GIS study on the urban evolution of the city of Brașov, Romania

Abstract:
Urban sprawl is often the result of the transformation of the vegetation-covered land into build-up land. This expansion is caused by economic development, population growth and changing living standards. The process of urban development in the Centre region of the country is a complex system, which reflects the characteristics of urbanization and industrialization. Brașov is the most representative city, located in the Centre of Romania, for economic and social structure change. To analyze the changes of urban sprawl, I used remote sensing data from 2015 to 2021. Sentinel 1 images provided the support to monitor the changes of the land cover. The images, after pre-processing in SNAP, were classified using ArcGIS Pro. This process gave a better understanding of the changes that took and take place in Brașov. The results indicate that the built surface almost doubled from 2015 to 2021. The growth could affect the citizens due to the reduction of green spaces and chaotic construction.