Modeling of urban growth in tsunami-prone city using logistic regression: Analysis of Banda Aceh, Indonesia

The urban development of Banda Aceh, Indonesia was very rapid after the tsunami in 2004, posing critical challenges in planning for its future sustainable development. Scientifically-derived information about its land change patterns and the driving factors of its rapid urbanization might provide vital information. However, the spatio-temporal patterns of its urban land use/cover (LUC) changes have not been examined. Hence, this study aims to: (1) detect and analyze the spatio-temporal changes in the urban LUC of Banda Aceh between 2005 and 2009; and (2) examine the driving factors that influence urban growth. The 2005 and 2009 LUC maps were derived from remote sensing satellite images using a supervised classification method (maximum likelihood). Both LUC maps contained four categories, namely built-up area, vegetation, water body, and wet land. The 2005 LUC map had an overall accuracy of 77.8%, while the 2009 LUC map had 89.4%. The two LUC maps were re-classed into two categories (i.e. built-up area and non built-up area) to facilitate logistic regression analysis. A total of seven variables or potential driving factors of urban growth were identified and examined, including two socio-economic factors (population density and distance to central business district) and five biophysical factors (distances to green open space, historical area, river, highway, and coastal area). The results showed that the LUC of Banda Aceh has changed drastically between 2005 and 2009, particularly its built-up area, which increased by 90.8% (1016.0 ha) at the expense of the other LUC categories. The socio-economic factors showed positive influence to the growth of the city, whereas the biophysical factors showed negative effect, except the distance to coastal areas. The importance of the findings for future landscape and urban planning for Banda Aceh is discussed.