are 33 %. The air service used “straightens” the distances, but even taking it into account, the real distances (mainly long-range, interregional) exceed the Euclidean ones by 28.5 %. The calculations performed to give an idea of the deviations of real, transport distances from the relatively easy-to-calculate Euclidean ones, which can be used in the analysis of migration distances in Russia.