Spatial Distribution Characteristic and Type Classification of Rural Settlements: A Case Study of Weibei Plain, China

The continuous development of urbanization in China has brought new opportunities to rural settlements but has also led to spatial problems such as disorderly layout and unbalanced morphological structures, and the sustainable development of the countryside faces great challenges. As the core spatial carrier of rural settlements, scientific identification of their characteristics and delineation of their types is conducive to the subsequent spatial optimization of rural settlements to promote the coordinated and orderly development of rural areas. In recent years, several studies have explored the characteristics and classification of rural settlements based on single factor influences, but few studies have comprehensively considered them from a multidimensional perspective. To fill this gap, this paper takes the rural settlements in the Weibei Plain as the research object, uses the continuous spectral transect analysis method, combines the landscape security pattern analysis, establishes a multidimensional feature matrix model, quantitatively analyzes the spatial differentiation characteristics, and classifies the types. The key findings are as follows. (1) According to the analysis of landscape security patterns, it was divided into four types of rural settlements. The rural settlements with high and medium security patterns accounted for 86.79%, and the overall ecological adaptability was good. (2) In terms of spatial distribution, 80% of patches in the Weihe River transect are small and unevenly distributed under the influence of river runoff, gradually changing from dense to discrete; the fluctuation range of the 70% patch area is restricted by the terrain in the Hanyuan tableland transect is small and changes from discrete to dense. In terms of spatial morphology, 70% of the Weihe River transect was irregular and varied greatly. The morphology of the Hanyuan tableland transect tended to be similar, and the degree of fragmentation of the Hanyuan tableland transect was higher than that of the Weihe River transect. (3) The Weihe River transect was divided into six types of settlement space, the Hanyuan tableland transect was divided into seven types, and the characteristics of different settlement space types were quite different. The results can provide a scientific basis for the spatial planning, industrial guidance, and facility layout of rural settlements and have important significance for the rational formulation of spatial agglomeration guidance strategies and the promotion of sustainable rural development in China.