Changes in the extent and distribution of urban land cover in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) between 1987 and 2010

Abstract

Largely due to data unavailability, the spatial pattern of urban growth in North Korea has been rarely studied. This study explored urban changes in North Korea and provided their plausible causes. The present study used satellite‐based land cover data sets produced by the government of South Korea to examine the extent and distribution of urban land cover in North Korea between the late 1980s (1987–1989) and late 2000s (2008–2010) at the municipal level. The urban expansion intensity index (UEII) was calculated for two 10‐year intervals, and the spatial autocorrelation of UEII values was examined. Major findings from the study are summarized as follows: (a) the capital city Pyongyang's dominance continued without any obvious sign of slowing down, (b) economic development districts do not appear to have much influence on urban land cover changes, and (c) the extent of urban land cover slightly decreased in much of the country between the late 1990s (1997–1999) and late 2000s (2008–2010). The results and discussion in this study suggest internal migration and stagnant economy as probably important causes for the phenomena.

Understanding the Intensity of Land-Use and Land-Cover Changes in the Context of Postcolonial and Socialist Transformation in Kaesong, North Korea

“…It spatially visualized multiple types of land covers of Kaesong based on the Korean Multi-Purpose Satellite but with a broader geographical scope, compared to Kim et al [20]. While these two studies demonstrated only the land categories of Kaesong for each year, Kang et al [16] analyzed the change of Built areas in Kaesong, along with the other nine large cities in North Korea. According to the authors, Kaesong's urbanization was more intensive in the 1980s-1990s than the 1990s-2000s, only analyzing LUCCs during the South-North division.…”

“…Among Asian urban areas under centralized socialist regimes, LUCCs in cities and border regions of mainland China and Vietnam have been studied extensively via remote sensing data [7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15]. However, much less is known about LUCCs in North Korea (i.e., Democratic People's Republic of Korea) or in areas along the inner border of South and North Korea [16][17][18][19][20][21].…”

Associations of Urban and Green Land Covers and Heat Waves in 49 U.S. Cities between 1992 and 2019

“…The UEII method was used to analyze the characteristics of land use morphology [38,47,48]. Shenghe et al [47] analyzed the urban expansion speed of Beijing in China by using UEII.…”

“…The average yearly proportion of a newly enlarged urban area to the total area is the urban expansion intensity index (UEII) for a spatial unit [38]. Urban expansion can occur in different directions in every urban area depending on its driving factors, including road networks, population density, slope, economy, etc.…”

“…Zhuhai city in China evolved from a double center city into a multi-center city and the urban areas were aggregated around Xiangzhou and Doumen districts from 1990 to 2015 [37]. Another study in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea used the combination of UEII and Local Moran's I in the ten largest cities in Democratic People's Republic of Korea and established that the urban expansion was visible in the western inland and eastern coastal regions [38]. This study expands the use of UEII and GEII by correlating them with the urban thermal environment.…”