Research on the Identification and Spatial Optimization Strategies of Dunhuang's Attractive Territorial Space

CHEN Tianhao¹, FANG Haozhou²

¹ School of Architecture and Urban Planning, Suzhou University of Science and Technology, Suzhou 215011, Jiangsu, China
² Gansu Guancheng Planning and Design Research Co., Ltd., Lanzhou 730070, Gansu, China

Abstract

Research on attractive territorial space within the framework of national territorial spatial planning represents a crucial pathway for constructing and refining regional spatial patterns in the new era. Investigating its conceptual mechanisms and spatial identification approaches holds significant meaning for enhancing regional cultural confidence, enriching social life, and protecting ecological environments. This study takes Dunhuang City—a typical desert-oasis city in northwestern China—as a case study. By constructing an evaluation index system for identifying Dunhuang's attractive territorial space and employing spatial analysis methods including the grey correlation model, kernel density analysis, and standard deviation ellipse, we comprehensively identify Dunhuang's attractive territorial space and propose spatial development strategies based on the identification results. The findings indicate that: (1) Dunhuang's attractive territorial space exhibits a spatial distribution pattern of "large dispersion, small concentration," characterized by a continuous southeast and dispersed northwest spatial configuration. (2) Dunhuang's existing attractive territorial space is closely related to medium-high density areas, with historical and cultural value serving as the primary evaluation factor influencing existing attractive territorial space. Potentially attractive territorial space shows a positive correlation with low-density areas, where natural ecological value constitutes the main evaluation factor affecting potential attractive territorial space. (3) Dunhuang's attractive territorial space follows an east-west orientation, with the Gobi Desert, oasis water systems, and historical culture exerting the most significant influence. (4) Dunhuang's attractive territorial space has formed a systematic structure of "attractive cities leading development, attractive corridors linking development, and attractive nodes shaped by classification," with six high-quality attractive territorial spaces constituting Dunhuang's high-quality territorial spatial development pattern.

Keywords: attractive territorial space; high quality; existing/potential; spatial identification; spatial optimization strategies; Dunhuang City

Territorial space not only hosts various biological activities but also serves as vital resources for human survival. National territorial spatial planning in the new era represents an important means of integrating comprehensive resources across entire territories and all elements, playing a crucial guiding role in the development, utilization, and protection of resources and environments. Spatial patterns, as representations of regional natural geography, socioeconomic conditions, and resource development and utilization, actively guide and shape territorial space. The 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China proposed "accelerating the construction of a new development pattern and striving to promote high-quality development." In this context, high-quality attractive territorial space not only lays a solid foundation for shaping regional characteristics and promoting high-quality development of regional resources and environments, but also holds great significance for enhancing regional cultural confidence, enriching social life, and maintaining ecological security.

Current research on attractive territorial space remains relatively limited both domestically and internationally, though discussions on high-quality resources and the protection and utilization of regional characteristics are quite extensive. For instance, Japan's sixth national comprehensive development plan integrated broad-area landscape resources and designated 10 "attractive tourist zones." Germany pioneered two rounds of spatial order planning, shifting research focus from resource protection and cultural landscape shaping to land use trade-offs while emphasizing sustainability and proposing an "open space alliance." The United States gradually established a wilderness natural space protection system centered on national park systems, providing institutional guarantees for sustainable resource development and utilization. Chinese research on attractive space originated from attractive cities, subsequently deriving attractive landscape spaces, suburban attractive areas, and characteristic attractive landscape zones that represent regional spatial strategies characterized by single elements. With the establishment of the national territorial spatial planning system, a comprehensive, all-element perspective provides new approaches for attractive space research. Li et al. elaborated on the concept of attractive territorial space, proposing a "point-line-area" construction approach and providing adjustment strategies and focal points at macro, meso, and micro scales, offering a pathway for domestic research. Zhang Zhixin constructed an identification index system for attractive territorial space based on four types of space—historical culture, natural ecology, agricultural production, and production-residence integration—and identified the attractive territorial space of Jilin City, forming a "point-line-area" attractive territorial space. Zhu et al. employed a "charm evaluation-charm space identification" approach to identify the attractive space of Jiuzhaigou County, identifying five types of natural attractive elements including lakes, waterfalls, beaches, and snow-capped mountains, as well as five types of cultural attractive elements including characteristic villages and architecture, obtaining Jiuzhaigou's attractive territorial space through spatial overlay. In summary, international research emphasizes the protection, utilization, and sustainable management of core natural resources but lacks comprehensive, all-element layout. Domestic research on attractive territorial space has gradually transitioned from single-element characteristics to comprehensive, all-element spatial studies within the national territorial spatial planning context, yet has not formed a scientific theoretical foundation for identification, lacks a support system for regional attractive territorial space optimization and guidance, and requires enrichment of identification methods and content.

1.1 Connotation

The ancient meaning of "charm" (魅力) is "extremely attractive power." Contemporary academia explores its connotation primarily from sociological, economic, and psychological perspectives. The charm studied in this paper is mainly materialized through physical resources and expressed through geographical space—namely, attractive space. Charm essentially represents value and attractiveness, which are interdependent and inseparable. In geography, value typically manifests as tangible and intangible value: tangible value is carried by physical spaces such as oases and deserts, while intangible value is carried by non-physical spaces such as history and culture. Attractiveness is generally divided into intrinsic emotions (e.g., feelings, beliefs) and external materials (e.g., scenic spots, cultural relics protection units), creating appeal through their own characteristics and connotations. As an embodiment of value and sublimation of attractiveness, charm is represented at the material level through attractive resources, forming attractive space in geographical space, and deriving both existing attractive space and potential attractive space, which together constitute attractive territorial space (Figure 1). Attractive territorial space refers to the portion of national space that naturally exists or has been artificially transformed (constructed) during specific historical stages, within certain regional scopes, cognitive levels, and supply-demand contexts, providing functional support for biological habitation and human survival and development, and being recognized and perceived by humans as having good value and appeal. High-quality attractive territorial space further refines the highest-value elements among natural, historical, cultural, social, and other factors, forming higher recognition and appeal, and playing a leading and driving role in regional patterns.

1.2 Research Framework

Located in the desert region of northwestern China, Dunhuang was once a Silk Road post station and a world civilization exchange center. Its desertified areas and arid environment have enabled its preservation. Through vicissitudes, it transformed from a commercial hub to a defensive town on China's western frontier, declining for a time, until the "Belt and Road" initiative once again endowed it with the role of a cultural exchange hub, making cultural convergence and spatial reconstruction key issues in Dunhuang's attractive territorial space research. This study takes Dunhuang's municipal territory as the research area, combines regional characteristics, and constructs an evaluation index system for Dunhuang's attractive territorial space from the value dimensions of historical and cultural value, natural ecological value, and resource influence value. It comprehensively and accurately identifies Dunhuang's attractive territorial space and, guided by high-quality development, refines and integrates it into high-quality attractive territorial space, proposing corresponding optimization and development strategies. This aims to provide spatial carrier guidance for Dunhuang's cultural re-prosperity, spatial re-creation, and charm re-emergence, while offering theoretical support for identifying attractive territorial space in desertification areas.

Based on Dunhuang's natural geographical pattern, historical and cultural characteristics, and historical development context, combined with the delineation and shaping of Dunhuang's "production-living-ecological" space under the national territorial spatial planning background, this paper divides Dunhuang's attractive territorial space into three major types: cultural attractive space, production attractive space, and ecological attractive space. Through the research pathway of "combing fundamentals, identifying space, shaping patterns, and determining strategies," it studies Dunhuang's attractive territorial space and constructs a basic思路 for an attractive territorial space pattern of "city (point) - corridor (line) - area (area)," forming three major attractive areas in Dunhuang—cultural, agricultural, and ecological. According to the characteristics of various spaces, it proposes classified development strategies (Figure 2).

2.1 Study Area Overview

Dunhuang is located in the inland desert area of northwestern China, at the junction of Gansu, Qinghai, and Xinjiang provinces. Geologically, it belongs to the western end of the Hexi Corridor depression zone and the southern margin of the Tarim Plateau. Its colorful natural foundation creates its "grand view garden" landform. Its unique location and geographical pattern have made it a convergence center for diverse cultures including religious art, Silk Road commerce, and frontier military culture.

2.2.1 Data Sources

The data involved in this study mainly include two types: vector spatial data and non-vector data. Vector spatial data primarily consist of resource points, including cultural relics protection units, natural geographical location data, and other tourist attractions. Non-vector data mainly include statistical data, resource distribution and characteristic description data, and tourist evaluation data. Sources are detailed in Table 1.

2.2.2 Construction of the Attractive Territorial Space Index System

To objectively present the natural, ecological, historical, and cultural values of Dunhuang's attractive resources, indicator selection follows scientific, objective, authentic, and accessible principles. Based on previous research and combined with Dunhuang's actual resource endowments and historical and cultural characteristics, and revised through expert consultation and the Delphi method, the final evaluation index system for Dunhuang's attractive territorial space was formed by selecting 12 sub-indicators from three dimensions: natural ecological value, historical and cultural value, and resource influence value. Since all indicators selected in this paper play positive roles in shaping Dunhuang's attractive space, all evaluation indicators are positive indicators. The evaluation index system is shown in Table 2.

This study takes Dunhuang's municipal territory as the research scope and attractive resource points as the basic evaluation units. Based on their value classification and attractiveness type, attractive resources are divided into existing attractive resources and potential attractive resources. Through data collection and web-based big data mining, 84 existing attractive resource points and 114 potential resource points were obtained. Existing attractive resources include national, provincial, and county-level scenic spots, forest parks, geological parks, exhibition halls, museums, and cultural relics protection units. Potential attractive resources include mountains, valleys, forests, and cultural relics protection units without grades or undeveloped status. Using the constructed evaluation index system, each resource point is graded and classified into 5 levels, with values assigned according to the value level of the resource type to obtain the classification results of attractive resource points (Table 3).

2.3.1 Improved Grey Correlation Model

In this study of attractive territorial space, to ensure the objectivity and authenticity of identification results while maintaining public recognition and acceptance, an improved grey correlation model is used for weight assignment. The grey correlation model overcomes traditional subjective weighting by determining weights through mathematical models. However, conventional grey correlation models suffer from excessive randomness and uncertainty in indicator weight determination. The improved grey correlation model for solving indicator weights can overcome the influence of decision-maker subjectivity, making the weight results for attractive territorial space evaluation more scientific and objective. The specific improved algorithm steps are as follows:

First, construct and standardize the original matrix data. Second, calculate the distance between each indicator sequence X_i (i = 1, 2, ..., n) and the optimal vector, using the formula:

D_i = |X_i - W| (1)

Third, calculate the weight of each indicator using the formula:

w_i = 1/D_i (2)

Finally, calculate the normalized weight of each indicator using the formula:

w*_i = w_i / Σw_i (3)

2.3.2 Kernel Density Analysis Method

Kernel density is a relevant measure reflecting the spatial clustering characteristics of point sets. This paper estimates the agglomeration and influence degree of Dunhuang's attractive resource points and their neighbors using the kernel density analysis tool in ArcGIS. It performs kernel density analysis on different types of attractive resource points, using the standard deviation stretch method for classification with a bandwidth (h) value set to 10,000. The identification results of attractive territorial space are graded using the natural breaks method. The calculation formula for kernel density analysis of attractive resource points is as follows:

f_n(x) = 1/(nh²) Σ K((x - X_i)/h) (4)

where f_n(x) is the kernel density estimate value; K is the kernel function; n is the number of attractive resource points; h is the bandwidth, determined by the distance between attractive resource points; x is a certain attractive resource point; and X_i is the distance from x to other attractive resource points.

2.3.3 Standard Deviation Ellipse

The standard deviation ellipse is a spatial statistical method representing spatial differences and distribution characteristics of attractive resource points. This paper uses it to reflect the gravity center distribution and movement trends of attractive resources. The ellipse center reflects the main agglomeration location of attractive resources, the ellipse rotation angle reflects the main trend direction of spatial distribution, and the long and short axes reflect the dispersion degree of attractive resources in different directions. The calculation formulas are as follows:

SDE_x = √(Σ(x_i - x̄)²/n) (5)
SDE_y = √(Σ(y_i - ȳ)²/n) (6)
tan θ = (Σ(x_i - x̄)(y_i - ȳ)) / (Σ(x_i - x̄)² - Σ(y_i - ȳ)²) (7)

where x_i and y_i are the coordinates of each attractive resource point; x̄ and ȳ are the mean center coordinates; SDE_x and SDE_y are the standard deviation distances in the x and y directions; and θ is the ellipse rotation angle.

3.1.1 Distribution Characteristics of Existing Attractive Territorial Space

Existing attractive territorial space is obtained by overlaying three types of spaces: existing natural ecology, historical culture, and resource influence (Figure 4). From the perspective of existing natural ecological value (Figure 4a), high-density areas are distributed near Dunhuang's central urban area at the Mingsha Mountain-Yueya Spring scenic area, the Yangguan National Nature Reserve to the southwest, and the Xihu National Nature Reserve and Yadan National Geopark to the northwest—primarily natural ecological areas. Among these, the natural landscape value factor has the highest influence, with a maximum kernel density of 4.21. From the perspective of existing historical and cultural value (Figure 4b), high-density areas are relatively dispersed, mainly representing existing historical and cultural areas such as the Mogao Grottoes, Xuanquanzhi, and Yumen Pass, as well as cultural relics protection units from various periods, reflecting Dunhuang's existing historical and cultural value. The historical and cultural value factor has the highest influence, with a maximum kernel density of 3.84. From the perspective of existing resource influence value (Figure 4c), Dunhuang's 5A-level scenic spots serve as the main domestic and international resource influence sources, with the crowd perception factor having the highest influence and a maximum kernel density of 3.12. Dunhuang's existing attractive territorial space is closely related to medium-high density areas, with historical and cultural value being the main evaluation factor affecting existing attractive territorial space, indicating that Dunhuang's attractive pattern primarily relies on already developed and utilized territorial space whose distribution is closely connected to human activities and socioeconomic evolution.

Dunhuang's existing attractive territorial space shows concentrated distribution characteristics. Attractive spaces formed by existing attractive resource points are mainly distributed in Dunhuang's central urban area, Yangguan Town, and along the Dang River, forming tourism belts, with a small portion distributed along the Shule River. Existing attractive territorial space exhibits two spatial distribution characteristics: first, existing attractive spaces along the Dang River and Shule River lines indicate that existing attractive spaces are closely related to water resource distribution and human behavioral activities; second, human activity historical attractive spaces centered on Dunhuang's 5A-level scenic spots, cultural relics protection units, and various historical sites demonstrate that Dunhuang's existing attractive spaces have changed with the prosperity and decline of Dunhuang's social economy over time.

3.1.2 Distribution Characteristics of Potential Attractive Territorial Space

Potential attractive territorial space is obtained by overlaying potential natural ecological value, potential historical and cultural value, and potential resource influence value (Figure 5). From the perspective of potential natural ecological value (Figure 5a), the Shule River and Dang River lines are the main ecological corridors, surrounded by rich natural ecological elements. The Shazhou urban area relies on oasis resource advantages, with numerous potentially undeveloped natural ecological elements surrounding it. The natural landscape value factor has the highest influence, with a maximum kernel density of 2.31. From the perspective of potential historical and cultural value (Figure 5b), Dunhuang's potential historical and cultural value areas are mainly distributed around Dunhuang's central urban area, Yangguan Town, and along the Shule River, with relatively broad spatial distribution. The main types are unannounced cultural relics protection units and ancient buildings and tombs with long histories, where the historical and cultural value factor has the highest influence and a maximum kernel density of 1.98. From the perspective of potential resource influence value (Figure 5c), Dunhuang's potential resource influence value areas are concentrated in the central urban area, Yangguan Town, and along the Dang River, while the geoparks and nature reserves in the northwest are potential resource influence distribution areas. The crowd perception factor has the highest influence, with a maximum kernel density of 1.76. Potential attractive territorial space shows a positive correlation with low-density areas of attractive territorial space, with natural ecological value being the main evaluation factor affecting potential attractive territorial space, indicating that the desert natural ecological landscapes formed by Dunhuang's special geography and climate still have considerable development potential.

Dunhuang's potential attractive territorial space is generally dispersed and widely distributed, indicating high development potential. Most attractive spaces that can be recognized and familiar to humans have not yet been excavated. Attractive spaces formed by potential attractive resource points are mainly distributed in the southeastern part of Dunhuang's central urban area, along the Shule River, and in Yangguan Town.

3.1.3 Spatial Pattern of Dunhuang's Attractive Territorial Space

Based on the evaluation results of existing and potential attractive spaces, Dunhuang's attractive territorial space evaluation results are obtained through comprehensive overlay analysis (Figure 6). After reclassifying the results using the natural breaks method into five levels, the identification results of Dunhuang's attractive territorial space are obtained. Overall, Dunhuang's attractive territorial space exhibits a "large dispersion, small concentration" spatial distribution pattern, presenting a spatial configuration of southeast continuity and northwest dispersion. Medium-high density areas are mainly the core desert oasis areas of Dunhuang's central urban area, northwestern Mogao Town, and northern Yueya Spring Town, where attractive territorial spaces are interconnected and spatial agglomeration effects are significant. Low-density areas are mainly scattered desertification regions with potential value in northern Dunhuang, where attractive territorial spaces are relatively discrete with long spatial distances and insignificant spatial agglomeration effects.

According to the resource types of attractive resource points, existing attractive resource points are divided into natural resources, cultural resources, cultural relics protection units, and tourist attractions. Potential attractive resource points are divided into cultural relics protection units, mountain valleys, water resources, and Gobi deserts. Each resource type is assigned values based on its value potential and attractiveness degree to obtain Dunhuang's attractive resource point classification system. Using the standard deviation ellipse based on this classification system, the spatial direction and central distribution of Dunhuang's attractive territorial space are obtained (Figure 7). In terms of ellipse area, the standard deviation ellipse area of existing attractive resources is smaller than that of potential attractive resources overall, indicating higher spatial agglomeration of existing attractive resources. In terms of ellipse axes and rotation angle, Dunhuang's attractive space mainly follows an east-west orientation, where the standard deviation ellipses of Gobi desert attractive space, water resource attractive space, and cultural relics protection attractive space have the strongest summarizing ability for Dunhuang's attractive territorial space, indicating that Dunhuang's attractive space is most influenced by Gobi deserts, oasis water systems, and historical culture.

3.1.4 Identification of Dunhuang's Attractive Territorial Space

Based on the analysis of Dunhuang's attractive territorial space pattern, combined with evaluation factors and perspectives of natural resource endowments, historical and cultural value, and social and economic development, a multi-level spatial development system of points, lines, and areas for Dunhuang's attractive territorial space is proposed. This forms an attractive territorial space system structure of "attractive cities leading development, attractive corridors linking development, and attractive nodes shaped by classification" (Figure 8). Based on the identification results and relying on Dunhuang's three major patterns of attractive space, historical and cultural protection, and tourism development, high-value resources that can represent Dunhuang's characteristics are selected as the construction core. According to the value and attractiveness of natural, historical, cultural, and social elements in the formation process of attractive territorial space, existing spaces are refined, integrated, and optimized to ultimately form six high-quality attractive territorial spaces with Dunhuang's characteristics: Mogao Reverence, Moon Spring Sand Ridge, Eternal Yangguan, Yumen Solitary Pass, Magic Yadan, and Nanquan Wild Fun (Figure 8; Table 6).

3.2.1 Mogao Reverence High-Quality Attractive Territorial Space

The Mogao Reverence high-quality attractive territorial space consists of the Mogao Grottoes key protection area, general protection area, and Sanwei Mountain scenic area. It is adjacent to the Mingsha Mountain-Yueya Spring scenic area to the west, borders the Mogao area to the north, and faces the Shazhou Prefecture City to the northwest. The spatial development strategy should first strictly protect the core area of the grottoes, then excavate the Buddhist cultural value of Sanwei Mountain, rely on the foundation of Mogao Town, combine the digital center and the "See Dunhuang Again" performance project, and enhance the area's style with Silk Road culture as the theme.

3.2.2 Moon Spring Sand Ridge High-Quality Attractive Territorial Space

The Moon Spring Sand Ridge high-quality attractive territorial space uses the Mingsha Mountain-Yueya Spring Scenic Area as its spatial carrier. Relying on the existing tourist attractions, it should improve the quality of core area infrastructure and service quality, while connecting surrounding homestays, Leiyin Temple, Dunhuang History Expo Park, and other scenic spots to form a Dunhuang desert city leisure resort area. In terms of tourism experience, it should strengthen innovation in desert sports products and add leisure products such as desert exploration, convalescence, vacation, and performances.

3.2.3 Eternal Yangguan High-Quality Attractive Territorial Space

The Eternal Yangguan high-quality attractive territorial space consists of Yangguan ruins, Yangguan Museum, Wowo Pool Wetland Park, Shouchang ruins, and Yemawan Natural Scenic Area. It is a high-quality attractive territorial space integrating frontier culture situational experience and oasis leisure vacation. The development focus relies on the museum to deeply excavate military cultural connotations and strengthen living inheritance and situational experience.

3.2.4 Yumen Solitary Pass High-Quality Attractive Territorial Space

The Yumen Solitary Pass high-quality attractive territorial space consists of Yumen Pass scenic area, Han Dynasty Great Wall ruins, beacon towers, Hecang City, and large and small square plate cities. It is a high-quality attractive territorial space integrating frontier culture memory and desert ecological wild fun. Spatial development should center on protective excavation, excavating frontier ruins and Silk Road culture, transforming heritage into experiential, research-based, and visitable tourism products, strengthening creative display, and improving supporting facilities such as tourism distribution, vacation, and catering to enhance service functions.

3.2.5 Magic Yadan High-Quality Attractive Territorial Space

The Magic Yadan high-quality attractive territorial space consists of Yadan National Geopark linked with other Yadan groups in Lop Nur and the Gobi Desert, forming a world-class geological theme exploration and vacation high-quality attractive space. In the tourism area outside the core protection zone, it should add characteristic leisure, sports, research, camping, photography, and other themed, experiential leisure and vacation projects to enhance the attractiveness and interest of Yadan scenic tourism. Based on traditional scenic tours, it should increase technological tour innovation and improve the comprehensive service quality of Yadan scenic area.

3.2.6 Nanquan Wild Fun High-Quality Attractive Territorial Space

The Nanquan Wild Fun high-quality attractive territorial space mainly consists of the Shule River, Nanquan Wetland Nature Reserve, Halahu, poplar forests, and Han Dynasty Great Wall ruins. The ancient Silk Road river channel connects oases, serving both as an ecological barrier and a migratory bird station. Nanquan Wetland is the core ecological area of Dunhuang's tourism ring line. Development priorities include strict wetland protection, ecological restoration, and public welfare activities; adding Silk Road-style post stations and viewing platforms; and laying out themed camps along the river to reproduce Silk Road customs.

4 Discussion

This paper identifies Dunhuang's attractive territorial space based on its connotation, which closely aligns with Dunhuang's territorial spatial pattern and provides a theoretical basis for its territorial spatial system construction and attractive space identification, demonstrating certain innovation and breakthrough. The main manifestations include: innovatively defining the connotation of attractive territorial space, starting from the value and attractiveness inherent in the term "charm," deeply analyzing the essence of attractive territorial space, dividing it into existing and potential categories with attractive resources as carriers, covering all spatial types, highlighting resource spatial attributes, and guiding the determination of evaluation indicators; innovating identification methods and research思路 by establishing an evaluation index system through conceptual definition and interpretation, using kernel density analysis and standard deviation ellipse spatial analysis methods to identify Dunhuang's attractive territorial space, and refining and integrating it into Dunhuang's high-quality attractive territorial space according to high-quality development requirements, Dunhuang's regional characteristics, and various spatial protection and development patterns. The identification methods and research思路 are relatively novel, and the identification results are relatively accurate, holding great significance for shaping regional territorial spatial characteristics and promoting high-quality development of regional resources and environments.

Although this paper demonstrates certain innovation and breakthrough, the following issues remain for discussion: First, regarding the identification index system. The constructed attractive territorial space index system has not yet evaluated urban development limiting factors (such as accessibility of transportation and other infrastructure, provision of public service facilities) and spatial control factors (such as ecological protection red lines and permanent basic farmland protection red lines), resulting in certain deviations in the identification results of attractive territorial space. Second, regarding the temporal dimension. Attractive territorial space is not only an important component of the current national territorial spatial planning system but also an important spatial composition formed by the integration and shaping of historical development stages and future development guidance. Therefore, the spatiotemporal pattern evolution and future development prediction of attractive territorial space will be future research priorities. The above discussions provide a theoretical foundation and spatial guidance for high-quality urban territorial spatial and socioeconomic development and urban charm quality improvement.

5 Conclusions

1) Overall, Dunhuang's attractive territorial space exhibits a "large dispersion, small concentration" spatial distribution pattern, presenting a spatial configuration of southeast continuity and northwest dispersion. Medium-high density areas are mainly the core desert oasis areas of Dunhuang's central urban area, northwestern Mogao Town, and northern Yueya Spring Town, where attractive territorial spaces are interconnected and spatial agglomeration effects are significant. Low-density areas are mainly scattered desertification regions with potential value in northern Dunhuang, where attractive territorial spaces are relatively discrete with long spatial distances and insignificant spatial agglomeration effects.

2) Regarding evaluation factors, Dunhuang's existing attractive territorial space is closely related to medium-high density areas, with historical and cultural value being the main evaluation factor affecting existing attractive territorial space. Potentially attractive territorial space shows a positive correlation with low-density areas, with natural ecological value being the main evaluation factor affecting potentially attractive territorial space.

3) Regarding identification results, Dunhuang's attractive territorial space follows an east-west orientation, where the standard deviation ellipses of Gobi desert attractive space, water resource attractive space, and cultural relics protection attractive space have the strongest summarizing ability for Dunhuang's attractive territorial space. Dunhuang's attractive territorial space has formed a systematic structure of "attractive cities leading development, attractive corridors linking development, and attractive nodes shaped by classification," with six high-quality attractive territorial spaces constituting Dunhuang's high-quality territorial spatial development pattern.

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