Spatial Development Process of the City of Izmit

Rapid developments in technology allow people to gain more knowledge about earth. People, who know the earth, have unconsciously and unlimited began to benefit from natural resources. This situation has revealed many spatial problems. Some of the most important spatial problems in cities are incorrect land use that is made without any consideration of land use capability and problems resulting from unplanned and rapid urbanization. The best way to evaluate and plan limited natural resources under the pressure of a growing population is to make a proper land use management. Therefore, monitoring of changes on land cover and use is significant for prudential planning activities. In this study, the spatial changes of the city of Izmit were revealed in temporal process, land use changes and expansion direction of urban areas were detected. The reasons and consequences affecting this situation were investigated. Thus, a significant base was created for the prudential planning of the city of Izmit. Landsat satellite images, providing continuous data from past to present, were analysed by supervised classification method; RS and GIS, while determining urban growth. According to the results, an increase was recorded in urban areas up to 2177 ha between the 1985 and 2015 period. This dramatic change has resulted in the decline of 1211 ha of farmland. Another conclusion is that the expansion direction of urban areas was determined to the north, south and east. Physical and human geography factors, affecting the urban development in the given trend, were examined in detail.