Spatial Pattern and Process of Urbanization in Karst Area-A Case Study in Guiyang City

This study aims to investigate the spatial pattern and process of urbanization in Karst area of Guiyang City, which has important significance for land management and urban planning in Karst area. Based on RS and GIS technologies,TM satellite images in 1986, 1995 and 2000 and CBERS-01 satellite image in 2006 were adopted to obtain the data of urban land utilization in the four years. The spatial pattern and process of urbanization were investigated using urbanization proportion index, urbanization intensity index and absolute expansion intensity. The urbanization process in Guiyang City was significant, exhibiting polygon-urbanization, line-urbanization and point-urbanization. From the perspective of spatial pattern, the urbanization in Guiyang City displayed the cluster development; from the perspective of urbanization process, the urbanization speed in some secondary central areas was higher than that of central areas. The spatial pattern and process of urbanization in Karst area were unique and were mainly influenced by terrain, transportation, economy, society, etc.