Spatial metrics and Landsat data for urban landuse change detection: case of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Geospatial Technologies.

The rapid development of urbanization coupled with fast demographic change and high demand for land resource requires landuse information for management and planning activities of urban regions. The advent of geospatial tools has great potential to long term monitoring and assessment of urban growth and its associated problems in surrounding landcover. This study analyzes urban landuse/landcover change of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, using landsat TM and ETM+ acquired, respectively, in 1986 and 2000. The landcover maps with four classes were generated using the Maximum Likelihood Algorithm of Supervised Classification. Overall classification accuracy was tested by Confusion Metrics and Kappa Coefficient. The landcover dynamics in pattern and quantities were analyzed using selected Spatial Metrics units. It has been found that tremendous changes in landcover occurred over the study period. The results indicated that the built-up area expanded to 49% with annual growth rate around 3.5% with significant fragmentation and contagion of small and isolated urban patches. Managers and planners could use this data as a decision-support tool for urban and environment management.