Monitoring settlement dynamics by anisotropic textural analysis of panchromatic VHR data

Abstract

A procedure for the calculation of a "built-up presence index" is presented. The index is based on fuzzy rule-based composition of anisotropic textural measures derived from the satellite data by the gray-level co-occurrence matrix (GLCM). The case study includes multi-temporal analysis, wide area coverage (65times135 kilometers) with multiple datasets, scattered settlements, and presence of arid and semi-arid areas together with complex agricultural landscape in the background. The concept is validated comparing the output of the procedure with and exhaustive reference dataset covering 218.23 square kilometers.