College of Earth Sciences, Jilin University, Changchun, Jilin, China.
Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
PLoS One. 2019 Mar 6;14(3):e0211964. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0211964. eCollection 2019.
Urban change (urbanization) has dominated land change science for several decades. However, few studies have focused on what many scholars call the urban densification process (i.e., urban intensity expansion) despite its importance to both planning and subsequent impacts to the environment and local economies. This paper documents past urban densification patterns and uses this information to predict future densification trends in southeastern Wisconsin (SEWI) by using a rich dataset from the United States and by adapting the well-known Land Transformation Model (LTM) for this purpose. Urban densification is a significant and progressive process that often accompanies urbanization more generally. The increasing proportion of lower density areas, rather than higher density areas, was the main characteristic of the urban densification in SEWI from 2001 to 2011. We believe that improving urban land use efficiency to maintain rational densification are effective means toward a sustainable urban landscape. Multiple goodness-of-fit metrics demonstrated that the reconfigured LTM performed relatively well to simulate urban densification patterns in 2006 and 2011, enabling us to forecast densification to 2016 and 2021. The predicted future urban densification patterns are likely to be characterized by higher densities continue to increase at the expense of lower densities. We argue that detailed categories of urban density and specific relevant predictor variables are indispensable for densification prediction. Our study provides researchers working in land change science with important insights into urban densification process modeling. The outcome of this model can help planners to identify the current trajectory of urban development, enabling them to take informed action to promote planning objectives, which could benefit sustainable urbanization definitely.
城市变化（城市化）主导了土地变化科学几十年。然而，尽管城市密度扩张（即城市强度扩展）对规划以及对环境和地方经济的后续影响都很重要，但很少有研究关注这一过程。本文记录了过去的城市密度扩张模式，并利用来自美国的丰富数据集，通过适应著名的土地转换模型（LTM）来预测未来东南威斯康星州（SEWI）的密度扩张趋势。城市密度扩张是一个重要且渐进的过程，通常伴随着更广泛的城市化。2001 年至 2011 年，SEWI 城市密度扩张的主要特征是低密度区域的比例增加，而不是高密度区域。我们认为，提高城市土地利用效率以维持合理的密度扩张是实现可持续城市景观的有效手段。多项拟合优度指标表明，经重构的 LTM 在模拟 2006 年和 2011 年城市密度扩张模式方面表现相对较好，从而使我们能够预测到 2016 年和 2021 年的密度扩张情况。未来城市密度扩张模式可能的特征是高密度持续增加，而低密度不断减少。我们认为，城市密度的详细类别和具体相关预测变量是密度扩张预测不可或缺的。本研究为从事土地变化科学研究的人员提供了有关城市密度扩张过程建模的重要见解。该模型的结果可以帮助规划者识别当前的城市发展轨迹，使他们能够采取明智的行动来促进规划目标，这无疑将有利于可持续的城市化。
