Spatiotemporal change in land use patterns of coupled human–environment system with an integrated monitoring approach: A case study of Lianyungang, China

There is an urgent need to quantitatively monitor the spatiotemporal pattern–process interactions of coupled human–environment systems in rapidly urbanizing areas. In this study, we mainly referred to structural(not functional) aspects of land-use pattern, and especially, we targeted at landscape composition and landscape fragmentation. We applied an integrated monitoring approach, to a case study of a new and fast-growing city in the east coast of China. This approach included gradient, spatial overlay and square blocks sampling analysis. The results showed that (1) over the past seven years, the urbanization intensified with its percentage of construction land from 8.19% in 2004 through 17.15% in 2008 to 25.79% in at the cost of more fragmentized agricultural land system and loss of wetland ecosystems; (2) Lianyungang is experiencing rapid urban expansions over the 2004–2008 and 2008–2011 periods in a dispersed and leapfrogged but not compact form; (3) the hypothesis of urban expansion following a process of diffusion and coalescence proposed by Dietzel et al. (2005) were confirmed again by this study; (4) the relationship between patch density of construction land and the degree of urbanization was characterized as an inverted Ushape pattern. Moreover, this study revealed the threshold of the changes of landscape fragmentation while the degree of urbanization is increasing until about 20–40% for Lianyungang city, which should be carefully applied to other places; (5) mean patch size follows an exponential growth or a quadratic growth in the process of urbanization in this study, which is new finding that has not been revealed by other relative case studies reviewed and stand the tests.

► We apply an integrated monitoring approach to examine spatiotemporal change in land use patterns of coupled human–environment system in a coastal city of China.
► We explore the relationships between patch density as well as mean patch size of construction land and the degree of urbanization.
► We reveal the threshold of the changes of landscape fragmentation while the degree of urbanization is increasing.
► Mean patch size of construction land will follow an exponential growth or a quadratic growth in the process of urbanization.