The effective protection and utilization of historical and cultural heritage in urban and rural areas are increasingly gaining public attention. Constructing a continuous and complete heritage spatial network is an important means for achieving holistic protection and utilization of heritage, and it is also a crucial approach to enhancing the overall connectivity of regional culture. How to construct a cultural heritage corridor is of great significance to the comprehensive protection of cultural heritage in historic urban areas. This study takes the cultural heritage of Tianjin’s historical urban areas as an example, uses the Minimum Cumulative Resistance (MCR) and Gravity Model (GM) to construct a cultural heritage corridor, and evaluates its suitability. This research enriches the theory of heritage conservation, aims to enhance the connectivity and integrity of cultural heritage, and provides a new perspective for the integrated development of regional culture and tourism in the process of activation and utilization.

Taking the traditional fort-type settlements in Shaanxi as the research object, quantitative research methods such as K-means clustering algorithm, correlation analysis, density analysis, and nearest neighbor index are used to study their spatial distribution, formation causes, and cluster characteristics. The objective of the study is to break through the geographical limitations of fort-type settlements research and to explore the scientific methods of classifying and analyzing traditional fort-type settlements. The conclusions are: (1) The results of cluster analysis show that the fort-type settlements in Shaanxi can be divided into three categories; (2) The overall distribution of fort-type settlements in Shaanxi shows multi-point aggregation, and contains both point and linear aggregation distribution; (3) There are four typical cluster systems among the traditional fort-type settlements in Shaanxi; (4) The factors that have the greatest influence on the distribution of settlements are construction force, wall masonry, age, fortification purpose, and topographic environment. The article innovatively proposes the "cluster system" perspective and introduces mathematical algorithms and quantitative research methods to study the cluster system of the fort-type Settlements. This approach is feasible and can be applied to other settlement-related studies. At the same time, the perspective of cluster system could be used in heritage conservation, which can contribute to the restoration of architectural relics and systemic conservation on a larger scale.

There are many subjective inferences regarding environment-related studies in modern studies of ancient military defense heritage, and the objective quantitative analysis of citadel site selection and layout has become the key to interpreting the environmental adaptability of citadels under defense strategies. Based on this, it has been proposed in this research that the site selection of ancient military citadels in a specific region (Zhejiang) has environmental adaptability characteristics. Firstly, an elevated hydrological overlay model was established by predicting and graphically verifying the ancient hydrological thresholds through geospatial analysis strategies. Secondly, the hydrological and topographical indicators of the regional environment where the military citadel is located were digitally extracted. Finally, correlation and weight influence calculations were performed for different environmental data. The environmental adaptability characteristics of the site layout of the Ming dynasty-era Zhejiang coastal defense military citadel, based on military defense needs, were obtained. In this way, we promote digital technology for the excavation, conservation and sustainable use of heritage resources.

Defensive capability is one of the essential attributes of traditional military settlements. In the Ming dynasty, coastal Wei fort was the one of the most functionally complex and wide-ranging fortifications in the military defense system of China. Because many factors affect their defensive capacities, including three dimensions: individual construction, synergistic links, and regional jurisdiction, it is not easy to compare different settlements’ defensive capacities or to judge the degrees of different factors’ influences. Through principal component analysis, this study determines the weights of each minor factor. It constructs a model for evaluating traditional Chinese military settlements’ defensive capabilities, to quantify the defensive capability. The results show that the synergistic relationship between the settlements, especially settlement accessibility, has the most significant impact on defensive capability, much higher than a single castle's defensive construction. The defensive capability index of the Wei forts in Guangdong is the highest, consistent with the highest rate of victory in the wars fought on the coast during the Ming dynasty. The defensive capacity is directly proportional to the rate of victory, which validates this evaluation model’s soundness. This study not only comprehensively evaluates the coastal Wei forts’ defensive capacity in the Ming Dynasty, but also provides new methods for the quantitative or comparative analysis of military settlements at other temporal and spatial scales.

Photovoltaic (PV) power generation is emerging as a key aspect of the global shift towards a more sustainable energy mix. Nevertheless, existing assessment models predominantly concentrate on predicting the overall capacity of PV power generation, often neglecting temporal dynamics. Drawing upon the urban energy substitution rate, utilization rate, and power supply stability, this study has devised a comprehensive evaluation model for the utilization of distributed photovoltaic systems (SUS). This model integrates the quantification of spatio-temporal features inherent in urban settings and buildings. Using Hohhot city as a case study, this study conducted simulations to analyze how the installation of PV systems affects the electricity consumption patterns across different land plots within the urban core. The study additionally examines how urban planning influences the adoption of PV power, taking into account both the timing of PV power usage and the stage of PV technology development. The evaluation model surpasses the constraints of current urban PV assessments, which primarily emphasize enhancing power generation potential without adequately quantifying supply–demand dynamics or spatial and temporal variations. This breakthrough significantly improves the precision and reliability of assessing the efficiency of distributed PV systems. Its implications extend widely to subsequent comprehensive evaluations of urban PV applications.