IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jlands/v2y2013i1p37-59d23406.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Mapping Urbanization Dynamics in Major Cities of Colombia, Ecuador, Perú, and Bolivia Using Night-Time Satellite Imagery

Author

Listed:
  • Isabel K. Parés-Ramos

    (Department of Biology, University of Puerto Rico, P.O. Box 23360, San Juan, PR 00931, USA)

  • Nora L. Álvarez-Berríos

    (Department of Environmental Sciences, University of Puerto Rico, P.O. Box 70377, San Juan, PR 00936, USA)

  • T. Mitchell Aide

    (Department of Biology, University of Puerto Rico, P.O. Box 23360, San Juan, PR 00931, USA)

Abstract

By 2050, 90% of the population in Latin America will live in cities, but there is a lack of up-to-date spatial information about the urban extent and patterns of urbanization in cities of this region. In this study, we analyzed population growth, urban density and urbanization dynamics between 1992 and 2009 in the major cities of Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador and Perú using Google Earth and DMSP/OLS night-time lights imagery. We used Google Earth to map the urban extent, and time series of night-time lights to analyze spatial patterns of urban development. The dominant urban development patterns were: high-density compact in Bogotá, Cali, Guayaquil, and Medellín; high-density expansive growth in La Paz/El Alto; low-density expansive in Quito and Santa Cruz; and a mix of high-density compact and suburban growth in Lima. Urban growth occurred largely along the periphery of cities, influenced by the local landscape and by demographic and socioeconomic factors such as immigration and housing prices. Urban density in Colombia (>20,000 per/km 2 ) was among the highest in the world. Future growth in the region will probably be characterized by densification and slow urban expansion. This study also validates the utility of Google Earth and night-time lights for monitoring urbanization.

Suggested Citation

  • Isabel K. Parés-Ramos & Nora L. Álvarez-Berríos & T. Mitchell Aide, 2013. "Mapping Urbanization Dynamics in Major Cities of Colombia, Ecuador, Perú, and Bolivia Using Night-Time Satellite Imagery," Land, MDPI, vol. 2(1), pages 1-23, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jlands:v:2:y:2013:i:1:p:37-59:d:23406
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/2/1/37/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/2/1/37/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. repec:aru:wpaper:200903 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Sutton, Paul C. & Costanza, Robert, 2002. "Global estimates of market and non-market values derived from nighttime satellite imagery, land cover, and ecosystem service valuation," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(3), pages 509-527, June.
    3. Bocarejo, Juan Pablo & Portilla, Ingrid & Pérez, Maria Angélica, 2013. "Impact of Transmilenio on density, land use, and land value in Bogotá," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 78-86.
    4. Ivo Imparato & Jeff Ruster, 2003. "Slum Upgrading and Participation : Lessons from Latin America," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 15133.
    5. Cohen, Barney, 2006. "Urbanization in developing countries: Current trends, future projections, and key challenges for sustainability," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 63-80.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Benedetto Manganelli & Beniamino Murgante, 2017. "The Dynamics of Urban Land Rent in Italian Regional Capital Cities," Land, MDPI, vol. 6(3), pages 1-18, August.
    2. Zhang, Lin & He, Xiaoxia & Jia, Zhenli, 2023. "Industrial agglomeration, public services and city size: Evidence from 286 cities in China," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).
    3. Murali, Ranjini & Suryawanshi, Kulbushansingh & Redpath, Stephen & Nagendra, Harini & Mishra, Charudutt, 2019. "Changing use of ecosystem services along a rural-urban continuum in the Indian Trans-Himalayas," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 40(C).
    4. Iwan Rudiarto & Wiwandari Handayani & Jawoto Sih Setyono, 2018. "A Regional Perspective on Urbanization and Climate-Related Disasters in the Northern Coastal Region of Central Java, Indonesia," Land, MDPI, vol. 7(1), pages 1-15, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Pankaj Bajracharya & Selima Sultana, 2022. "Examining the Use of Urban Growth Boundary for Future Urban Expansion of Chattogram, Bangladesh," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(9), pages 1-21, May.
    2. Ahsan Nawaz & Xing Su & Qaiser Mohi Ud Din & Muhammad Irslan Khalid & Muhammad Bilal & Syyed Adnan Raheel Shah, 2020. "Identification of the H&S (Health and Safety Factors) Involved in Infrastructure Projects in Developing Countries-A Sequential Mixed Method Approach of OLMT-Project," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(2), pages 1-18, January.
    3. Patrick Lehnert & Madison Dell & Uschi Backes-Gellner & Eric Bettinger, 2024. "The Effect of Postsecondary Educational Institutions on Local Economies: A Bird’s-Eye View," NBER Working Papers 32679, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Corral, Leonardo R. & Schling, Maja, 2017. "The impact of shoreline stabilization on economic growth in small island developing states," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 210-228.
    5. Alina Kulczyk-Dynowska & Agnieszka Stacherzak, 2022. "The Impact of a City on Its Environment: The Prism of Demography and Selected Environmental and Technical Aspects Based on the Case of Major Lower Silesian Cities," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(11), pages 1-18, May.
    6. Vu, Khuong & Hartley, Kris, 2018. "Promoting smart cities in developing countries: Policy insights from Vietnam," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 42(10), pages 845-859.
    7. Zhixiong Tan & Haili Wu & Qingyang Chen & Jiejun Huang, 2024. "Spatiotemporal Analysis of Air Quality and Its Driving Factors in Beijing’s Main Urban Area," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(14), pages 1-18, July.
    8. Combs, Tabitha S., 2017. "Examining changes in travel patterns among lower wealth households after BRT investment in Bogotá, Colombia," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 11-20.
    9. Dinkelman, Taryn & Schulhofer-Wohl, Sam, 2015. "Migration, congestion externalities, and the evaluation of spatial investments," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 189-202.
    10. Mari-Isabella Stan, 2022. "The impact of the pandemic crisis on employment in the context of urbanization," Technium Social Sciences Journal, Technium Science, vol. 33(1), pages 492-505, July.
    11. Juergen Bitzer & Erkan Goeren, 2018. "Foreign Aid and Subnational Development: A Grid Cell Analysis," Working Papers V-407-18, University of Oldenburg, Department of Economics, revised Mar 2018.
    12. Angel Espinoza E., 2024. "Public Transportation and Consumer Prices: Chain Stores, Street Vendors and Mom and Pop Stores," Working Papers 2024-02, Banco de México.
    13. Zhen Yang & Jun Lei & Jian-Gang Li, 2019. "Identifying the Determinants of Urbanization in Prefecture-Level Cities in China: A Quantitative Analysis Based on Spatial Production Theory," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(4), pages 1-18, February.
    14. Krittaya Sangkasem & Nattapong Puttanapong, 2022. "Analysis of spatial inequality using DMSP‐OLS nighttime‐light satellite imageries: A case study of Thailand," Regional Science Policy & Practice, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 14(4), pages 828-849, August.
    15. Mohammed Iddrisu Kambala, 2023. "Colonial Origins of Comparative Development in Ghana," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 59(2), pages 188-208, February.
    16. Malayaranjan Sahoo & Narayan Sethi, 2022. "The dynamic impact of urbanization, structural transformation, and technological innovation on ecological footprint and PM2.5: evidence from newly industrialized countries," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 24(3), pages 4244-4277, March.
    17. Bernard Fosu Frimpong & Frank Molkenthin, 2021. "Tracking Urban Expansion Using Random Forests for the Classification of Landsat Imagery (1986–2015) and Predicting Urban/Built-Up Areas for 2025: A Study of the Kumasi Metropolis, Ghana," Land, MDPI, vol. 10(1), pages 1-21, January.
    18. Yan Yan & Hui Liu & Ningcheng Wang & Shenjun Yao, 2021. "How Does Low-Density Urbanization Reduce the Financial Sustainability of Chinese Cities? A Debt Perspective," Land, MDPI, vol. 10(9), pages 1-18, September.
    19. Ulep, Valerie Gilbert T. & Ortiz, Danica Aisa P. & Go, John Juliard & Duante, Charmaine & Gonzales, Rosa C. & Mendoza, Laurita R. & Reyes, Clarissa & Elgo, Frances Rose & Aldeon, Melanie P., 2012. "Inequities in Noncommunicable Diseases," Discussion Papers DP 2012-04, Philippine Institute for Development Studies.
    20. De Luca, Giacomo & Hodler, Roland & Raschky, Paul A. & Valsecchi, Michele, 2018. "Ethnic favoritism: An axiom of politics?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 115-129.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jlands:v:2:y:2013:i:1:p:37-59:d:23406. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.