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Urban sprawl has become a remarkable feature in urban development, especially in developing countries, in the last decades. To face this phenomenon, it is required to first forecast auto-spreading orientation rural areas over time in order to avoid shapeless urban growth. Although GIS/RS and CA-Markov models are applied to study urban growth patterns the world over, very few studies have applied these methods to examine the urban growth of Iran. A major land use change is detected here from 1989 to 2013. In this study the future sprawl of this province is forecasted for target years of 2025 and 2037 through a simulation. The results predict an alarming increase in urban development for the target years of 2025 and 2037, with an expansion is predicted to develop of 11510 and 18320 ha, respectively. In sum, this model is an efficient tool for the support of urban planning decisions and facilitates the process of sustainable urban development providing decisionmakers.

Abstract:The hypothesis addressed in this article is to determine the extent of selected land use categories with respect to their effect on urban expansion. A model that combines a logistic regression model, Markov chain, together with cellular automata based modeling, is introduced here to simulate future urban growth and development in the Gilan Province, Iran. The model is calibrated based on data beginning in 1989 and ending in 2013 and is applied in making predictions for the years 2025 and 2037, across 12 urban development criteria. The relative operating characteristic (ROC) is validated with a very high rate of urban development. The analyzed results indicate that the area of urban land has increased by more than 1.7% that is, from 36,012.5 ha in 1989 to 59,754.8 ha in 2013 and the area of the Caspian Hyrcanian forestland has reduced by 31,628 ha. The simulation results, with respect to prediction, indicate an alarming increase in the rate of urban development in the province by 2025 and 2037 that is, 0.82% and 1.3%, respectively. The development pattern is expected to be uneven and scattered, without following any particular direction. The development will occur close to the existing or newly-formed urban infrastructure and around major roads and commercial areas. If not controlled, this development trend will lead to the loss of 25,101 ha of Hyrcanian forest and, if continued, 21,774 ha of barren and open lands are expected to be destroyed by the year 2037. These results demonstrate the capacity of the integrated model in establishing comparisons with urban plans and their utility to explain both the volume and constraints of urban growth. It is beneficial to apply the integrated approach in urban dynamic assessment through land use modeling with respect to spatio-temporal representation in distinct urban development formats.

This paper examines the first 10 years (1979—89) of the implementation of the Urban Land Act in Iran in order to revisit the debate on the capacity of market-enabling policies to improve low-income housing provision in developing countries. The outcome of the Iranian experience during the study period shows that, at the very least, governments can play an important and effective role in low- and middle-income housing provision through direct provision of urban land in parallel with markets. This suggests that the best way forward may be a combination of market-enabling approaches that develop basic institutional functions plus proactive government intervention for developing public land banks to provide better access to cheap land for a range of housing providers including individual households, co-operatives and private developers.

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Urban environments are often subject to many challenges, which make it very difficult to assess sustainability performance of urbanization. Indexing can be an appropriate systematic tool for sustainability assessment in sophisticated decision‐making situations involving simultaneous consideration of multiple qualitative and quantitative factors. In this study, a systems approach was adopted to develop a composite index called SUQCI (Sustainable Urban Quality Composite Index) in order to assess the potential of a city to become sustainable. The index is composed of 10 components containing a total number of 16 indicators. According to which, the 22 districts of Tehran City were compared in terms of sustainability of urban environment quality. The obtained results indicated that the Districts 1, 2, and 3 are in ideal sustainability conditions. These areas are among prosperous places of the city. About 59.09% of all districts were below the average SUQCI. The Districts 18 and 19 with the SUQCI values of 0.21 and 0.25 remain in critical condition. In overall, a great injustice in distribution of sustainability components is observed in Tehran so that unsustainable urban environment becomes more evident in underserved areas of the city. In recent years, increasing attempts have been made to overcome the injustice. © 2015 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Environ Prog, 34: 1473–1480, 2015

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