Abstract

Up-to-date information on land use and land cover, especially in urban areas, and awareness of its changes and developments over a period of time is very important for planners and managers. The present study aims to monitor spatial changes in land use and land cover in the urban area of Babol and Amirkola in the period 1986 to 2020 and forecasting it for 2030. The present research is applied based on the purpose and descriptive-analytical based on the nature and method. Data are taken from Landsat 5 and 8 satellite images. The Fuzzy ARTMAP model was used to detect and classify images, the cross-tab and LCM models were used to analyze land use and land cover changes, and the CA-Markov model was used to predict land use and land cover in 2030 in the IDRISI TerrSet software environment. ArcGIS software was also used to draw the final maps. The results showed that the conversion of garden-use and irrigated agriculture into the built environment has a growing trend, so that these lands have increased from 11.3% in 1986 to 19.7% in 2020 and according to the forecast by 2030, built-up land will reach 22.2% of the total area. Also, the ratio of built-up to non-built land has increased from 12.8 percent in 1986 to 24.5 percent in 2020, and is projected to reach 28.6 percent in 2030, which shows the high rate of garden and agricultural lands destruction.