Satellite monitoring of urban spatial growth in the Amman area, Jordan

The detection and analysis of land use changes in the urban environment is an important issue in planning. Remote sensing and geographic information systems are considered as the most efficient techniques for this type of studies. These techniques had been applied to investigate the effects of urbanization on fertile lands and to quantify urban growth of Amman area. Five land covers were identified in space and time using aerial photographs, LANDSAT and IKONOS images acquired at different dates. The study showed that the urban area was increased by 162 km(2) over the period 1918-2002, which represents 509 times the original urban area. The fertile lands decreased by 86 km(2), which represents 23% of loss. Moreover, the urban expansion over 1918-2002 was analyzed and its impacts on the Amman area environment were assessed. The results of our study were compared to other similar studies for Istanbul and Bangkok. The comparison showed that Amman has the largest percent annual rate of urban expansion.