Hindawi Complexity Volume 2021, Article ID 8831325, 11 pages https://doi.org/10.1155/2021/8831325 Research Article Spatial Spillover Effects of Economic Growth Based on High-Speed Railways in Northeast China Haoming Guan 1 and Qiao Li 2 1School of Geographical Sciences, Northeast Normal University, 5268 Renmin Street, Changchun 130024, China 2School of Architecture and Design, Changchun Institute of Technology, 3066 Tongzhi Street, Changchun 130021, China Correspondence should be addressed to Qiao Li; [email protected] Received 18 August 2020; Revised 18 December 2020; Accepted 3 March 2021; Published 1 April 2021 Academic Editor: Wen-Ze Yue Copyright © 2021 Haoming Guan and Qiao Li. /is is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. /is paper examines the spatial spillover effects of public transportation infrastructure on regional economy in Northeast China, the “rust belt” region in China. /e dataset consists of socioeconomic data from 47 cities in the area during the period of year 2005 through 2015. Accessibility is used as an explanatory variable to reflect the influence of infrastructure on economic development. In order to avoid the endogenous, queen contiguity matrix is used to define the spatial weight matrix. In the paper, the dynamic panel data model is also used to explore the effects of high-speed railways in the whole study area and attempted to confirm the spatial differences among Heilongjiang Province, Jilin Province, and Liaoning Province. /e results show that the high-speed railways increase the cities’ connection in terms of accessibility, and a significant positive spillover effect exists after the con- struction of high-speed railways (HSR), indicating the extensive economic benefits of HSR construction, despite of the overall economic difficulty experienced by this region. 1. Introduction growth rate [6]. Many believe that this region’s over-reliance on natural resources and heavy industry is the main con- China has developed dramatically in the past few decades, tributing factor [7]. Seeing the success of the east coast, the with an average 10% growth rate over the past 30 years [1]. Chinese central government started a series of policies to However, the development is geographically unbalanced stimulate the economy of the Northeast region. One of these especially between the east coast and the inland area [2]. key policies was to invest in infrastructure and expand public Several reasons may have contributed to this phenomenon: transportation especially the high-speed rail (HSR) in this first, most economic policies implemented by the central region. It was expected that public transportation enables to government favor cities in coastal areas; second, the east serve larger markets much more economically to make the coast enjoys great locational advantage [3], and its acces- market potential enlarged [8]. /e enhanced market po- sibility to both inland resources and ports makes it attractive tential increases cities connectivity caused by transportation in the global economy [4]; third, the development of systems [9]. transportation infrastructure in this region may have played Historically, the northeast region had reasonably good a key role in enabling the spatial spillover of economic transportation infrastructure. /e Chinese Eastern Railway development and hence agglomeration, implying further helps carry the trade flow between China and Russia and industrial and population clustering [5]. promoted the regional economy. /e T-shaped line con- In contrast, the economic development in Northeast sisted of three branches of railways: the western branch, China has fallen behind. As the old base of heavy industrial, referring to the Harbin-Manzhouli Railway, the eastern the northeast region has suffered from population loss and branch, now the Harbin-Suifenhe Railway, and the southern very low (and even negative in recent years) economic branch, which has become a part of the Beijing-Harbin 2 Complexity Railway [10]. /e proposed HSR under this stimulation change of shortened travel time and reduced cost, which policy, the Harbin-Dalian (Ha-Da) HSR, was built along this enhances the accessibility [29,30]. And, the accessibility Chinese Eastern Railway. /e total length of this HSR is 921 always represents the location endowment of a city in one kilometers with 24 stations, connecting 9 main cities in the region transport network [31]. /en, once the location region. /is HSR began its construction phase on August 23, endowment is enhanced by developed transportation ways, 2007, and was put into operation on December 1, 2012. it must prosper the economic growth effects. Some empirical However, some research explored that Harbin-Dalian results explain the mechanisms and process [32]. HSR has positive effects on the tourism industry [11], but the economic development in the northeast region did not seem to show any clear trend of improvement after the operation 2.2. Spatial Spillover. With the infrastructure development, of HSR. Doubt had been casted on the effect of infrastructure the unbalanced development of different areas caused by investment in such an economically difficult region. /e transport infrastructure such as HSR will cause externality purpose of this paper is thus to examine the effect of HSR on on economy [33]. Many studies have attempted to quantity the regional economy considering the influence of other the spatial spillover effects of infrastructure since 1980s factors at the same time. /ere has been no lacking of studies [34–36]. /e spatial spillover elasticity of railway investment on the effect of HSR in developed countries or regions. was usually found positive [37–39]. /e spillover impact of Nonetheless, its effect on economically challenging regions transport infrastructure stock was estimated by using spatial has been rarely investigate. By disentangling the effects of econometrics models and it was found the spillover effects of various factors, this paper identifies the effect of HSR and transport infrastructure existed at both national and regional assesses the influence of the stimulation policy in a quan- level [40]. Arbues´ et al. analyzed the spatial productivity of titatively rigorous way. transportation infrastructure in 47 Spanish provinces and provided strong evidence demonstrating the positive effects 2. Literature Review of road infrastructure projects on private economy [8]. Comber et al. suggested that accessibility could be used to 2.1. Measurement of Transportation Conditions: Accessibility. measure the spillover effects of transport infrastructure [41]. /e transportation condition can be measured in different However, not all spillovers imply positive effects on econ- ways. Some simplified metrics are the number or density of omy [42,43]. Negative spillover effects were indicated in the road segments, intersections, and stations. /e more so- central region of China in 1991–2000 [40]. Moreno and phisticated approach, which has been adopted by many Lopez-Bazo investigated the economic returns of trans- studies, is the index of accessibility. Hansen came up with portation investment and found negative spillovers across the traditional definition of accessibility as the potential for Spanish areas [44]. In terms of methodology, spatial opportunities of interaction [12]. Accessibility was defined as econometric modeling is the main approach used to quantify the convenience level that activities could be reached from spatial spillover effects. Literature can be found in finance, one place by using some transport services [13]. Over years, geography, economy, and environment [45–49]. Re- accessibility has become a main metric measuring social and searchers also explored the spatial dynamic panel data economic development in one region [14]. Many researchers models to analyze variables lagged in space, in time, or in regard accessibility as a concept of interaction activities both space and time [50]. [15–17]. Some popular definitions of accessibility are the Beijing-Shanghai HSR runs through China’s two most weighted travel time, daily accessibility, and potential values important economic zones (Yangtze River Delta and Bei- [18,19]. Generally, accessibility calculation approaches jing-Tianjin-Hebei region). /e population along this rail- mainly based on time or potential especially in the field of way covers more than a quarter of the national population. economy and connection between cities [20–22]. /e time /e core cities are often the gathering places of high-income cost method is used in the field of microperspective mostly groups and the demand for fast transportation is very high. in one city, such as job accessibility or healthy accessibility In contrast, some intermediate-node cities with lower [21,23–25]. Market potential is commonly used to be as an economic levels have much lower demand for fast trans- accessibility indicator from an economic perspective which portation than core cities. Moreover, in order to maintain is analyzing cities’ correlation related to the mass of desti- high-speed operation, the number of high-speed rail stations nation and inversely proportional to the distance and travel is relatively small compared to ordinary railways, and most time [1]. Another method to calculate accessibility is in the of them are in cities with high demand for fast traffic. HSR synthetical perspective, time, cost, mass, and even price cost