Spatiotemporal Analysis of Human Mobility in Greater Tokyo Area Using Hourly 500 m Mobile Spatial Statistics from 2019 to 2021

Abstract

Spatiotemporal evaluation of human mobility is crucial to deepen and broaden the understanding of drivers and mechanisms behind urbanization. In this study, daytime human mobility was quantified based on the inflow and outflow of population in 500 × 500 m spatial grids using a processed version of the hourly DOCOMO Mobile Spatial Statistics (MSS) dataset. Using K-means clustering of the temporal mobility values over the Greater Tokyo Area, five typical diurnal patterns representing distinguishable intensities of diurnal human mobility over weekdays and weekends were identified. Mapping their spatiotemporal changes from the period of January 2019 to December 2021, a different perspective on regional human mobility was explored. These include the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic on human mobility, the relationship between human mobility and locations of public infrastructures, and a large-scale human mobility across central and peripheral areas inside the large megacity.