Spatial Spillover Effects of Transport Infrastructure in Chinese New Silk Road Economic Belt

Based on the inner-effect mechanism of transport infrastructure and regional economic growth, this paper builds a specialized spatial weight matrix by utilizing the panel data from 31 provinces in New Silk Road Economic Belt (NSREB) and other areas from 2005 to 2014, and combines with the spatial panel model to analyze the spatial spillover effects of transport infrastructure. According to the analysis, the transport infrastructure plays an obvious lead role in regional economy growth alongside the NSREB, and the economic growth invigorates common development in surrounding regions. In addition, differences were observed among the different transport infrastructure with regard to their influences on regional economic development, as the highway transport affects regional economic growth to a larger degree than railway transport.