Urbanization analysis through remote sensing and GIS in Kuala Lumpur, Manila and Singapore cities

This research work intends to explore the spatial analytical methods to identify both general trends and more subtle patterns of urban growth. In Kuala Lumpur, Malian and Singapore, where urban area have experienced an unprecedented rate of growth over the last 30 year. In this uncontrolled situation, city planners lack tools to measure, monitor and understand urban sprawl processes. Multi-temporal remote sensing has become an important data-gathering tool for analyzing these changes. The objective of this study is to explore an approach for combining remote sensing and spatial metrics to monitor urbanization and investigate the relationship between urbanization and urban land use plans. The study areas, consisting of the cities of Kuala Lumpur, Manila and Singapore, were examined using Landsat data from 1989 to 2014. In this study an ArcGIS spatial metric was undertaken to produce urban growth maps and evaluation the characteristics of urban composition. Land cover change analyses at the metropolitan city levels reveal that over the past three decades the significant increase of built-up land in the study area was mainly at the expense of non-forest vegetation cover. The spatial and temporal heterogeneity of the land cover changes allowed the identification of fast and slow sprawling areas. The results of the analysis suggest that at the metropolitan level both the areas of nonforest vegetation and the forestland became more fragmented due to development. Several factors contribute to on-going challenges of spatial planning and urban policy in these megacities, including rapid population shifts, less organized urban areas and a lack of data with which to monitor urban growth and land use changes. Key-Words: Urbanization, Landsat data, Change detection, Remote Sensing, GIS