Temporal and spatial variations of impervious surface landscape pattern and the driving factors in Xiamen City, China

Abstract

Xiamen is one of China's five major special economic zones and is the core city of Haixi Economic Zone, with a high level of urbanization. Monitoring and driving force analysis of impervious surfaces can increase our understanding of urbanization process and have important significance for urban landscape pattern research and urban ecological environment construction. We used the Landsat remote sensing image data from 1978 to 2018 to reveal the temporal and spatial variation characteristics of the impervious surface landscape in Xiamen in the past 40 years, using the full-restricted least squares method, landscape pattern analysis, slope gradient analysis and correlation analysis. We further analyzed its relationship with social and economic factors. The results showed that, during 1978-2018, the impervious surface of Xiamen increased by 348.96 km2, with a mean annual increase of 8.72 km2. The impervious surface dynamics reached a maximum of 9.0% in 2005-2010. More than 86.6% of the impervious surface of Xiamen was distributed within 6° of slope, with a tendency to expand to a greater slope in 2010-2018. With the increases of slope, the proportion of impervious surface decreased, the density of plaque decreased with the shape tending to be regular and continuous, the degree of fragmentation of the impervious surface increased. The increases of impervious surface in Xiamen was significantly related to the regional economic aggregate and population. In the study period, the spatial pattern of impervious surface in Xiamen significantly altered. In the future urban planning process, the extent and speed of impervious surface expansion should be coordinated to avoid ecological problems caused by excessive impervious surface to meet the need for sustainable development of Xiamen.