Study of the Simulated Expansion Boundary of Construction Land in Shanghai Based on a SLEUTH Model

The SLEUTH model is one of the recent methodological advances, but its data sources are mainly interpreted from remote sensing images. It doesn’t cover the whole urban area and exhibits technical errors. Moreover, the relationships between land use and land cover change (LUCC) and sustainability have seldom been discussed. Aimed at addressing these shortcomings, we focus on a wider range and use different data sources to simulate and predict the boundary of urban construction land expansion, and analyze the relationship between the expansion style of urban land and the change of ecological service value. Based on Shanghai land use map data, which covers the whole city scope and eliminates the error in data processing, we use a SLEUTH model to simulate the urban growth mode in Shanghai in 2020 under two scenarios, i.e., the natural growth mode and ecological priority mode, which are different from the previous scenario modes such as unprotected, light protected, moderately protected, and heavily protected modes. The results are as follows: (1) The development of urban land in Shanghai is most reasonable under the ecological priority mode as its ecological service value is higher than that of the natural growth mode; (2) Construction land expansion in Shanghai is very slow under the ecological priority mode, wherein construction land growth mainly occurs in the northwest, southwest, and southeast of Shanghai, and the northwest part of Chongming Island; (3) The surrounding area of the central city is given priority over edge growth, where the growth range is small. The outer suburbs are given priority for widespread growth, which is synchronous with the slow growth of roads.