Spatial Integration or Isolation? Capturing the Rhythms of Daily Lives Across Neighbourhoods in Helsinki Using Mobile Phone Data

ABSTRACT People's exposure to various social and spatial contexts over time leads to patterns of spatial integration and segregation. While the study of spatial integration has predominantly focused on the location and context of residential neighbourhoods, the emerging activity space approach to segregation argues that it is important to consider people's actual activity locations and mobility. This study builds on both approaches, to provide insights into residential communities' spatial integration over their daily use of urban space. By focussing on the Nordic welfare state context, with its low socioeconomic disparities and deep‐rooted antisegregation policies in Finland, we paid specific attention to the extent to which residents of affluent, mixed, and disadvantaged neighbourhoods exhibit spatial integration over their activity spaces. By combining mobile phone and population register data from the Helsinki Metropolitan Area, we were able to show residential communities' use of urban space hour‐by‐hour on a workday and a weekend day, and its time‐sensitive associations with their neighbourhood‐level socioeconomic characteristics. We found that residents of disadvantaged neighbourhoods are spatially more isolated than residents of affluent and mixed neighbourhoods. Specifically, they spend more time in their own neighbourhood, have more concentrated use of urban space outside their home neighbourhood, and are less exposed to the socially diverse city centre. However, the intergroup differences are more significant at weekends, which highlights the importance of time‐sensitive segregation analysis. Finally, we argue for the need for neighbourhood‐centred integration policies to consider residents' use of urban space both within and beyond their home neighbourhood.