Urban Sprawl and its Impacts on Rural Areas Sustainable Development (Case: Peripheral villages of Birjand)

Spatial structure of undeveloped countries has been resulted in unequal physical growth of cities and urban sprawl that in turn has had different impacts on peripheral villages. Birjand in southern Khorasn province as a regional city has had increasingly growth due to its central position and successive droughtst. The physiognomic changes of Birjand surrounding rural spaces have been studied in this paper with an emphasis on land use changes and spatial consequents of city physical growth. Research sample society has been four villages at surrounding area of Birjand. Research required data has been collected through satellite Images of land sat TM 5 during 2001-2011, remote sensing technology and also filing a questionnaire. Selected data has been analyzed based on grounded theory. Finding show that urban sprawl has solved the peripheral rural spaces in the city during above decade. Rural lands have been changed to residential land use. Urban physical growth has resulted in changes on economic, social, cultural, management and service structure of peripheral rural area. This change has not been accordance with rural sustainable development.