Land disturbance tempo-spatial dynamics in mountainous urban agglomeration and its driving forces: A case study of west Sichuan urban agglomeration, China

Abstract

Land disturbance (LD), commonly reflecting anthropogenic-induced land surface changes, has received unprecedented attention due to its contribution to achieving Sustainable Development Goal 15: life on land. Considerable LD in China, such as urban sprawl, farmland expansion and forest loss, have resulted in a spectrum of environmental problems in recent decades. To present function-based solutions to mitigate LD, the “productive-living-ecological” system (PLES) theory released by China’s government is more conducive to investigating LD and supporting plan-makers concerning regional territorial spatial planning. Currently, there is a relative lack of attention to LD studies in China’s mountainous areas. Hence, we selected the western Sichuan urban agglomeration (WSUA), a typical mountainous-hills urban agglomeration, as the study area, and presented a work that investigates the tempo-spatial dynamics of LD from 2000 − 2020, based on the PLES theroy and an interdisciplinary LD assessment framework of “process-structures” in WSUA. Finally, the contribution of the driving factors system, including geophysical, economic, and social, was investigated using a spatially geo-detector and bivariate Moran's I methodologies. In this work, we found the remarkable living land sprawl, and the productive-ecological and ecological land showed a dramatic decline trend, with a total 21,845.2 ha decline from 2000 to 2020 in WSUA. Although an encouraging increase in ecological land has been observed after 2010 with a total of 220,650 ha, urban sprawl has offset ecological restoration efforts. The LD hotspot patterns in SWUA were categorized into four types, which have led to general fragmentation of PLES land, and mainly clustering under 14° slope due to the scarcity of suitable land resources. In addition, we found that the geophysical driving force also significantly influences LD in mountains urban compared with the socioeconomic pillars. Finally, we provided SWUA’s plan-makers with recommendations and spatial solutions programs for harmonizing the PLES land disturbance and achieving sustainable development.