Prediction of land‐use conversions for use in watershed‐scale hydrological modeling: a Canadian case study. (22nd August 2014)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: El‐Khoury, Antoun; Seidou, Ousmane; Lapen, David R.; Sunohara, Mark; Zhenyang, Que; Mohammadian, Majid; Daneshfar, Bahram
• Is Part Of: Canadian geographer. Volume 58:Number 4(2014)
• Page Start: 499
• Page End: 516
• Publication Date: 2014-08-22
• Subjects: Geography -- Periodicals; 910
• DOI: 10.1111/cag.12105
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0008-3658

Abstract

<abstract abstract-type="main" xml:lang="en"> <title>Abstract</title> <sec id="cag12105-sec-0002" sec-type="section"> <p>Land‐use conversion models elucidate the complexities and spatial interdependencies of components of land use systems and provide insights into future land‐use configurations. In this paper, the 2012–2050 future land‐use patterns in the South Nation (SN) River basin, located in eastern Ontario, Canada, were generated with a modified version of the CLUE model and a 2011 reference map. The SN is an example of a basin where some water quality endpoints have dropped below acceptable limits because of a combination of intensive agriculture, urbanization, and climate change. Five historical land‐use maps were used to identify the historical trends in generalized land‐use classes. Seven demographic and geographic factors were used to derive the spatial distribution of land suitability to each land‐use class. The methodology was first validated by simulating land‐use changes from 1991 to 2011 starting from the 1991 reference map, and comparing the simulated 2011 map to the 2011 reference map. Then, the 2012–2050 land‐uses were generated, assuming historical trends derived from historical reference maps will continue in the future. Environmental impacts of the projected land‐use changes were discussed.</p> </sec> </abstract>