Abstract
Cities and towns in developing countries are experiencing an unplanned and uncontrolled development known as urban sprawl. This research examines urban sprawl in Awka metropolis, between 1986 and 2016. Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper (TM) of 1986, Landsat Enhanced Thematic Mapper plus (ETM+) data of the year 2000 and Enhanced Thematic Mapper plus (ETM+) 2016 were used for this study. Geographic Information System was employed for the analysis of the data. Result showed that Awka metropolis witnessed a remarkable growth between 1986 and 2016 from mere 3444.48 Km2 in 1986 to about 11,452.46 Km2 in 2016. This growth contributed to the sharp decline in farmland from 25,500.51 km2 (19.13%) in 1986 to 17,848.44 km2 (13.60%) in 2000 and further declined to 10,037.07 km2 (10.01%) in 2016. Bare surfaces witnessed an increase over the years of this study. This increase is as a result of clearing of natural vegetation for urban development, thereby exposing the land to direct contact with rainfall, leading to gully erosion in the area. Light vegetation also witnessed a sharp decreased from (38.53%) in 1986 to (8.53%) in 2000. It further decreased (8.53%) to (4.62%) in 2016. Therefore, increase in population led to the increase in urban sprawl in the study area. The study recommends that there is a need for a regular monitoring of urban sprawl and development in the study area by the state government especially with the aid of geospatial techniques for better decision making.
Highlights
Cities and towns in developing countries are experiencing rapid population growth and uncontrolled development known as urban sprawl
The results show that the urban growth of Awka metropolis varied with time and class of land use, while in 1986 and 2000 the growth rate is little, it became higher between 2000 and 2016 due to the population increase and development brought about creation of the new state capital
The period of thirty (30) years from 1986 to 2016 witnessed considerable increase in population in the study area, this can be inferred from the fact that the land area covered by built-up area, comprising of residential, commercial, industrial and institutional land uses are on the increase, thereby affecting other land use/cover categories
Summary
Cities and towns in developing countries are experiencing rapid population growth and uncontrolled development known as urban sprawl. For the first time in history the urban population of the world has outnumbered the rural population (Badiane, 2006) [1]. This epochal transition occurred mostly in Africa and other developing countries of Latin America and Asia. The world has urbanized faster than originally predicted by T.R. Malthus (1978) [2]. In 1950, there were 86 cities in the world with a population of more than one million (Badiane, 2006) [1]
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