ABSTRACT
Our world is becoming urban. Although more than 50% of the global population already lives in urbanized areas, the United Nations (2011) foresees that by 2050, the entire expected global population growth of 2.3 billion people will be completely absorbed by urban areas. This massive process of urbanization produces immense spatial differences in stage, dynamics, or patterns across continents, cultural areas, or regions. For instance, Europe, North America, and Japan have been urban
9.1 Introduction .................................................................................................. 171 9.2 Study Sites: Chinese Megacities ................................................................... 176 9.3 Data ............................................................................................................... 177 9.4 Methods ........................................................................................................ 178
9.4.1 Classification of Multitemporal and Multisensoral Remotely Sensed Data ...................................................................................... 178
9.4.2 Spatial Analysis of Urban Patterns ................................................... 181 9.5 Results ........................................................................................................... 182
9.5.1 Urban Footprint Product and Its Accuracy ....................................... 182 9.5.1.1 Change Detection of Chinese Megacities .......................... 184 9.5.1.2 Measuring and Comparing Spatial Patterns
of Chinese Megacities ........................................................ 185 9.6 Conclusion .................................................................................................... 189 Acknowledgments .................................................................................................. 190 References .............................................................................................................. 191
societies for decades; China is today experiencing a dynamic process of transformation toward an urban society, and developing countries (especially of Asia and Africa) have only recently entered this transformation process.
