Spatial influence of ICT: locational characteristic of restaurants with online reservation

Abstract

Information and communication technology (ICT) has become a significant consideration for understanding urban space. This study proposes digitally accessible space (DAS) to quantify the influence of ICT on urban space. DAS provides digitally accessed customers (online reservations via mobile devices or web platforms) with obvious incentives over physically accessed customers. Using three fundamental measurements in conventional location theory – density of existing marketplace, accessibility via public transportation, and land use – the entire area of Seoul is stratified into four groups in order of profitable commercial activities. Web-crawled DAS data and existing restaurants in the area are expressed with a location quotient (LQ). Consequently, the measurements indicate that secondary profitable areas commonly possess the largest portion of DAS, which refutes conventional physical feature-based location theory. Finally, this study determined that the manner in which people visit commercial facilities and how restaurants attract customers has become influenced by ICT, which is sufficient to change restaurants’ location decisions. ICT becomes an innovative strategy for independent restaurants to compete in the most beneficial marketplace.