Session 1 - Montefiore

Annex: Data and methodological approach
Annex: Data and methodological
approach
A The challenge of scales
The assessment of the phenomena of urban
sprawl at the European level requires appropriate
information and tools effective at different scales.
The issue of urban sprawl must be defined and
comprehended in the urban-regional context in
which the dynamics of urban sprawl are operational
and urban management undertaken. Furthermore,
there is a need to broaden the window of inquiry
in order to assess the extent of the impacts of urban
sprawl across on the political and geographic
territory of Europe. This is the challenge of scales
as both the information used and tools applied in
the assessment of urban sprawl must be effective at
these scales.
In this report two main data sets have been used, to
establish linkages between the different scales:
• Corine land cover (1990 and 2000). CLC
limitations include resolution of urban areas
with minimum mapping unit 25 ha and
minimum change detection of 5 ha. But CLC
is currently the only harmonised spatial
data covering all of Europe, with two time
references shots for most countries. CLC makes
it possible to assess the extent of urban sprawl
in Europe, identifying different patterns and
hot spots, and providing information about the
neighbourhood of these zones so that change in
the environmental context can be understood.
• MOLAND (Monitoring Land Use Dynamics)
database. This is a comprehensive database of
28 urban areas and 6 wider regions developed
by JRC since 1998. MOLAND has four time
windows: mid-1950s, late 1960s, mid-1980s and
late 1990s. The database includes cities from
all EU-15 countries except the Netherlands
and Luxemburg, from several EU-10 countries
as well as some countries in the pre-accession
phase. Most urban areas in the MOLAND
database have 0.5 to 2 million inhabitants.
The selection of urban areas and regions was
influenced by European research interests,
for example, the inclusion of areas with
Structural Funds subsidies, border regions,
areas with specific development dynamics etc.
For each urban area detailed information is
available on land use/cover changes, but also
on socio-economic data from the 1950s. The
database provides a wide time frame that is
generally lacking at the European level, and the
wide distribution of cities is useful to illustrate
issues that are not possible with a narrower
frame of reference.
It is important to emphasise that both data sources
share the same definitions of land cover classes.
In the case of MOLAND a more detailed level of
subclasses has been derived in view of its higher
level of resolution. The common basis of land use
classes ensures some comparability of results.
B Definition of urban areas
Urban sprawl is extending urban growth far
beyond their administrative boundaries, and in
order to ensure that there is full comparability of
results between cities the units of analysis need to
be clearly defined. In this report urban areas have
been defined by morphology and the distribution of
urban land across the territory. CLC and MOLAND
data sources originate from different projects, and so
the definitional bases are slightly different. It should
also be borne in mind that both data sources possess
different resolutions. Overall, however, general
trends, such as direction of change and order of
magnitude of built-up areas, are consistent between
both data sets. Details are provided in the following
paragraphs.
Delineation of urban morphological zones with
Corine land cover
Urban morphological zones (UMZ) are defined as
built up areas lying less than 200 m apart. Urban
areas defined from land cover classes contributing to
the urban structure and function are:
• continuous urban fabric (111 according to CLC
code);
Urban sprawl in Europe
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