Current and Future Land Use Characters of a National Central City in Eco-Fragile Region—A Case Study in Xi’an City Based on FLUS Model

Dingrao Feng,Yiyu Sun,Min Zhang,Wenkai Bao,Meichen Fu

doi:10.3390/land10030286

Abstract

Land use change plays a key role in terrestrial systems and drives the process of ecological pattern change. It is important to investigate the process of land use change, predict land use patterns, and reveal the characteristics of land use dynamics. In this study, we adopted the Markov model and future land use (FLUS) model to predict the future land use conditions in Xi’an city. Furthermore, we investigated the characteristics of land use change from a novel perspective, i.e., via establishment of a complex network model. This model captured the characteristics of the land use system during different periods. The results indicated that urban expansion and cropland loss played an important role in land use pattern change. The future gravity center of urban development moved along the opposite direction to that from 2000 to 2015 in Xi’an city. Although the rate of urban expansion declined in the future, urban expansion remained the primary driver of land use change. The primary urban development directions were east-southeast (ENE), north-northeast (NNE) and west-southwest (WSW) from 1990 to 2000, 2000 to 2015, and 2015 to 2030, respectively. In fact, cropland played a vital role in land use dynamics regarding all land use types, and the stability of the land use system decreased in the future. Our study provides future land use patterns and a novel perspective to better understand land use change.

Highlights

Land use change plays a vital role in terrestrial systems, which partly or completely alter the land surface properties of the original ecosystem [1,2,3]
We investigated and answered the following question: what are the characteristics of land use change in prefecture-level cities? the objectives of our research were (i) to model and predict land use change based on the Markov-future land use (FLUS) model; (ii) to investigate land use patterns; (iii) to reveal the stability of land use systems, identify key land use types, and examine urban development characteristics; and (iv) to advance policy implications
The simulations revealed that urban sprawl dramatically altered the land use pattern

Summary

Introduction

Land use change plays a vital role in terrestrial systems, which partly or completely alter the land surface properties of the original ecosystem [1,2,3]. Land use change is an important driving factor in all aspects, such as the carbon cycle [4], biodiversity [5], climate change [6], and CO2 emissions [7]. It is necessary for policy-makers and researchers to monitor the present land use and rapidly model future land use conditions through convenient remote sensing, which is beneficial to achieve sustainable development. Human-driven processes such as urbanization, afforestation, the “Grain for Green” program, and land development, have accelerated land use cover change [16,17]. Anthropogenic and biophysical factors must be considered in the process of land use change modeling

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion