STUDY OF URBAN SPRAWL ON AHMEDABAD CITY USING GEOSPATIAL DATA

Abstract

India expect to add 300 million new urban residents by year 2050. Urbanization is considered as the most influential drivers of land use and land cover change associated with population and economy. Over the years Remote Sensing and GIS techniques have been used as effective tool for detecting urban growth and it’s modelling. In order to properly plan the city, macro level planning needs to be done, for which analysis to the ward level needs to be done to understand the trend for urban area growth in order to estimate the future requirement and better enforcement of the Planning policy. Ahmedabad being a financial capital of the Gujarat which has seen tremendous growth in urban area is selected for the study. The present study aims at quantifying urban growth trend analysis and detecting the same in different levels of the city i.e. City level, Zone level and Ward level from year 1990 to 2018 over span of 28 years for Ahmedabad City. Urban growth has been analysed for every three levels for urban growth ad Road network growth and an attempt has been made to compare the trend and find out the ward wise saturation level for urban. Urban area from 1990 -2018 increased from 180 sq.km to 280 sq. km over the span of 28 years. For Zone wise analysis, we have observed that some of the areas such as East, New West have increase in urban area by more than 50% and almost on verge of saturation in terms of urban area in a zone. For zone wise analysis we have observed some wards have increase in their urban area from 30% to 90-95 % and over the span of 28%, almost reached their maximum capacity. Road density for each ward is calculated in order to understand its trend and compare it with urban growth. Zone like New west zone has had 180 km of road developed over last 28 years which shows how the area must have grown from 36% of urban area to 77% of urban area. Road network growth has decreased from 1990-97 to 2011-18 from 216 km of road already being constructed in 1990 to mere 38 km constructed in 2018. Road being a driving force for an development, has always impacted the Urban growth, but due to Road development, Estate prices also increases and same was observed for the city and a trend is observed for the same. Such Trend analysis and Sprawl map helps in understanding the city better and help us for better planning and enforcement of policies.