美国数学建模优秀论文.docVIP

Applying Voronoi Diagrams to the Redistricting Problem May 10, 2007 Abstract Gerrymandering is an issue plaguing legislative redistricting resulting from inade-quate regulation. Here, we present a novel approach to the redistricting problem, an approach that uses a state’s population distribution to draw the legislative bound-aries. Our method utilizes Voronoi and population-weighted Voronoiesque diagrams, and was chosen for the simplicity of the generated partition:Voronoi regions are con-tiguous, compact, and simple to generate. We found regions drawn with Voronoiesque diagrams attained small population variance and relative geometric simplicity. As a concrete example, we applied our methods to partition New York state. Since New York must be divided into 29legislative districts, each receives roughly 3.44%of the population. Our Voronoiesque diagram method generated 29regions with an average population of (3. 34±0. 74%.We discuss several re?nements that could be made to the methods presented which may result in smaller population variation between re-gions while maintaining the simplicity of the regions and objectivity of the method. Finally, we provide a short statement that could be issued to the voters of New York state to explain our method and justify its fairness to them. 1 Team 1034Page 2of 21 Contents 1Introduction 4 1.1Current Models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 1.2Developing Our Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 2Notation and De?nitions 5 3Theoretical Evaluation of our Model 6 4Method Description 7 4.1Voronoi Diagrams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 4.1.1Useful Features of Voronoi Diagrams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 4.2Voronoiesque Diagrams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 4.3Determining Generator Points Using Population Density Distributions . . . 9 4.4Procedure for Creating Regions using Voronoi and Voronoies