Multi-scale spatiotemporal analysis of landscape ecological responses to railway corridor development

The rapid expansion of transportation infrastructure has brought sustained and multidimensional impacts of railway construction on surrounding ecosystems. This study examined ecological changes across the pre-construction, construction and post-construction phases of the Lalin Railway in an ecologically fragile region. Based on multi-temporal monitoring data, we applied the Random Forest model and Geographical Detector to explore land use changes, landscape pattern dynamics, variations in the remote sensing ecological index (RSEI) and their driving factors. The results show continuous land use evolution, with the comprehensive annual land use change rate exceeding 1% from 2014 to 2022. The transition rates of cropland, built-up land and unused land were all above 40%, and built-up land increased by 2.45%. Forestland and grassland remained the dominant land cover types, with forestland expanding by 1.89% and grassland declining by 1.67%. Railway construction increased landscape diversity and fragmentation, with the most pronounced effects within the 1 km buffer zone along the railway. The regional RSEI, a key indicator of ecological quality, decreased from 0.52 in 2014 to 0.45 in 2022, following a trend of initial decline and subsequent recovery. This reveals that the local ecosystem has gradually recovered after construction but has not been fully restored to its original state. Driving factor analysis demonstrates that land use structure dominates the spatial pattern of regional ecological quality. Based on these findings, we propose targeted ecological protection strategies, offering scientific guidance for the green and ecologically integrated development of linear transportation infrastructure.