Analysis of urban sprawl and its role in the trend of green space changes Case study: City of Yazd

Physical urban growth has the most significant impact on the vegetation of surrounding areas; the assessment and analysis of these changes are essential in geography and use different mechanisms. Here, remote sensing is the main technology for assessing expansion and the rate of change of land cover. Accordingly, the present study has been conducted with the aim of evaluating the physical growth of the city of Yazd in the years 1986–2016 and its impact on the trend of urban green space changes through the use of satellite images. This is an exploratory-descriptive research and it is cognitive in terms of the objective. To achieve this objective, the data from remote sensing and geographic information systems are used. The calculation of the trend of physical growth changes indicates that the city area was 3,118.25 hectares in 1986 and it increased to 15,232.47 hectares during a 30-year period; 52 percent of the urban growth was related to the horizontal and sprawl growth of the city. Assessment of the NDVI index showed that the density of vegetation had a tangible decreasing trend so that the sum of good and excellent vegetation was equal to 2,419 hectares in 1986; in 2016, the vegetation decreased to only 1,601 hectares. The maximum decrease in vegetation exactly corresponds with the maximum physical urban growth in the northwestern and the southeastern parts of the city such that the results of the research showed about 818 hectares of vegetation and gardens became constructed lands between 1986 and 2016