Identification of Urban Functional Zones Considering Point of Interest Differences: A Case Study of Nanjing City

ABSTRACT Identification of urban functional zones is of paramount significance to urban planning and construction. Point of Interest (POI) data, a type of geospatial data widely employed in recent years for urban functional zone identification, are often used in urban functional zone identification. However, the variability among different types of POIs is often not explored in existing research. This paper explores a novel approach for identifying urban functional zones that reflects the differential roles of various POIs. This approach involves identifying core POIs that represent significant features within a region and constructing spatial co‐location combinations based on these core POIs to identify urban functional zones. The experimental results demonstrate that this method achieves an accuracy of 90.57% in identifying urban functional zones in Nanjing, outperforming methods that do not consider POI differentiation under similar conditions. By considering and analyzing the differential roles of various POIs in the identification process, this study offers a new perspective for research on urban functional zone identification.