How Urban Expansion Influencing Temporal and Spatial Changes in Land Use: A Case Study of Nanchang, Southeast China

The accelerated pace of global urbanization has exacerbated the tension between anthropogenic activities and land resource allocation, rendering systematic evaluation of urban expansion’s spatial impacts on regional land-use patterns imperative for informing sustainable land-use planning strategies and facilitating coordinated socioeconomic development. Nanchang was selected as the study area to investigate urban land-use dynamics. Multitemporal Landsat imagery spanning 2005 to 2020 was subjected to spatial pattern analysis, followed by CA-Markov modeling projections of land-use evolution. This integrated methodology enabled systematic evaluation of land resource allocation efficacy in Nanchang, providing empirical evidence for optimizing spatial planning decisions. The results show that: From 2005 to 2020, woodland areas exhibited a continuous decline, with a cumulative reduction of 300.27 km 2 over the 15-year period. Concurrently, unused land underwent conversion to construction and agricultural land uses, resulting in a proportional decrease. While both grassland and construction land demonstrated proportional increases, the expansion rate of construction land showed a marked acceleration during the study period. Agricultural land, woodland, grassland and water areas are greatly affected by elevation slope. Construction land is greatly affected by the convenience of transportation, and old construction land, as the initial boundary of expansion, has driven the transformation of surrounding land use. In 2035, agricultural land will remain largely stable; woodland will slightly decrease; both grassland and water areas will show a decreasing trend; and construction land will increase by 306.31 km 2 . A comprehensive understanding of land use dynamics in Nanchang provides critical insights for sustainable urban planning. The integration of developmental initiatives with ecological conservation constitutes a fundamental requirement for achieving sustainable land resource management and regional sustainable development.