Forecasting Land-use Changes in Mashhad, Using Cellular Automata(CA) and Artificial Neural Network Algorithm (ANN) (Case Study: Mashhad metropolitan Region)

Land is the place of interactions, transactions and the node of conflicts between various social groups. It is through the land, the way of using it, and realization of forces that encounter on it (constructing the artificial environment), which the spatial organization shapes. There are lots of factors influence the land-use change, but it is human activities that generally form these changes, and subsequently changing the spatial configurations of region. The concrete crystallization of these uncontrolled activities is unequal accumulation of capital in the metropolitan region, and increasing the regional imbalances more and more. Thus it is essential that through studying the driving forces of changes in land-use, and related spatial factors, one think about the possible future processes. Then, the objective of this study is forecasting land-use changes in Mashhad metropolitan region, using Cellular Automata (ca) and Artificial Neural Network algorithm. The research method was quantitative, and using land maps in the years 1993 and 2011, land-use changes for the years of 2030, 2048, 2066 and 2084 will be simulated in Q Gis2.4 environment. The conclusions show that first, future land-use changes will lead to consuming more and more agricultural lands and grasslands, so that, deteriorating rural settlements. Secondly, the continuing of present development of urban settlements and land-use changes, may cause environmental disasters and consequently leaving irreparable socio-economic damages in the region. According to the results, it is necessary for the planning and management system of the region, to adopt a comprehensive approach in order to prevent the future environmental problems, also to control horizontal expansion of settlements.