Importance of Land Use Maps in Statistical Studies of Urban Mobility Based on Signaling Information Provided by Mobile Devices

The study emphasizes the importance of land use maps in the calculation of statistical indicators from urban mobility studies, based on the signaling of mobile equipment in a mobile phone network. In the restrictive context of the GDPR, the introduction of land use maps in the process of statistical analysis of urban mobility becomes important and helps to distribute mobile network users who have signaled in an administrative territorial unit as close as possible to reality. The study found that, in some cases, it is necessary to use different types of land use maps for an area that is part of an administrative territorial unit, depending on the time of day and the social events that take place in the observation interval in which the statistical study of urban mobility is carried out. The study shows the difference between the methods of distributing mobile network users present in an administrative area. From the tests carried out in the study, a significant difference was found between the uniform distribution of mobile network users detected in a territorial administrative unit and the distribution based on the weight of population density given by land use in each area of the territorial administrative unit. Such weighted distributions, used in urban mobility statistical studies, can bring an advantage in business decision-making by large retailers, marketing agencies, as well as local authorities in planning public transport networks.