A method to analyse neighbourhood characteristics of land use patterns

Publication

Neighbourhood interactions between land use types are often included in the spatially explicit analysis of land use change. Especially in the context of urban growth, neighbourhood interactions are often addressed both in theories for urban development and in dynamic models of (urban) land use change. Neighbourhood interactions are one of the main driving factors in a large group of land use change models based on cellular automata (CA).

This paper introduces a method to analyse the neighbourhood characteristics of land use. For every location in a rectangular grid the enrichment of the neighbourhood by specific land use types is studied. An application of the method for the Netherlands indicates that different land use types have clearly distinct neighbourhood characteristics. Land use conversions can be explained, for a large part, by the occurrence of land uses in the neighbourhood.

The neighbourhood characterization introduced in this paper can help to further unravel the processes of land use change allocation and assist in the definition of transition rules for cellular automata and other land use change models.

Authors

Verburg PH , Nijs TCM de , Ritsema van Eck J , Visser H , Jong K de

Specifications

Publication title
A method to analyse neighbourhood characteristics of land use patterns
Publication date
24 March 2004
Publication type
Publication
Magazine
Computers, Environment and Urban Systems 2004; 28:667-90
Product number
91185