ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Environ. Sci.
Sec. Land Use Dynamics
Distribution and Driving Mechanisms of Revolutionary Heritage in a Mountainous Plateau Urban Agglomeration via GIS: Evidence from Central Yunnan, China
Provisionally accepted
- 1Southwest Forestry University, Kunming, China
- 2Macau University of Science and Technology, Taipa, Macao, SAR China
- 3City University of Macau, Taipa, Macao, SAR China
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Revolutionary sites are irreplaceable cultural resources, yet their spatial aggregation patterns and regional protection scales still lack systematic quantitative evidence. In this study, we focus on the Central Yunnan Urban Agglomeration and construct a cross-period database of 583 revolutionary sites covering six historical stages and multiple protection levels. Based on this dataset, an integrated analytical chain combining GIS spatial measurement, geographically weighted regression (GWR), and random forest (RF) modeling is employed to reveal spatial heterogeneity and nonlinear driving mechanisms. The results show that the overall distribution of sites presents a multi-core and corridor-like clustering pattern, with higher densities in the south, lower densities in the north, and a prominent high-density zone in the Xishan–Wuhua–Guandu–Chenggong area. Approximately 47% of all sites are associated with key institutions, significant meetings, or major events of the Liberation War, demonstrating the overlap of "organizational highlands" and "battlefield highlands" in shaping core aggregation areas. The directional evolution of distribution centers follows a northeast–south– northwest trajectory, confirming the strategic spatial logic of "encircling the cities from the countryside." The GWR–RF results further reveal that natural geographic factors, especially slope and elevation, act as primary rigid constraints, while socioeconomic variables exert moderate but spatially heterogeneous effects, and cultural resource variables contribute relatively limited influence. By constructing a comprehensive temporal–spatial database and applying mixed-method models, we identify a multidimensional "natural–institutional–economic" driving framework and propose a "node–corridor–network" protection model, offering a quantitative paradigm for integrating red tourism and providing scientific foundations for the precise protection and sustainable utilization of regional revolutionary heritage.
Keywords: central Yunnan urban agglomeration, Driving Mechanisms, Geographically weighted regression, GIS spatial analysis, random forest, revolutionary sites, Spatial pattern evolution
Received: 03 Dec 2025; Accepted: 11 Feb 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Cao, Liu, Chen and Huang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Yuhao Huang
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