Monitoring the Different Types of Urban Construction Land Expansion (UCLE) in China’s Port City: A Case Study of Ningbo’s Central City

Qing Zheng,Qiming Zheng,Ghali Abubakar,Ke Wang,Lingyan Huang

doi:10.3390/su9122374

Abstract

The internal structure of urban construction land expansion (UCLE) is closely related to urban sustainability, and the UCLE in China’s port city has a unique pattern. This study attempted to monitor the internal structure evolution of UCLE based on construction land transfer data in Ningbo’s central city from 2002 to 2015. Equality fan analysis and kernel density analysis were applied to characterize the spatial–temporal dynamics of different types of UCLE and to summarize their evolution patterns. The results revealed that in the whole study area, the rank of the expansion size and intensity of construction land was: industrial land > traffic land > residential land > public land > commercial land. The dominant directions of all types of UCLE were the directions of the port zones. In the port zones, there were more apparent expansion trends and higher expansion intensities of industrial, traffic and public lands, which meant that the port had significant impact on UCLE, especially in terms of industrial land. Additionally, commercial and residential land expansions showed a circle-shaped gradient pattern; industrial land sprawl was in a leapfrog pattern; public and traffic land sprawl was illustrated in a bi-centric pattern. In the future, local government should encourage the development of residential and public land rather than industrial land, and shift the present industry structure which dominated by industry to a more balanced structure, in order to achieve sustainable development.

Highlights

Urban construction land expansion (UCLE) is the key research area of urban planning and urban geography which has attracted the attention of many decision makers, planners and scholars [1]
In order to alleviate these problems, many scholars have carried out numerous studies, which cover the following aspects: urban spatial extension and sprawl [6,7,8,9,10,11], industrial spatial layout [12,13], urban land use changes [14,15,16,17], and traffic organization [18,19], all of which has provided an important theoretical support for the study of UCLE
Ningbo is a famous industrial and commercial city in East China; its industry and commerce have been booming since the commercial port was opened

Summary

Introduction

Urban construction land expansion (UCLE) is the key research area of urban planning and urban geography which has attracted the attention of many decision makers, planners and scholars [1]. Creating a suitable internal structure of UCLE is beneficial to effective allocation of urban land resources, as well as social and economic sustainable development [4,5]. In order to alleviate these problems, many scholars have carried out numerous studies, which cover the following aspects: urban spatial extension and sprawl [6,7,8,9,10,11], industrial spatial layout [12,13], urban land use changes [14,15,16,17], and traffic organization [18,19], all of which has provided an important theoretical support for the study of UCLE

Methods

Results

Conclusion