Evaluating Land Use and Land Cover Changes and Their Impacts on Soil (Case Study: The Coastal City of Gomish-Tepe)

One of the environmental consequences and conflicts arising from land use and land cover changes is the intensification of soil erosion, which seriously threatens urban water and soil resources. Therefore, it is necessary to regularly identify the spatial dimensions of land use and land cover and their effects on cities so that policymakers and researchers can make informed decisions. Satellite data is one of the fastest and most cost-effective methods available to researchers for preparing land use maps. this study aimed to evaluate the changes in land use percentage and its impact on erosion between 1993 and 2023 in the city of Gomish Tappeh, located in Golestan province. For this purpose, a vegetation cover percentage map was first prepared using TM and OLI sensor images from the Landsat satellite. After atmospheric and radiometric correction, a land use map was created using the pixel-based method (maximum likelihood algorithm), the object-oriented method (nearest neighbor algorithm), and the ARAS method. The most important accuracy assessment methods, including overall accuracy and the classification kappa coefficient, were then extracted. An erosion zoning map was prepared using the resulting land use maps and factors including slope, lithology, distance from roads, distance from rivers, precipitation, and soil, using the Kritik weighting method and the WLC method. the results showed that in the land use maps from 1993 to 2023, the increase in rainfed lands was accompanied by a decrease in pastures, with the most significant change being a downward trend in pasture use. Additionally, according to the 1993 and 2023 erosion zoning maps, Gomish Tappeh is categorized as having both a very high risk and a high risk of erosion. The increase in the area of very high-risk and high-risk erosion classes in the studied basin can be attributed to the conversion of pasture-covered lands to rainfed agricultural lands, the plowing of pastures on steep slopes, the increase in residential areas on riverbanks, and the disregard for river boundaries, which accelerates the erosion process.