Impact of Settlement Growth on Yenagoa’s Urban Environment

This research is a study on the assessment of settlement growth and its impact on the urban environment in Yenagoa Metropolis. Landsat imageries of 1988, 1996, 2004, 2012 and 2020 were acquired from the United Sates Geographical Survey. Supervised image classifications using level 1 classification scheme was adopted to extract LandUse/LandCover. The five Epochs of images were used to extract the built-up areas, water bodies and vegetation areas. The area (ha) of land use for each epoch was determined using clipping images. The spatio-temporal changes were determined as a percentage of LULC per epoch and which was done following standard methods. Mapping technique was used to compare satellite imageries. Findings showed that built up areas was 1,279.81 in 1988, 2,497.87 in 1996, 4,554.73 in 2009, 7,804.30 in 2012 and 10,447.50 in 2020. While the percentage change of built-up are in 1988 was 6.12%, 1996 was 11.94%, 2004 was 21.78%, 2012 was 34.31% and 2020 was 30.09%, respectively. It is therefore recommended here that government should empower urban planning and development agencies, legally and financially to carry out their responsibility to implement existing master plan of the city. Engage in citizen education on how to contribute in managing the environment and sustainable land use management framework in the study area for proper management of the urban environment to enhance sustained settlement growth in the city.