Analysis of the Effectiveness of Urban Land-Use-Change Models Based on the Measurement of Spatio-Temporal, Dynamic Urban Growth: A Cellular Automata Case Study

Yilun Liu, Yueming Hu, Shaoqiu Long, Luo Liu and Xiaoping Liu
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Yilun Liu: College of Natural Resources and Environment, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Yueming Hu: College of Natural Resources and Environment, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Shaoqiu Long: College of Natural Resources and Environment, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Luo Liu: College of Natural Resources and Environment, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
Xiaoping Liu: School of Geography and Planning, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China

Sustainability, 2017, vol. 9, issue 5, 1-15

Abstract: Developing countries have been undergoing dramatic urban growth over the past three decades. It is essential to understand and simulate the urban growth process for smart urban planning and sustainable development purposes. Cellular automata (CA) modeling is an efficient approach to simulating urban land use/cover change; however, the traditional CA method has limitations in simulating the various urban growth patterns and processes. This study aims to analyze the influences of different urban growth characteristics on the effectiveness of CA modeling by conducting a case study over the area in the Pearl River Delta of Southern China. We used the growth rate, landscape expansion index, and spatial dependency to quantify the urban growth characteristics. The effectiveness of CA modeling was measured through a comparison of the simulation results with the reference data. The simulation results and validation analyses reveal that the traditional CA is not applicable for the following three situations: (1) the urban growth pattern characterized by less growth area or a higher ratio of outlying expansion; (2) the urban region that includes several subregions with disparate growth characteristics; and (3) the existence of temporal differences in growth characteristics over a long period.

Keywords: landscape expansion index; cellular automata; logistic CA; urban growth; Pearl River Delta (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

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