Digital Divide in Riyadh Neighborhoods: A Spatial Analysis

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

The objective of this paper is to use Geographical Information Systems for identifying Digital Divide in Riyadh Neighborhoods, Saudi Arabia. Geo-database was created that includes Streets, Neighborhoods, ICT Access Data and Coverage Map for Riyadh. We used QGIS and overlay for analysis, intersection selected as tool for this paper. The results indicate that after analyzing the use of information communication technology in all regions of the Kingdom it turns that Riyadh, Ash Sharqiyyah and Makkah in average with percentage 50%, While Al Jawf, Al Madinah, and Najran are the least with percentage 42%. Then we focused on Riyadh to analyze the digital divide because it is the capital of Saudi Arabia and occupations the highest percent of communications towers in the KSA due to population density. Regarding coverage of the 4G, the neighborhoods at the center have recorded very high coverage score. While neighborhoods at the edges of the city have low values of coverage score. Same for 3G, it is more intense in the center and the coverage percentage is higher than 4G. For 2G we found it had the highest coverage compared to 3G or 4G