Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983

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Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/rsase

Monitoring land use/land cover change, urban growth dynamics and MARK
landscape pattern analysis in ve fastest urbanized cities in Bangladesh
Mohammad Mehedy Hassan
Department of Geography, University of Florida, 3141 Turlington Hall, P.O. Box 117315, Gainesville, FL 32611-7315, United States

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: With little known and explored urban morphology in the fastest growing countries like Bangladesh in South Asia,
Five cities this study aims at exploring urban spatial signature and explaining spatiotemporal land use and land cover
Land use/land cover patterns in the ve cities (Rajshahi, Rangpur, Sylhet, Khulna, and Barisal) in Bangladesh. Using time series
Urban growth Landsat imagery, socioeconomic data and, other geospatial information with ecological analysis tools, this study
Landscape fragmentation
quanties and characterize the spatial-temporal landscape patterns and urban growth trajectory across the ve
Sustainable development
selected sites. The spatial representation of these ve sites demonstrates a continuous increase in urban/built-up
areas replacing arable agricultural land, waterbodies, vegetation cover and wetlands, which thereby sub-
stantially altering the structure and function of the ecosystem surrounding the cities. Built up areas, representing
impervious surface as observed from land cover maps in these ve cities, are expanding quickly. The total built-
up cover within the ve cities grew from 2356 ha in 1973 to 13,435 ha in 2014 with a net increase of ap-
proximately 468%, while vegetation cover and crops eld within same time period declined at 27.77% and
61.91%, respectively. This dramatic urban/built-up expansion has resulted in an increasingly faster alteration in
the landscape composition causing to structural complexity at both class level and landscape level. Such rapid
and unplanned urban expansion further has brought an overwhelming challenge to planners and policy makers,
and has put a strain on local authorities to properly manage and utilize its limited land-based resources due to
lack of time series geospatial information. The resulting thematic map and spatial information from this study is,
therefore, to facilitate an understanding of urban growth dynamics and land cover change pattern in the ve
cities in Bangladesh. The result further can aid planners, stakeholders, and other interested groups to make the
best possible choices regarding limited land-based resources to achieve an economically prosperous and en-
vironmentally sustainable future.

1. Introduction (Islam, 2011), which is thought to be responsible for as much as two-

As one of the fastest urbanized countries in the world, Bangladesh
has experienced an unplanned and a rapid rate of urbanization in recent
years (Hassan and Nazem, 2015). Currently, 34% of her population
lives in urban areas and this total is expected to reach 56% in the year
2050 (UN, 2014). The estimated growth of urban population over the
last two decades was 4.22% per annum, while the national population
growth rate was 2.14% per year (growth calculated from 1991 to 2011
population census). Such explosive population growth with socio-eco-
nomic progress led to exurbanizaiton and urbanization in Bangladesh
over the past decades which has further resulted in a territorial ex-
pansion of each cities and growth centers. As a result, the total territory
occupied by cities expanded to 10,712 square kilometers, accounting
for 7.25% of the country's total land areas (BBS, 2001). This phenom-
enal urban growth has been attributed to many factors, including nat-
ural population growth and large inux of rural-urban migration
thirds of the hike in urban population in Bangladesh (Afsar, 2003). In
addition, changes in urban delimitation and the denition of an urban
area over the last decade have also facilitated urban expansion and the
subsequent population increases (BBS, 2011; Islam, 2011). A notable
feature of this expansion is that the growth in urban areas has spilled
over to local administrative boundaries, and in some cases, multiple
cities or growth centers have merged into a single entity.
This rapid and uncontrolled urbanization, however, is an important
phenomenon in the economic development, social progress, and cul-
tural transformation of the country because 64% of the national gross
domestic product (GDP) is generated in the urban sector (UPPR, 2011;
Nazem et al., 2011). Additionally, these cities hold a special place in the
country as they are the cultural, industrial, business, education, in-
novation, entertainment, and political heart of the entire nation (Islam,
2011).
Rapid urbanization in Bangladesh is exerting enormous pressure on

E-mail address: mehedy@u.edu.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.rsase.2017.07.001
Received 4 December 2016; Received in revised form 5 July 2017; Accepted 7 July 2017
Available online 08 July 2017
2352-9385/ 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
M.M. Hassan
local capacities and on limited land-based resources, leading to many
problems such as pollution, crime, trac congestion, poverty, and
economic and ecological challenges for the entire country. Such growth
puts a strain on the ability of city authorities to provide services like
energy, health care, transportation, sanitation, and physical security.
Further it underscores pressing concerns for urban planners, stake-
holders, and policy makers in the country due to a shortage of re-
sources, time-bound urban information, and lack of professional plan-
ners (Hassan and Nazem, 2015).
Moreover, the urban growth in Bangladesh has typically been de-
scribed as either a change in the absolute area of urban space, or as an
aggregate measure of the extent of cities with respect to decadal po-
pulation growth based on census data. State-owned census data in
Bangladesh, however, ambiguous, has often raised conict between
government and non-government sources. Additionally, it oers a
vague approach in dening administrative delimitation with un-
predictable spatial information on population distribution in urban
areas. Hence, such aggregate measure delivers limited information re-
garding the spatial patterns of urbanization, its precise physical extent,
and the driving elements of the urbanization process.
Empirical study suggests; as urbanization continued to increase,
landcover become increasingly diverse in pattern, fragmented in
structure and more complex in shape leading to a number of negative
consequences to biotic and abiotic resource (Qi et al., 2014), such as
losses of fresh productive agricultural land (Hass et al., 2015), dis-
turbance to rural economic stability and lifestyle, and loses of habitat
and species diversity (Wu et al., 2011). Thus, periodic urban growth
and its changing patterns must be monitored and characterized, and
understood its resultant impact on the land, ecology, and the environ-
ment in respect to spatial and temporal context.
Although RS in combination with GIS has already proven to be a
powerful and most useful technique for tracking urban growth and land
use/land cover change, there have been none or few systematic studies
conducted on tracking urban growth and land cover change in ve cites
selected as the study area for this research. In addition, previous studies
have shown that (Hassan et al., 2015) the urban land in Bangladesh has
increased exponentially, with development being chaotic and in-
ecient in the last two decades. Thus, a comprehensive understanding
of urban growth and land cover change across the selected cities of the
study area, which may raise awareness and concern for the need of
better policies and planning for urban land development, is required.
Therefore, the main purpose of this study is to explore and explain
spatiotemporal land use/ cover change, urban growth dynamics and
landscape pattern analysis across ve urban areas in Bangladesh. Using
time series Landsat imagery, socioeconomic data, and other geospatial
information enabling with GIS and remote sensing and ecological
analysis tools, this study quanties and characterize the temporal pat-
tern of urbanization and varieties of spatial signature and textural form
of landscapes in ve urban areas.
2. Description of the study area, data source and methods
2.1. Study areas
Among the ve study areas, three sites are located in the north, and
the other two are located in the south of the country (Fig. 1). In general,
the landscape of all ve cities are easily accessible from the capital city-
Dhaka of the country either by road, air, or water ways. The topography
of these cities ranges from low, at wetland to slightly undulating with
a few small swampy areas with elevation ranges from 20 to 35 m such
as in Rangpur, Rajshahi, and Sylhet. While cities in the south such as
Khulna and Barisal have an average elevation of 7 m. Nearly 2.5 million
and approximately 8% of the country's urban population live across
these ve cities (BBS, 2014). The highest population density is found in
Khulna (13,134 persons) and Sylhet city (12,704 person), and the
lowest in Rajshahi at 4628 persons per sq km (BBS, 2014).
70
Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983
In the north, the city of Rangpur lies between 25 41 to 25 49 north
latitudes and 89 12 to 89 18 east longitudes with an average elevation
at 35 m above the sea level. It is a relatively juvenile divisional head-
quarters that received status as a city corporation in 2010 (BBS, 2011),
serving a primarily agricultural region on the greater north Bengal of
Bangladesh.
The city's growth, however, has been powered by its recent up-
grading administrative status, from a district township to a divisional
headquarters, and by the foundation of a public university, Begum
Rokeya University, and a Medical College. Upgradation of this previous
district town to divisional headquarters has increased its importance in
all respects, including a special emphasis on its economic aspects.
Currently, the city of Rangpur is the home of nearly 308,000 people,
with a density of 6057 persons residing in the 50.69 square kilometers
of its jurisdictional area.
The city of Rajshahi is the fth largest city in the country, located to
the northwest in Bangladesh, between 24 21 to 24 26 north latitude
and 88 32 to 88 40 east longitude, with an average elevation of 21 m
above sea level. The economy and industry are mainly based on agri-
cultural products and factories, like silk and other cottage industries. In
spite of being an important city, industrial development in Rajshahi has
not taken place to any great extent. The city, however, is well connected
with a developed road network to all regional and interregional cities in
the country. Currently, the city has a population of 448,087 within its
48 sq. km. jurisdiction (BBS, 2014).
The Sylhet in the north is the fourth largest urban agglomeration in
the country and the regional headquarters in the northeastern region of
Bangladesh. The city is located on the bank of the river Surma, between
24 51 to 24 56 north latitude and 91 5 to 91 54 east longitude with
an average elevation of 20 m above sea level. To the north, the eleva-
tion of the city gradually increases to above 30 m due to the presence of
several undulating hillocks, whilst the south is comparatively low with
an average elevation of 17 m. Topographically, the landscape is at
along the river bank, where the elevation seldom exceeds 20 m. This
monotonous topography, however, is broken up by hills in the north
and northeast parts of the city. The maximum height of this undulating
landscape is 40 m above sea level. The hills in the metropolitan, from
north-south, are presumed to have inuenced the precise location of the
early township foundation, but due to rapid urbanization these ob-
stacles have become minor.
The other two sites in this study are in the south of the country with
proximity to the sea and the world's largest mangrove forest. These two
metropolises provide excellent linkages with several navigable rivers,
the sea, other coastal towns and growth centers, and with the country's
largest port cities- Chittagong and Mongla. These metropolises have a
unique physiography and geophysical setting and their proximity to the
coast has shaped their formation.
In the south, Khulna is the regional capital of southwest Bangladesh
and the third largest urban center in the country. It is located at 22 46
to 22 54 north latitudes and 89 28 to 89 35 east longitudes, on the
west banks of the Rupsha and Bhairab rivers, with average elevation of
7 m (23 feet) above sea level. Physiographically, the area is part of the
largest delta in the world. It is characterized by Ganges tidal oodplains
having lower relief and crisscrossed by innumerable canals and rivers
surrounded by tidal marshes and swamps. The city of Khulna is stra-
tegically important as it links the second port city of the country-
Mongla, and a direct railway connection with Kolkata of India, and
other parts of the country including the capital city Dhaka. The major
economic sectors in the city are jute, chemicals, sh and seafood
packaging, food processing, sugar mills, power generation, ship
building and export processing. The township rst became a corpora-
tion in 1984 with an area of 46 square kilometers. This study however,
conducted beyond the city corporation areas due to continuous north-
ward expansion into the Gilatola cantonment, the Shirmoni residential
area and south-west along Satkhira-Khulna highway including the area
of Khulna University.
M.M. Hassan
Fig. 1. Location and elevation map of ve cities.
The other study site in the south is Barisal, which stands on the bank
of the river Kirtonkhola, located in the southern coast of Bangladesh at
90189023 east longitude and 22382245 north latitude. The
average elevation of the city from mean sea level is 7 m. The high
elevation lands lie in the north, northwest and eastern part of the study
area where major urban development has taken place. It is the sixth-
largest city of Bangladesh and the population surpassed 339,308 in the
2011 census year (BBS, 2014). The areas, however, included in this
Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983
study is 86.59 sq. km. that includes the city corporation area (58.97 sq.
km.) and its immediate periphery to the north, northwest part along to
the Dhaka-Barisal highway.
Climate pattern of these selected sites follows the general trend of
the rest of the country. The cool and dry winter (December-February) is
followed by a hot and rainy pre-monsoon period (March-May) and then
by the cooler but very wet monsoon season (June-September). This is
followed by a transitional humid and showery period up to the
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M.M. Hassan Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983

Table 1
Synoptic representation of the study areas.
Source: (BBS, 2014)(Urban Area Report)

City Location Rank in National Population Average Elevation Jurisdiction Area Corporation Status Literacy Rate
Context (2011) (meter) (sq.km.) (Year) (%)

Khulna 22 46 to 22 54 north latitudes 89 3rd 664,728 7 50.61 1990 73.6

28 to 89 35 east longitudes
Sylhet 24 51 to 24 56 north latitude 91 4th 531,663 20 41.85 2001 67.4
5 to 91 54 east longitude
Rajshahi 24 21 to 24 26 north latitude 5th 448,087 21 97.18 1991 74
88 32 to 88 40 east longitude
Barisal 2238 to 2245 north latitude 6th 339,308 7 69.19 2000 74.8
9018 to 9023 east longitude
Rangpur 25 41 to 25 49 north latitudes 89 7th 308,000 35 50.69 2010 72
12 to 89 18 east longitudes

beginning of winter. From mid-November to late February the weather
is typically dry and cool A brief description of these ve cities are
presented in (Table 1).
2.2. Data sources
This study makes uses of various spatial and non-spatial data from
diverse source including multiyear population census data, socio-eco-
nomic census data from city level statistical year books, and rst hand
data from eld level observation.
The main spatial and temporal data used in this study such as;
Landsat MSS 60 m (1973), TM 30 m (1989), ETM 30 m (2000) and OLI-
TIRS 30 m (2014) satellite image were derived from open access
Landsat imagery services at http://glovis.usgs.gov. All Landsat image
were cloud free and were acquired between January and March of the
respective year. The specic date and year for this study was selected
because of the availability of cloud free Landsat imagery across the ve
sites. GIS data like; administrative boundary, road network, and other
physical features were collected from particular city corporation oce,
oce of the City Development Authority and Urban Development
Directorate (UDD). The details data characteristics, sources, temporal
scale and spatial resolution are described in Table 2. To determine the
extent or physical delimitation of the city study area, in most case, city
corporation boundary was considered. However, for cities like Sylhet
and Barisal, master planning boundary was taken into account, and for
Khulna, the north boundary of the city corporation area was extended
due to agglomerations of continuous built-up area and the density of
contiguous ambit.
2.3. Pre-processing of the input data
Prior to image processing, the Landsat images were stacked to ob-
tain multi-band composite images and later subset with respect to the
study area, in order to reduce computation and image analysis time.
Using road network data, a comparatively high-resolution image from
OLI-TIRS was geo-referenced mostly through ArcGIS 10.2.2 and Erdas
Imagine 14 software; other images were subsequently co-registered to
this OLI-TIRS image as a reference to perform geometric correction. The
results of this image-to-image registration were examined using three
dierent methods, including examining the root mean square error
(which was less than 0.5 pixels), using image overlays, and image
ickering/blending (Hassan et.al, 2015). All images were registered
and re-projected to local coordinates (Bangladesh Transverse Mercator
with datum Everest 1830) and a rst order polynomial transformation
with nearest neighbor resampling was applied.
2.4. Image classication
Accurate information on urban growth and land cover change de-
rived from satellite images is crucial for the monitoring of urbanization,
land management and environmental change studies (Turner et al.,
2007). However, acquiring accurate information for such studies can
still a challenging task, particularly in urban areas, due to extremely
heterogenous landscapes and often occurring problem of mixed pixels.
For example, sands or bare soils are often confused with bright im-
pervious surfaces due to their similar spectral reectance. To deal with
these problems, a wide range of parametric and non-parametric
methods for analysis of airborne and satellite derived imagery are in
practice and continue to be proposed. Since increasing accuracy in land
cover classication is essentially important for remote sensing analysis,
data mining technology and machine learning algorithms such as
Support Vector Machine (SVM), Articial Neural Network (ANN), De-
cision Tree (DT) and ensembles classier such as Random Forest (RF),
used in remote sensing studies have shown a quantum increase in re-
cent times.
In particular, SVM (Vapnik, 2000) and Random Forest (Breiman,
2001) have recently received considerable attention in remote sensing
image classication due to their ability to successfully handle small
training data sets with computational eciency, and often producing
higher classication accuracy than the traditional methods (Qian et al.,
2015; Mountrakis, Im, and Ogole, 2011). Both SVM and RF are su-
pervised, non-parametric statistical learning techniques (Cutler et al.,

Table 2
Description of the collected geospatial and socio-economic data.

Data Types Year Producer Scale

Metropolitan Master Plan (Urban Development Plan, Structure Plan) UDD, LGED
and Detailed Area Plan
Landsat MSS, TM, ETM and OLI-TIRS 2/21/1973, 1/27/1989, 1/26/2000, 3/21/2014 USGS global land cover 60 m, 30 m
facilities
http://glovis.usgs.gov. Spatial Resolution
Physical Features, Road Network Data UDD, CUS, LGED
Socioeconomic data, Population Census, Urban Area Report 1984,1987,1991,2001,2008 2011,2013, 2014 Bangladesh Bureau of Statics
(BBS)
Topographic Map 1956 US Navy 1:250000
Urban Poor Settlement Survey 2011 Center for Urban Studies (CUS)

72
M.M. Hassan
2007), which are not imbedded with assumption problems, and typi-
cally involve the identication of multiple classes (Jin, 2012).
Although non-parametric based algorithms for image classication
methods have shown high image classication accuracy rates, this
study uses rule-based supervised image classication techniques a
maximum likelihood classication (MLC) algorithm to classify six land
cover classes in the ve cities of the study area. The reasons for
choosing MLC are self-evident: rstly, the purpose of this study is to
examine spatial extent of built-up areas, rather than focusing on shape,
dimension and the internal variation of various urban structures.
Secondly, classication accuracy of non-parametric based algorithms
mainly depends on availability of spatial, spectral and temporal re-
solution of remote sensing data. Lastly, MLC for urban land cover
classication and impervious surface mapping have been employed in a
number of previous studies and is still used because this algorithm
greatly reduces the data requirements while still providing a greater
potential to extract detailed information on urban landscape (Jat et al.,
2017; Ramachandra et al., 2015; Yuan et al., 2005; Yin et al., 2005).
Hence, considering the research objectives, data availability, compat-
ibility with previous work and the availability of the algorithm in
mostly image processing software, maximum likelihood algorithm in
Erdas Imagine platform is used in this study for Landsat image classi-
cation for the ve cities.
Six types of land cover classication scheme for this study was de-
veloped, partly derived from Anderson et al. (1976) rst-order hier-
archical classication system and based on previous knowledge and
eld investigations combined with additional information from pre-
vious research. Land cover classication types were determined by a
combination of supervised and unsupervised (ISODATA) classication
(Suribabu et al., 2012), as well as manual interpretation of satellite
images (Peng et al., 2011; Bui et al., 2013) topographic maps, survey
data and ground truth information. In this way, six thematic land use
and land cover categories were generated (Table 3) and classied using
training sites or signature les that appeared fairly homogeneous on the
image.
Nearly 3060 signatures were collected for each land cover classes
and were submitted for statistical analysis of similarities (Wondrade
et al., 2014). Using Google Earth, and GPS eld survey data in addition
to an image enhancement technique, these land covers were manually
distinguished and a reasonable signature was extracted from each land
use class. Using these signature les, supervised classication was
carried out with a maximum likelihood algorithm (Yuan et al., 2005).
Finally, to reduce potential salt-and-pepper eects, a 3 3 majority
lter was applied before the classied land covers were used for further
analysis (Yin et al., 2005; Bui et al., 2013). To demonstrate the spatial
conguration of urban expansion, eight transect zones, forming fan
shaped areas, were created with respect to pre-determined urban
center. The fan-shaped transects were drawn in GIS, referenced around
the location of each study area city corporation building in the center of
the old town. Then using a GIS overlay, the built-up areas that fall
within each zone were aggregated and the total area of each category
Table 3
Land use/land cover classication scheme.
Land Cover Types Description
Urban/ Built up area These include all developed land, including commercial,
residential, industrial and other infrastructure
Agriculture/Crop eld Land used for agriculture, paddy eld, vegetables, fruits
and other cultivable lands
Water bodies Lake, ponds, lagoon, river, aqua shing and vast sea
water
Forest and Vegetation Hilly forest, homestead vegetation, coastal mangrove,
bush and shrubs
Fallow land Open hill, exposed hilly soil, landll, barren land, bare
soil, Sandy beaches, Dune and River bank
Lowland/Wetland Accretion Land, Deposited land, river bank
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Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983
within each sector was calculated (Xu et al., 2007; Raee et al., 2009).
Finally, these values were displayed as spider graph (Fig. 6), allowing
the spatial distribution of built-up areas to be visualized and illustrated.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Accuracy assessment
Since image heterogeneity presents a major challenge in land cover
classication, accuracy assessment was carried out in combination with
eld observation GPS data, manual interpretation of Landsat images,
topographic maps, google earth high resolution images, and random
sampling. Topographic map with random sampling, for example, was
used to validate the thematic map of 1973 and 1989, while GPS point as
reference dataset associated with training sample extracted from high
resolution google map and Landsat images were used to validate the
land cover map of 2000 and 2014. Since GPS ground truth data were
mostly collected in the vicinity of the road network, additional sets of
validation points using random sampling for each landcover map was
generated to ensure unbiased distribution of verication data across the
study area (Fig. 2). In this way, nearly 200250 (varied from year to
year) stratied sampling points were generated (Liu et al., 2009;
Shooshtari and Gholamalifard, 2015; Yi et al., 2016)and then used with
GPS data for class-specic accuracy assessment. The number and spatial
distribution of verication point were varied due to dominance of
certain land cover classes. Waterbodies for example; having consistent
spectral signature across the landscape and easy to distinguish from
other classes. Thus, it requires small set of validation point but provided
higher classication accuracy (< 97% for all periods) then other
classes. On the other hand, fallow land and agricultural land are often
confusing and perhaps the most challenging task in image classication,
particularly in tropical region like Bangladesh where fallow typically
covers with grass, given the similar spectral reectance as agricultural
land. As a result, fallow land in this study had the lowest classication
accuracy rate around 6279%. The overall accuracy assessment result
was also varied with the respect of the study area, availability of aux-
iliary data and the spatial resolution of the thematic map. Accuracy
assessment, for example, were higher with the map of 2014 and 2000,
ranges between 90 and 93 with Kapa statistics 8187 due to available of
supporting documents. However, for the map 1989 and 1973, assess-
ment result was between 81.17 and 86 with Kappa values ranges from
73 to 77, which are good but not represent strong agreement
(Congalton, 1991). However, these minor drawbacks should not com-
promise the goal of this study to illustrate the urban dynamics and
utilities of landscape metrics in landscape fragmentation studies.
3.2. Spatial and temporal patterns of urbanization across the ve cities
The selected cities for this study are the major centers for banking
and nance, retailing, trade, transportation, tourism, real-estate, busi-
ness, political, and administrative functions that house nearly 8% of the
country's total urban population (BBS, 2014) and approximately 20% of
its economic units (BBS, 2013). Due to a dierent geographical loca-
tion, topographical setting, and regional factors, as well as adminis-
trative and economic functions, city growth is looked at and studied for
various spatial scales and temporal dimensions. Fig. 3 and Table 4
utilize satellite images for dierent time periods over the past four
decades to clearly illustrate the radical transformation of the landscape
pattern and the typical urban growth in the ve selected cities (Fig. 4).
Of the ve study areas, four cities i.e., Rajshahi, Sylhet, Barisal and
Khulna, began and then developed along the banks of great rivers, in-
cluding the Padma, Suruam, Kittonkholam and Rupsha-Vairob, re-
spectively. The growth and expansion of these city landscapes was
primarily dominated by the meandering patterns of these rivers, the
topography of the river valleys in which each city stands, and the cir-
cuitous nature of their transport routes. Later development of the Assam
M.M. Hassan
Bengal Railway (which functioned from 1892 to 1942) catalyzed sub-
stantial urban development in the city's heartland. An ecient circu-
lation network, location, and linkage between the areas with regional
towns and growth centers were important elements in both the town-
ship formation and the development of these urban areas.
3.2.1. Quantifying spatial pattern and urban growth trajectory in Barisal
The coastal city of Barisal, in Southern Bangladesh grew and thrived
along the northwest bank of Kittonkhola, a navigable river, which indeed
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Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983
Fig. 2. GPS training point and random sampling location on map (Study
area Khulna).
had a major inuence on the development of that township. The area
where the primary township developed was the inner side of the loop of
this meandering river which was thus safe from erosion and ooding. It
was positioned at a comparatively higher altitude from the surrounding
area and was easily serviced by its water linkage. From observing the
topographic map of 1956 and the Landsat image of 1973, one can see that
the city's early growth was restricted at Chawck Bazaar and surrounding
the port and launch terminal where a dense built-up was found inside the
oval- shaped ring road along the Sadarghat and Port strip.
M.M. Hassan
Fig. 3. Spatio-temporal land cover pattern in ve cities (from 1973 to 2014). Fig. 3
The built- up area throughout these early periods was around
421 ha or only 5% of the total land area. Both the population and urban
expansion in the study area became impetuous between the 1974 and
1981 census periods when net population increase was 45% with an
annual growth rate of 6.4% (BBS, 1987, 1998). Built-up cover during
this period (19731989) also exhibited the highest growth (aggregate
growth 131.35%) at a rate of 8.20% annually and increased its share to
11.25% (974 ha) in city landscape formation. This increase in popula-
tion growth accompanied with economic progression in the area was
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Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983
observed, suggesting impressive growth toward the north (15% ex-
pansion), northwest (27% expansion) along the Dhaka-Barisal highway
and also toward the southwest (25.6%), which is comparatively low
lying and undulating ood prone, backwash areas, thereby consuming
fresh agricultural land, vegetation cover, and wetland.
In the following year, the population and the built-up area con-
tinued to increase in the city, but not as rapidly as during the previous
decade. For example, the urban area in the period 19892000 increased
to 1661 ha or 1.7 fold greater (it was 2.3 fold in 1989) than in the
M.M. Hassan Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983

Table 4
Land use/ land cover statistics of the study areas (1973-2014).

Rajshahi 2014 (ha) % 2000 (ha) % 1989 (ha) % 1973 (ha) %

Agriculture 978 18.65 1671 31.86 2328 44.39 2440 46.52

Built-up 2708 51.63 1864 35.54 966 18.42 433 8.26
Fallow land 64 1.22 87 1.66 87 1.66 52 0.99
Lowland 99 1.89 193 3.68 268 5.11 231 4.40
Vegetation 949 18.09 948 18.07 1247 23.78 1780 33.94
Waterbodies 447 8.52 482 9.19 349 6.65 309 5.89
Total (ha) 5245 100.00 5245 100.00 5245 100.00 5245 100.00
Rangpur
Agriculture 1999 39.77 2440 48.55 3124 62.16 3550 70.63
Built-up 1831 36.43 936 18.62 392 7.80 110 2.19
Fallow land 59 1.17 38 0.76 24 0.48 20 0.40
Lowland 64 1.27 58 1.15 42 0.84 54 1.07
Vegetation 972 19.34 1348 26.82 1269 25.25 1169 23.26
Waterbodies 101 2.01 206 4.10 175 3.48 123 2.45
Total (ha) 5026 100.00 5026 100.00 5026 100.00 5026 100.00
Sylhet
Agriculture 428 9.85 605 13.92 769 17.69 1115 25.66
Built-up 3055 70.29 2686 61.80 2018 46.43 484 11.14
Fallow land 163 3.75 52 1.20 38 0.87 85 1.96
Lowland 92 2.12 98 2.25 124 2.85 234 5.38
Vegetation 425 9.78 716 16.47 1254 28.85 2233 51.38
Waterbodies 183 4.21 189 4.35 143 3.29 195 4.49
Total (ha) 4346 100.00 4346 100.00 4346 100.00 4346 100.00
Khulna
Agriculture 203 3.70 456 8.32 964 17.59 2477 45.20
Built-up 3772 68.83 2798 51.06 1614 29.45 1027 18.74
Fallow land 53 0.97 79 1.44 113 2.06 245 4.47
Lowland 487 8.89 538 9.82 307 5.60 225 4.11
Vegetation 817 14.91 1380 25.18 2143 39.11 1302 23.76
Waterbodies 148 2.70 229 4.18 339 6.19 204 3.72
Total (ha) 5480 100.00 5480 100.00 5480 100.00 5480 100.00
Barisal
Agriculture 2049 23.66 3277 37.85 4234 48.90 6003 69.33
Built-up 2069 23.89 1661 19.18 974 11.25 421 4.86
Fallow land 192 2.22 49 0.57 17 0.20 61 0.70
Lowland 77 0.89 330 3.81 198 2.29 39 0.45
Vegetation 3548 40.97 2632 30.40 2332 26.93 1431 16.53
Waterbodies 724 8.36 710 8.20 904 10.44 704 8.13
Total (ha) 8659 100.00 8659 100.00 8659 100.00 8659 100.00

have contributed to the primary development of the Barisal city in an

Rajshahi
east-west alignment, later moving northwest along the Dhaka-Barisal
highway. Presently, the built-up area in the city has spread mainly
Rangpur along three corridors; in the northwest (26.4%) to the Dhaka-Barisal
Highway, in the southwest (35.5%) along Dhaka-Patukhali and west-
1973 ward (16%) to the Brisal-Jhalakathi highway. Together these three
Sylhet trajectories accounts for nearly 78% of the built-up area in the city. The
1989
2000 elevation heights of these areas are 610 feet above sea level. Due to the
Khulna
2014 natural barriers of the Kirtankhola River, the city of Barisal cannot
extend south, southeast, or east. In addition, due to low lying land,
spatial expansion of the already built-up area cannot spread further
Barisal westward.

0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000 3500 4000

Hectares 3.2.2. Quantifying spatial pattern and urban growth trajectory in Khulna
In the southwest, the city of Khulna, is mainly an expansion of trade
Fig. 4. Comparative urban/built-up growth trend in ve cities (19732014).
centers that were situated close to the Rupsa and Bhairab Rivers.
Khulna has long been the major center for trade and commerce and is
previous era when the annual growth rate was calculated at 6.4%.
the third largest economic center in the country after Dhaka and
Population at this time was growing at the rate of 3.2% in the city (BBS,
Chittagong. The city has a linear shape, stretching north and south
2008). Still, the major urban growth trajectory was toward the north,
along the west bank of the rivers, Bhairab and Rupsa, respectively. It
southwest and northwest at 18%, 26.6% and 37.8%, respectively. Due
was observed from the topographic map of 1956 that the primary
to population growth and the subsequent expansion of trade and
growth center was on the southwest bank of the Rupsha River, sur-
commerce, the current development of the city is radiating southwest,
rounding the location of the present City Center and Dack Bangla in
north, northeast, west and northwest- from the banks of the Kirtankhola
Sadar thana, where a relatively compact urban form was found. A
River and extending into rural areas and beyond the outskirts. Such
ribbon shaped development with sparsely populated settlement was
geographical expansion of the urban cover in the city amounted to 2069
documented along the Eastern Bengal railway corridor to the northwest
hectors in 2014 and comprised 24% of the city's landscape.
of the city. During this period, the estimated urban growth, as seen from
Topographical features of the area, together with the coast factors,
the topographic map, was approximately 350 ha with very slow organic

76
M.M. Hassan
growth and a comparative stable population. The process of urbaniza-
tion, however, accelerated between 1950 and 1960 when planned in-
dustrialization took place at Khalishpur, including the establishment of
an anchorage at Chalna with the subsequent declaration of that city as a
regional headquarters in 1961. Until this time, the population in the
city was 128,000, but it grew more than three-fold to 468,000 persons
in 1974 (BBS, 1984) when the built- up area reached 1027 ha in the
Metropolitan region.
Using the easy and navigable access of the rivers Rupsa and Bhairab
and convenient linkages with other regional towns and growth centers,
the city has become the most important center of business, commerce,
industry, tourism and transportation hub in the region. As a result, both
population growth and subsequent urban expansion received stimulus
after the post-independence era of Bangladesh. For the 19741981
census, the population in Khulna city totaled 665,417 persons (BBS,
1984) while built-up expanded to 1614 ha in 1989, in where industrial
installations with residential uses were the main occupants of urban
land. Throughout this phase, major urban expansion took place to the
northwest along the Jessore-Khulna highway (this trajectory remains
the major built-up expansion at 56%) and surrounding Khalishpur
where major industrial sites like jute mills and other heavy industry
(e.g. Khulna newsprint mills and Khulna hardboard mils) are situated.
On the other hand, residential development continues to the south,
adjoining the immediate periphery of the old town, and heading
northwest near the location of Boyra, Sonadnga, Daulatpur, and the
Gialtola Cantonment.
In the following periods, 19892000, the city witnessed substantial
urban growth when the built-up surpassed 2800 ha, nearly double in
size compared to the previous decades. The net built-up growth was
73.3% with an annual increasing rate of 6.6% over this period. This
huge urban expansion may have been linked to several ambitious
projects, including 9 residential development projects on 265 acres of
land at Sonadanga, Nirala, Mujgunni, Daulatpur, Shiromoni, and
Mirrerdanga. In addition, a planned heavy industrial estate was de-
veloped at Shiromoni on 511.29 acres of land (http://www.kda.gov.
bd/City_Development.php). Moreover, the establishment of a promi-
nent education institution like Khulna University (1991) on the south-
west outskirts and later construction of a city by-pass on the west
periphery of the city that connecting with the Ruphsa Bridge on the
south and the Jessore highway on the north, allowed exponential de-
velopment in the Western region of the city by consuming lowlands that
had once been used for agriculture and shrimp farming purposes.
The city's recent growth, however, has been observed as moving in a
westward direction along the four major corridors, including to the
northwest surrounding the KUET road, along the old Satkhira link and
Satkhira-Khulna highway, the Bastuhara bypass link, Jalil Shorani,
adjacent to Khulna University and near to the Zero point. All these areas
have mainly witnessed residential development by lling in of lowlands
and encroaching on fresh arable agricultural land, water bodies, and
vegetation cover. As a result, the built-up cover in the city exceeded
3772 ha by 2014 and accounted for nearly 69% of the city's land cover,
while crop elds and vegetation cover declined 92% and 37%, re-
spectively during that same period.
3.2.3. Quantifying spatial pattern and urban growth trajectory in Rajshahi
In northern Bangladesh, the city of Rajshahi, is the oldest and
sizeable urban form in the region, dating back to seventeenth century,
when it was the preeminent trading center for silk with the Dutch and
later the French and English. The city's primary growth, as it has been
observed from the topographic map of 1956, is a rectangular shape with
approximately 350 ha urban form (calculated in GIS) grounded just
between railway and river, surrounding the location of the Dargah para
and Shaheb bazar parallel to the river bank, and its alignment closely
touching the northern margin of the Eastern Bengal Railway. The river
in the south and railway in the north served as barriers that forced the
town to grow in a ribbon-like form almost exclusively along a single
77
Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983
thoroughfare, Natore-Rajshahi lane at Boalia Thana. There was also a
sparsely populated settlement near the eastern corridor beside the
Damkura Passage that ran toward the west alongside the Dhaka-
Rajshahi Highway. The major expansion of Rajshahi began only after
the liberation of Bangladesh, while the city was connected by rail and
road with other regional growth centers in north Bengal. Within a few
years, Rajshahi's developed area grew to 966 ha, as estimated from a
thematic map showing growth between 1973 and 1989. The city's de-
veloped area steadily expanded outwards at rates which often exceeded
10% per year, in south-east, south-west and west directions, which
comprised 10.3%, 14% and 42% of developed land, respectively. Due to
the presence of prominent educational institutions like Rajshahi
University of Engineering Technology (RUET) and Rajshahi University
in the eastern edges of the city, which occupy one-third of the current
city corporation land, the built-up area could only expand between the
area of the river embankment road and the Dhaka-Rajshahi Highway in
the east.
Rajshahi city's growth however, nearly doubled in 2000, when built-
up exceeded to 1864 ha with population increases to 388,811 persons
in the city corporation area and 651,062 persons in the statistical me-
tropolitan area (BBS, 2008). Still, the bulk built-up expansion took
place in the west (33%) surrounding Munshipara, Haragram, Bullan-
para and along the Rajshahi-Nawabganj Highway. To the north it ex-
panded along the major thoroughfare (airport road), a new residential
area at Uposhohor and industrial area at Sopura on the northern edge of
the city. Furthermore, some residential (e.g. Padma, Parijat and
Chayanir) and industrial development projects also contributed to the
built-up development in the city over this period. In addition, several
road developments, such as the Alupatti-to-Sonadidhi road through
Sahebbazar, the extension of greater road from Gourhanga to Talaimari
road and Kalpana cinema hall to the rail station road during the 1990s
allowed substantial land development in adjoining area.
The city Rajshahi has experienced recent growth in all directions,
particularly in the north along the airport road, in the west parallel to
the Padma embankment and city bypass corridor, and in the east along
the Dhaka-Rajshahi Highway. Built-up cover diusing outward from
the city core, with leapfrog development, scattering urban settlement
over the rural landscape by consuming agricultural land, vegetation
cover, water bodies, low land and fallow land that are present in be-
tween city periphery and inner circle of Rajshahi bypass thoroughfare.
Currently the built-up area in the city corporation area exceeds 2708 ha
as calculated from thematic map of 2014 and the city population is
449,756 persons as of the 2011 census (BBS, 2014).
3.2.4. Quantifying spatial pattern and urban growth trajectory in Rangpur
In the case of Rangpur, little or no organized urban forms were
documented until the post-independence era of Bangladesh. The pri-
mary settlement according to a topographic map from 1956 was to the
north-east edges of the city surrounding the present Sath-matha point
(Seven road conjunction) and extending towards south-west to north-
east, along the Eastern Bengal Railway corridor. The city, however,
later shifted towards the north-west corridor due to the construction of
some major government buildings, including the cantonment, the
central hospital, administrative and education facilities, and the den-
sication of road infrastructures coupled with proximity to commercial
facilities. As a result, a gravitational shift took place in the location of
railway corridors to road linkage corridors, and these places later be-
come the main urban development area. In 1973, the current city
growth areas were primarily agricultural with only a few small houses
was found along the major road network. This predominantly rural,
agricultural landscape gradually changed to a peri-urban landscape due
to increased human settlement in the 1970s and 1980s, and subse-
quently, built-up space spread toward southwestward form the north-
west along the main road. Presently the city accounts for nearly
1831 ha of built-up area, which is nearly double than in the year 2000
and ve times higher than in 1989. The city's current growth
M.M. Hassan Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983

4000 Fig. 5. Net gain and loss land cover classes in ve cities over 41-
year study period.
3000
Gain

2000

1000
Hectares

-1000

-2000
Loss

-3000

-4000

-5000
Agriculture Builtup Fallow Lowland Vegetation Waterbodies
Rajshahi -1462 2275 12 -132 -831 138
Rangpur -1551 1721 39 10 -197 -22
Sylhet -687 2571 78 -142 -1808 -12
Khulna -2274 2745 -192 262 -485 -56
Barisal -3954 1648 131 38 2117 20

accelerated because of its recent administrative status as well as re-
puted academic institutions like Begum Rokeya University, Rangpur
Medical College and Cadet College. Due to the presence of several
textile, jute, and pharmaceutical companies, the area has been as-
suming the status of a large urban agglomeration comprising these in-
dustries and other commercial development in the inner and outer belts
of city areas. The recent growth trajectory as observed from the land
cover map of 2014, expanding towards the south (20.3%) surrounding
the Modern stoppage, towards the manmade barrier of the railway to
the east (3.5%), towards the north-west (19.3%) along the Rangpur-
Dinajpur Highway and to the west (27.1%) along the City Bypass. The
city's periphery has been extending into rural areas since the mostly at
or gently rolling countryside presents no obstacles to the area's devel-
opment. Unauthorized and unplanned developments at the edge of the
city, especially haphazard and piecemeal homesteads, commercial
areas, and other non-conforming land-uses, occurring mainly along the
major routes of communication, were observed during the eld survey.
3.2.5. Quantifying spatial pattern and urban growth trajectory in Sylhet
The growth of the north-eastern city- Sylhet was primarily inu-
enced by the commercial cultivation of tea, the importance of the shrine
of the saints Hazrat Shahajalal and Shahparan, abundant natural re-
sources (e.g., major gas and oil reservoir), being an important tourist
gateway to the country, as well as the economic impact of international
remittance from millions of overseas employees especially from the
United Kingdom. The topographic map of 1956 and subsequent Landsat
images suggest that the early growth of the Sylhet city took place on the
at plain of the river bank (where the average elevation is 20 m) sur-
rounding the location of Kazir bazar, Kotwali, Lama bazar, and
Sheikhghat. Later urban growth extended to the north-north-west along
the major thoroughfares of Hazrat Shahjala shrine and the airport road.
Based on the 1973 Landsat images, it is estimated that the net built up
growth by this time covered 484 ha, accounting for 11.14% of the city
land area. In the following period between 1973 and 1989, city ob-
served a substantial built-up expansion at approximately 317%, with
annual growth rates of nearly 20%. The bulk amount of the built-up
expansion up to this time took place to the north and west of the city,
which constitute 28% and 17% of the built up respectively. Later urban
expansion extended over the hillock towards the north (16.25%), north
east (18.41%), and west (19.44%) of the city. These huge built up ex-
tensions can be linked to massive infrastructure development, in-
creasing civic facilities in the city. This expansion resulted in an im-
portant migration of the rural population into the city, especially those
in the rural community whose relatives live in the United Kingdom.
Therefore, one can assume that the growth rate may be due to foreign
remittance enabling rural people to move to the city to take advantage
of the security and the upgraded civic facilities. The majority of this
migrant population previously lived on the northern bank of the Surma
River. In absolute numbers, the population increased to 117,398 in
1991 census, doubled from the previous census in 1981 (BBS, 1998). In
the following decade (19892000), built-up areas have continued to
grow (at the rate of 3% per year), but at a less rapid pace than before.
The urban developed area reached 2686 ha in 2000, constituting 62%
of the urban land cover.
Although built up growth in the city and its adjoining periphery
dropped to 3.0% per year between 1989 and 2000 period, the popu-
lation by this time increased remarkably to 320,280 people at the rate
of 17.28% (19912001 census period) annually in the city (BBS, 2008).
Given the physical constraints in the north, further outward expansion
was restricted, and as a result, subsequent urban growth was directed
toward the eastward corridor (24.34%) along the Dhaka-Sylhet
highway and north-west corridor (20.70%) through the Sylhet-Su-
namgang highway and these axis becomes the main trajectory for the
recent urban development. Currently the city enjoys higher population
growth at the rate 6.59% per year as estimated from 2001 to 2011
population census (BBS, 2014) while the built up expansion in the city
comparatively stable and observed slow growth at the rate of 1.0% per
year as estimated from the thematic map between 2000 and 2014
period. Currently the net built up expansion in the study area is 3055 ha
which accounts for 70.29% of urban land and home of nearly 531,663
population (BBS, 2014).
Over the 41-year, the selected cities in this study has experienced
huge urban/built-up expansion by expense of agricultural land and
vegetation cover. As represented in Fig. 5, the net amount of agri-
cultural land and vegetation cover in the ve cites was lost by 9928 and
3321 ha respectively while built-up was gained by 10,960 ha. Highest
built-up expansion was taken in place like Khulna, Sylhet and Rajshahi
at net amount 2745, 2571 and 2275 ha respectively. Vegetation and
agricultural land, on the other hand, was lost by 485 and 2274 ha in
Khulna, 1808 and 687 ha in Sylhet and 831 and 1462 ha in Rajshahi
respectively. Vegetation cover, however, city in Barisal appears to be
increased by 2117 ha. These are due to mainly much of the study areas
are rural-urban mixed and partly because of increasing number of
homestead vegetation resulting from reforestation program in the
coastal areas of the country.
4. Compositional and congurational changes in landscape
pattern
Anthropogenic activities such as urbanization continued to reveal,

78
M.M. Hassan Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983

Rajshahi Rangpur
North North
500
900
450
800
North 400 North
North 700 North 350
West East West East
600 300
500 250
400 200
300 150
200 100
100 50

West 0 East West 0 East

South South South South

West East West East

South South

Sylhet Khulna
North North
800 2500
700
600
North 2000 North
North West North East
West East
500 1500
400
1000
300
200 500
100
West 0 East West 0 East

South South
South West South East West East

South
South

Barisal
North
700

600
North North
500
West East
400

300

200

100

West 0 East

South South
West East

South

2014 2000 1989 1973

Fig. 6. Spatial and temporal urban/built-up expansion trajectory in ve cities.

landscapes become increasingly complex in shape and structure,
leading to leap-frog and discontinuous development across the city
(Yetao et al., 2010). Impervious surfaces including roads, buildings, and
other man-made infrastructure serve as walls to animal movement,
dividing wildlife populations, disrupting gene ow, metapopulation
dynamics and species dispersal, transforming contiguous landscapes
into small patches with low connectivity (Liu and Yang, 2015; Seto and
Fragkias, 2005; Lausch et al., 2015). Thus, urbanization, characterized
by multiple impervious surfaces, possesses signicant ecological threats
to wildlife over time through the process of habitat loss and degrada-
tion due to landscape fragmentation (Wu et al., 2011; YeTao et al.,
2010).
Over the last decades, post classication land cover maps with
landscape metrics have been used to study landscape fragmentation
analysis (Seto and Fragkias, 2005; YeTao et al., 2010; Shrestha et al.,
2012). Landscape metrics provide quantitative representation of habitat

79
M.M. Hassan Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983

% Urban Land MPS NP

80 18 2000

16 1800
70
1600
60 14
1400
12
50 1200
10
40 1000
8
30 800
6
600
20
4 400
10 2 200
0 0 0
1973 1989 2000 2014 1973 1989 2000 2014 1973 1989 2000 2014

ED AWMPFD LPI

120 1.28 80

70
100 1.26
60
80 1.24
50

60 1.22 40

1.20 30
40
20
20 1.18
10
0 1.16 0
1973 1989 2000 2014 1973 1989 2000 2014 1973 1989 2000 2014

Fig. 7. Changes in spatial metrics at class-level across the ve cities.

PD CONTAG LSI
80
25 70 30
60
20 25
50
20
15 40
30 15
10
20 10
5 10
5
0
0 1973 1989 2000 2014 0
1973 1989 2000 2014 1973 1989 2000 2014

SHEI SHDI IJI

0.90 1.60 90
0.80 1.40 80
0.70 1.20 70
0.60 1.00 60
0.50 50
0.80
0.40 40
0.60
0.30 30
0.20 0.40
20
0.10 0.20 10
0.00 0.00 0
1973 1989 2000 2014 1973 1989 2000 2014 1973 1989 2000 2014

Fig. 8. Changes in spatial metrics at landscape-level across the ve cities.

composition and conguration within landscapes by measuring frag-
mentation and describing specic patterns and process for a given
landscape. As this study specically focuses on landscape fragmentation
in terms of spatial connectivity, the landscape metrics that are the most
relevant to achieve the research objectives and provide insights into the
key ecological components and urbanization patterns are employed and
explained. Thus, six landscape level metrics, i.e., PD, SHEI, IJI, SHDI,
AWMFD, LSI, and CONTG, and six class level metrics including MPS,
NP, ED, AWMPFD and LPI were selected and computed using the
FRAGSTATS (McGarigal and Marks, 1995) spatial pattern analysis
program. The results and generated matrix are shown in Fig. 7 and 8.
Both class level and landscape level metrics computed in this study
suggest that there are diverse landscape patterns and land fragmenta-
tion processes across the ve cities. For example, the number of patches
(NP) for the city of Barisal, Khulna, Rajshahi and Rangpur rst in-
creased and then declined, while the city of Rangpur continues to in-
crease towards the end of the periods. NP basically describes the degree
of subdivision for a specic class of landscape by counting the total

80
M.M. Hassan
number of patches for a given area (Turner et al., 2001). While NP is
best used in conjunction with other landscape metrices, increasing
patches in a given landscape generally indicates greater fragmentation
with less continuity. Initially, the city of Barisal showed the greater
number of vegetation patches and peaking in 1989, while urban and
agricultural patches both grew gradually, reaching the greatest number-
around 550 patches- at the end of the study period. This indicates a
highly-fragmented city landscape due to high number of small patches.
Vegetation patches across the ve cities remain highest over the study
period compared to a dierent time period. This may be a result of the
expansion of homestead vegetation and urban sprawl at the rural-urban
interface at the city edges.
LPI quanties landscape composition through the percent of land-
scape occupied by the largest patch (Mcgarigal, 2001). It is the ratio of
the area covered by the larges patch in the landscape to the total area of
landscape. LPI has widely been used as an indicator of landscape
fragmentation (Sun et al., 2014; Zhang et al., 2004; Zhang et al., 2012).
LPI approaches 0 when the largest patch of the corresponding patch
type is increasingly small and 100 when the entire landscape consists of
a single patch. Largest patch index (LPI), across the ve cities sharply
declined since 1973 but then increased from the year of 2000. This
implies that the once dominant vegetation and agricultural land cover
declined due to rapid expansion of urbanization and were replaced by
built-up patches. LPI both in Barisal and Rangpur decline at 44% and
60% respectively, while in Khulna, Sylhet and Rajshahi LPI declined
until 1989 at 40%, 16% and 57% respectively, then increased until the
end of the study time period. The examination of LPI for each class
allows a better understanding about the behavior of this metric than
when analyzed for the entire landscape. LPI at the class level quanties
the percentage of total landscape area comprised by the largest patch.
As such, it is a simple measure of dominance. For example, agricultural
patch for all the cities were the dominant classes in 1973. However, it
decreased with time, declining to 95% in Barisal, 97% in Rajshahi, 96%
in Khulna and 78% in Rangpur due to increasing dominance of built-up
land cover.
The quantity and quality of the large patches have a direct impact
on the total number and diversity of species in the ecosystem (Freitas
et al., 2013). Patch size aects biomass, primary productivity, nutrient
storage per unit area, as well as species composition and diversity
(Asgarian et al., 2015; Wei and Zhang, 2012). As a general rule, the
larger the patch, the better it is for wildlife conservation. Patch Size is
used to measure the subdivision of habitat in a landscape and can serve
as an indicator of ecosystem function as the size of patches can indicate
the number of species that the area can support. Mean Patch Size (MPS)
for all the cities in this study dropped sharply since the 19731989 and
remained constant during the rest of the period. This might seem sur-
prising; however, it can be explained by the loss of several of the
smaller vegetation patches.
PD and ED metrics both measure the complexity of the shape of
patch and represent the spatial heterogeneity of a landscape mosaic
(Wei and Zhang, 2012). ED is a measurement of landscape congura-
tion with applications to the study of edge eects. Both PD and ED
metrics grew steadily across the ve cities which indicates the in-
creasing fragmentation in the landscapes. There is a notable spike in PD
for the city of Rangpur and Sylhet in 2000 and in ED for all ve cities in
1989 which can be attributed to the proliferation of vegetation and
agricultural patches. The highest rate of change of both metrics was
observed in the period between 1989 and 2000. Examination of edge
metrics at class level found both agriculture and vegetation edge den-
sity metrics was the highest in 1973 and keep growing to the rest of the
period for the ve cities except Sylhet and Khulna where built-up edges
replaced in agricultural classes from the year of 1989. Shape metrics are
as important as patch size metrics for the understanding of landscape
conguration. LSI as shape metrics for this study increases over time in
all cases, although it has lower value in Khulna and Sylhet and higher
value in Barisal and Rangpur at the end of the period. (Fig. 8)
81
Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 7 (2017) 6983
Diversity metrics quantify landscape composition by measuring
richness and evenness of patch types (Shoyama and Braimoh, 2011).
Diversity metrics are inuenced by the number of land cover categories,
and by patch richness and evenness. Shannon's Diversity Index (SHDI)
measures relative patch diversity, or the proportional abundance of
each patch type within the landscape. SHDI index tends to be zero when
there is only one patch in the landscape and increases as the number of
patch types increases. While Shannon's Evenness Index (SHEI) measures
the patch distribution and abundance within landscape. SHEI is equal to
zero when the observed patch distribution is low and approaches one
when the distribution of patch types becomes more even. From 1973 to
2014 the diversity metric for the city of Barisal, Rangpur and Rajshahi
increased constantly indicating that the landscape composition became
more even and land use types were more equally distributed. However,
this trend was inversed during 19892014 for the Khulna and Sylhet,
suggesting an increasing heterogenous in that particular landscape. In
contrast, the subsequent slight decline in SHDI and SHEI between 2000
and 2014 reected that the continual increase in urban land use trun-
cated the heterogeneity and made landscape uneven again.
CONTAG is a landscape-level metric that measures to what extent
landscapes are aggregated or clumped as a percentage of the maximum
possible (O'Neill et al., 1988). CONTAG approaches 100 when all patch
types are maximally aggregated and the landscape consists of single
patch. While CONTAG approaches 0 when the patch types are vastly
disaggregated with landscape is dominated by greater number of
smaller patches. The CONTAG tend to decrease over time and parti-
cularly at a higher rate in Barisal, Rangpur and Sylhet, however the
values again became higher since 2000. This tendency armed that
landscape was vastly disaggregated and less contiguous pattern during
the period of 19892000 then it tends to be homogeneous, mainly in-
uenced by increasing urban classes. This fact is already evident as the
land cover map shows the agricultural dominated urban landscape of
1973 became spatially heterogeneous and fragmented during the ex-
pansion of anthropogenic structure and vegetation cover by 1989. Later
of the study period, vegetation and agriculture becomes segmented into
smaller patches, as a result, a new matrix of urban development has
replaced over the vegetation matrix.
The area-weighted mean patch fractal dimension (AWMPFD) de-
scribes the shape complexity of a landscape (Tian and Wu, 2015).
AWMPFD approaches 1 for landscapes with simple shape of perimeter
while it approaches 2 for highly complex shape of perimeters. The
fragmentation of the built-up patches, expressed by the AWMPFD,
shows a uctuation and diverse trend across the ve landscapes. The
value of AWMPFD shows an increasing trend at the end of the period
before it dropped signicantly in 2000. This trend, however, was higher
in Barisal and Rajshahi then Rangpur, Sylhet and Khulna. This con-
rmed that the landscapes for the ve cities had complex shape peri-
meters between 1973 and 1989 then again in 2014.
The last metric computed for this study is the Interspersion
Juxtaposition Index (IJI), which measures patch adjacency or how
patch types are interspersed or intermixed within a landscape. IJI is
calculated in percentage and approaches 100% when all classes are well
interspersed and approaches zero when patch types are poorly inter-
mingled. IJI tends to decline for the city of Barisal, Khulna and Rajshahi
before it reached its highest of around 60% in 2000. For the city of
Rangpur, the IJI value tended to increase from 45% in 1973 to 65% in
2014. The IJI value for Sylhet increases in 2014 but at a lower level
than in 1973. Overall the IJI results indicate that Sylhet and Rangpur
city landscape leading to a more intermingled than Rajshahi, Khulna
and Barisal. They also indicate that the highest interspersion for all
cities during the period of analysis occurred in 19892000. This pos-
sibly indicates a trajectory of urban expansion and landscape trans-
formation within the study area.
The gradual changes in landscape metrics across the ve cities
suggest that the landscapes are constantly undergoing a major trans-
formation from one dominant land cover to another resulting from
M.M. Hassan
eect of disturbances, and the growth of human activities. This dra-
matic land cover change stimulated by rapid urbanization in these ve
cities has resulted in a fundamental change of landscape patterns.
Therefore, the impact of these spatial relationships on ecological pro-
cess is a promising subject and important for further studies.
5. Conclusion
This study quantitatively characterizes the land use/land cover
pattern and dynamics of urban expansion in ve divisional cities in
Bangladesh using Landsat imagery enabling with GIS and Remote
Sensing techniques over the period of 19732014. The results suggest
that the selected study area has undergone rapid urban development
over these 41 years. Urban/built-up areas have increased by 468%,
covering about six times the urban area as in 1973, resulting in a sig-
nicant decline in vegetation cover and crop elds. Urban pressure in
Bangladesh, fueled by the granting of independence in 1971, resulted in
gradual increases in quality of life as well as the emergence of new
services and infrastructure, such as educational, administrative, health
and other civic facilities, leading to progressive urban transformation in
the country. As a result, both urban/built-up expansion as well as po-
pulation growth in the cities were highest during the period of
19731989 as can be seen in this study. Highest growth among the ve
study areas, by this time, was documented in Rajshahi, Sylhet and
Rangpur, at 12.36%, 11.02% and 16% respectively. From 19892000,
all ve cities maintained relatively stable growth, averaging 6% per
year. Growth continued during the following year; however, the rate
was in most cases less than 3%, as calculated from the land cover maps
of 2000 and 2014. Major urban growth took place in the direction of
southwest and northwest in the cities of Khulna and Barisal, while cities
in the north expanded in all directions, particularly to the east, west,
north and north-west. The ndings also suggest a continuous increase in
built-up areas replacing agricultural and vegetation areas, at a rate
much faster than the urban population growth in all ve cities, whose
dynamics are supported by a pre-existing growth center and road in-
frastructure. The changes in CONTAG, ED, AWMPFD and diversity
index indicate a higher spatial heterogeneity in the landscape due to
increasing dominance of built-up areas. This process however, is
markedly dierent in Rangpur, Rajshahi and Barisal where both vege-
tation and built-up predominately increases resulting in a highly frag-
mented landscape. As such expansion puts a strain on urban eciencies
and creates a wide range of management and environmental problems,
GIS and RS technologies might be considered as important tools and
techniques for analyzing the processes and eects of many rapidly
growing urban areas in less developed countries, where alternative
sources of information are limited due to lack of resources. Hence, the
time series thematic map and spatial information generated from this
study using remote sensing and GIS may assist local planners and sta-
keholders in the country as well as concerned academia to better un-
derstand urban dynamics at a local level. In addition, it will serve as a
guide for determining the best use of limited land and other resources
that are available at the local level, and in planning for an urban future
based on a vision of sustainable urban development and its implica-
tions.
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