A GIS-based moving window analysis of landscape pattern in the Beijing metropolitan area, China

Abstract

Quantifying landscape pattern and its change is essential for monitoring and assessment of ecological consequences of urbanization. Using the GIS-based land-use data for 2002, we combined moving window analysis along an urban-rural gradient and around the urban centre with landscape metrics to quantify the spatial pattern of urbanization in Beijing. The results of moving window analysis along the urban-rural gradient indicated that, for class-level metrics, the spatial pattern of urbanization could be quantified using landscape metrics, different land-use types exhibited distinctive spatial signatures, and, for landscape-level metrics, the increase in urbanization in the metropolitan Beijing region has resulted in dramatic increases in patch density (PD), edge density (ED), and patch and landscape shape complexity, and sharp decreases in the largest and mean patch size (MPS), agriculture land-use type, and landscape connectivity. The results of moving window analysis around the urban centre showed that the direction of urbanization could be quantified using the class-level metrics, and landscape-level metrics indicated similar results to gradient analysis. In general, moving window analysis showed that the increasingly urbanized landscape became compositionally more diverse, geometrically more complex, and ecologically more fragmented.