Analyzing spatial patterns and influencing factors of different illegal land use types within ecological spaces: A case study of a fast-growing city

The conflict between socio-economic development and ecological protection results in large areas of illegal land use within ecological spaces. Determining the spatial patterns and influencing mechanisms of illegal land use is important because it is harmful to the natural environment. Previous studies mainly considered macro-scale influencing factors, but rarely analyzed the influencing mechanisms behind different types of illegal land use (e.g., residential areas, industrial areas). Therefore, we assessed the spatial distribution of suspected illegal land use and then investigated the influencing factors of various illegal land use types by combining remote sensing and the maximum entropy algorithm. The accuracies of the models for almost all types of illegal land use were much higher than 0.8. The results indicated that 36.14% of the subdistricts exhibited illegal land use issues in terms of the first-level ecological red lines, and 56.63% of subdistricts had this problem within the second-level ecological red lines. Rural residential areas, residential areas, and industrial areas were the major types of illegal land use. In addition, population, elevation, and transportation had a great impact on the occurrence probability of illegal land use. Particularly, transportation-related factors, such as distance from roads, distance from trunk lines, and distance from highways, had a large impact on illegal residential and industrial areas. Proximity to public transportation facilities was associated with a greater risk of illegal commercial areas. Therefore, local governments should strengthen the management of high-risk areas and monitor them closely to prevent conflicts between urban development and ecological protection plans. They must pay sufficient attention to areas with higher population density, lower elevation, and closer proximity to public transportation facilities. Overall, these conclusions can facilitate the fine-scale protection of ecological spaces and provide a theoretical basis for sustainable ecological planning.