This study deals with the use of satellite TM multi-temporal data coupled with statistical analyses to quantitatively estimate urban expansion and soil consumption for small towns in southern Italy. The investigated area is close to Bari and was selected because highly representative for Italian urban areas. To cope with the fact that small changes have to be captured and extracted from TM multi-temporal data sets, we adopted the use of spectral indices to emphasize occurring changes, and geospatial data analysis to reveal spatial patterns. Analyses have been carried out using global and local spatial autocorrelation, applied to multi-date NASA Landsat images acquired in 1999 and 2009 and available free of charge. Moreover, in this paper each step of data processing has been carried out using free or open source software tools, such as, operating system (Linux Ubuntu), GIS software (GRASS GIS and Quantum GIS) and software for statistical analysis of data (R). This aspect is very important, since it puts no limits and allows everybody to carry out spatial analyses on remote sensing data. This approach can be very useful to assess and map land cover change and soil degradation, even for small urbanized areas, as in the case of Italy, where recently an increasing number of devastating flash floods have been recorded. These events have been mainly linked to urban expansion and soil consumption and have caused loss of human lives along with enormous damages to urban settlements, bridges, roads, agricultural activities, etc. In these cases, remote sensing can provide reliable operational low cost tools to assess, quantify and map risk areas.<\/p>","DOI":"10.4018\/ijaeis.2014040102","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2014,9,10]],"date-time":"2014-09-10T14:30:39Z","timestamp":1410359439000},"page":"19-37","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":31,"title":["Quantifying Urban Sprawl with Spatial Autocorrelation Techniques using Multi-Temporal Satellite Data"],"prefix":"10.4018","volume":"5","author":[{"given":"Gabriele","family":"Nol\u00e8","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute of Methodologies for Environmental Analysis, National Research Council, Tito, Italy & School of Engineering, University of Basilicata, Potenza, Italy"}]},{"given":"Rosa","family":"Lasaponara","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute of Methodologies for Environmental Analysis, National Research Council, Tito, Italy"}]},{"given":"Antonio","family":"Lanorte","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute of Methodologies for Environmental Analysis, National Research Council, Tito, Italy"}]},{"given":"Beniamino","family":"Murgante","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Engineering, University of Basilicata, Potenza, Italy"}]}],"member":"2432","reference":[{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-0","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"93","DOI":"10.1111\/j.1538-4632.1995.tb00338.x","article-title":"Local indicators of spatial association \u2013 LISA.","volume":"27","author":"L.Anselin","year":"1995","journal-title":"Geographical Analysis"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-1","article-title":"Density analysis on large geographical databases. Search for an index of centrality of services at urban scale","author":"G. S.Borruso","year":"2004","journal-title":"Computational science and its application, Lecture Note in Computer Sciences"},{"issue":"4","key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"281","DOI":"10.1111\/j.1538-4632.1996.tb00936.x","article-title":"Geographically weighted regression: A method for exploring spatial non-stationarity.","volume":"28","author":"C.Brunsdon","year":"1996","journal-title":"Geographical Analysis"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-3","unstructured":"Cheng J., & Masser, I. (2002). Modelling urban growth patterns: A multiscale perspective."},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-4","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-540-69839-5_31"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-5","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.2307\/622936"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-6","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Geary, R. (1954). The contiguity ratio and statistical mapping. The Incorporated Statistician, 5.","DOI":"10.2307\/2986645"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-7","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"189","DOI":"10.1111\/j.1538-4632.1992.tb00261.x","article-title":"The analysis of spatial association by distance statistics.","volume":"24","author":"A.Getis","year":"1992","journal-title":"Geographical Analysis"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-8","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.4018\/jaeis.2013010105"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-9","first-page":"93","article-title":"Change detection at multiple scales seasonal and annual variations in landscape variables.","volume":"62","author":"E. F.Lambin","year":"1996","journal-title":"Photogrammetric Engineering and Remote Sensing"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-10","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/j.jag.2011.09.005"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-11","first-page":"1","article-title":"ERS-1: Landuse mapping and crop monitoring; A first close look to SAR data.","volume":"37-38","author":"J.Lichtenegger","year":"1992","journal-title":"Earth Observation Quarterly"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-12","first-page":"304","volume":"Vol. 7974","author":"B.Manganelli","year":"2013","journal-title":"Urban residential land value analysis: The case of Potenza"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-13","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"3472","DOI":"10.1080\/014311600750037507","article-title":"Dynamics of urban growth in the Washington DC metropolitan area, 1973-1996, from Landsat observations.","volume":"21","author":"J. G.Masek","year":"2000","journal-title":"International Journal of Remote Sensing"},{"issue":"2","key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-14","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"284","DOI":"10.1111\/j.1467-8306.2004.09402005.x","article-title":"Tobler's first law and spatial analysis.","volume":"94","author":"H. J.Miller","year":"2004","journal-title":"Annals of the Association of American Geographers"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-15","first-page":"10","article-title":"The interpretation of statistical maps.","author":"P.Moran","year":"1948","journal-title":"Journal of the Royal Statistical Society. Series A (General)"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-16","first-page":"1243","article-title":"Change detection for monitoring forest defoliation.","volume":"60","author":"D. M.Muchoney","year":"1994","journal-title":"Photogrammetric Engineering and Remote Sensing"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-17","first-page":"670","volume":"Vol. 7334","author":"B.Murgante","year":"2012","journal-title":"Analyzing migration phenomena with spatial autocorrelation techniques"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-18","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.4018\/jaeis.2011070102"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-19","unstructured":"Nol\u00e8, G., Lasaponara, R., & Murgante, B. (2013). Applying spatial autocorrelation techniques to multi-temporal satellite data for measuring urban sprawl. International Journal of Environmental Protection (IJEP), 3(7), 11-21. World Academic Publishing. ISSN: 2226-6437 http:\/\/www.ij-ep.org\/paperInfo.aspx?PaperID=12042"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-20","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"26","DOI":"10.1016\/j.landusepol.2013.10.001","article-title":"The urban transformation of Italy's Adriatic Coast Strip: Fifty years of unsustainability.","volume":"38","author":"B.Romano","year":"2014","journal-title":"Land Use Policy"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-21","first-page":"129","article-title":"Operational multispectral information extraction: The DLPO image interpretation program.","volume":"63","author":"C. T.Sailer","year":"1997","journal-title":"Photogrammetric Engineering and Remote Sensing"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-22","first-page":"62","volume":"Vol. 6016","author":"S.Scardaccione","year":"2010","journal-title":"Spatial autocorrelation analysis for the evaluation of migration flows: The Italian case"},{"issue":"2","key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-23","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"269","DOI":"10.1111\/j.1467-8306.2004.09402003.x","article-title":"Tobler's first law of geography: A big idea for a small world?","volume":"94","author":"D. Z.Sui","year":"2004","journal-title":"Annals of the Association of American Geographers"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-24","first-page":"37","article-title":"Global lands cover monitoring by NOAA NDVI Data.","author":"R.Tateishi","year":"1991","journal-title":"Proceeding of International Workshop of Environmental Monitoring from Space"},{"issue":"2","key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-25","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"234","DOI":"10.2307\/143141","article-title":"A computer movie simulating urban growth in the Detroit region.","volume":"46","author":"W. R.Tobler","year":"1970","journal-title":"Economic Geography"},{"issue":"2","key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-26","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"304","DOI":"10.1111\/j.1467-8306.2004.09402009.x","article-title":"On the first law of geography: A reply.","volume":"94","author":"W. R.Tobler","year":"2004","journal-title":"Annals of the Association of American Geographers"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-27","unstructured":"United Nations Population Division. (2001). World population monitoring 2001: Population, environment and development. Retrieved from http:\/\/www.un.org\/esa\/population\/publications\/wpm\/wpm2001.pdf"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-28","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1775","DOI":"10.1080\/01431160110075802","article-title":"Using a time series of satellite imagery to detect land use and land cover changes in the Atlanta, Georgia metropolitan area.","volume":"23","author":"X.Yang","year":"2002","journal-title":"International Journal of Remote Sensing"},{"key":"IJAEIS.2014040102-29","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"317","DOI":"10.1016\/j.rse.2005.08.006","article-title":"Land cover classification and change analysis of the Twin Cities (Minnesota) Metropolitan Area by multi-temporal Landsat remote sensing.","volume":"98","author":"F.Yuan","year":"2005","journal-title":"Remote Sensing of Environment"}],"container-title":["International Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Information Systems"],"original-title":[],"language":"ng","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.igi-global.com\/viewtitle.aspx?TitleId=114684","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2022,6,1]],"date-time":"2022-06-01T22:32:45Z","timestamp":1654122765000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/services.igi-global.com\/resolvedoi\/resolve.aspx?doi=10.4018\/IJAEIS.2014040102"}},"subtitle":[""],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2014,4,1]]},"references-count":30,"journal-issue":{"issue":"2","published-print":{"date-parts":[[2014,4]]}},"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.4018\/ijaeis.2014040102","relation":{},"ISSN":["1947-3192","1947-3206"],"issn-type":[{"value":"1947-3192","type":"print"},{"value":"1947-3206","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2014,4,1]]}}}