Assessment of land use changes in düzce province following the 1999 east Marmara earthquake

This study was conducted to monitor the temporal changes in land use that occurred in Düzce Province following the earthquakes of August 17 and November 12, 1999, using Remote Sensing (RS) and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) techniques. The analysis was based on four periods of Landsat satellite imagery obtained from the Earth Explorer platform. The 1999 Landsat 7 ETM+ image was selected to represent the pre-earthquake period, while subsequent data were acquired from Landsat 5 TM for 2009 and Landsat 8 OLI for both 2019 and 2024. Prior to classification, the images were subjected to geometric and atmospheric corrections and enhanced using various image processing techniques, including band combinations and Principal Component Analysis (PCA). Different band combinations were utilized to improve the spectral separability of key land cover types, particularly agricultural areas, built-up areas, and forested lands. Based on the CORINE land cover classification scheme, the study area was categorized into four main land use classes; agriculture, forest, artificial surfaces, and water bodies. Supervised classification was performed using the Support Vector Machine (SVM) algorithm in the ArcGIS software environment. Accuracy assessments were conducted separately for each band combination, and the results were evaluated comparatively. The classification outputs were then used to identify land use changes over the 25-year period, with a particular focus on the post-earthquake expansion patterns of urban areas. This research aims to contribute to a better spatial understanding of land cover transformation in Düzce, particularly in the context of post-disaster urban development dynamics.