MODELLING LAND ALLOCATION PROCESS IN TIME AND SPACE

Modeling land allocation for different land uses at regional level is a multi-dimensional problem, as it is influenced by spatial, temporal and dynamics of environmental and socio-economic factors in the complex process of land use change. It is therefore a challenge to develop a proper model that can handle these complexities. In this context, a new model has been conceptualized and developed. The model is considering the expert knowledge, the heuristics and human decision-making in modeling the process of land use change. This paper briefly presents the conceptual model, which is developed based on cellular automata concept and tested with the Borkhar and Meymeh township datasets in Esfahan, Iran.