There are growing concerns about the effects of urban encroachment occurring
near military installations. Urban growth and development infringing upon a military
installation, in this case Fort Benning, GA,
negatively influences the installation's ability to conduct training and
maintain combat readiness. These negative factors greatly hinder the viability
of the installation. The primary objective of this study was to monitor urban
encroachment affecting Fort Benning. A secondary objective was to utilize an
efficient, more automated approach to extract urban features from low cost,
readily available satellite imagery. Assisted feature extraction software (Feature
Analyst, version 4.0) was used to derive urban area estimates, which can be
used to monitor the extent and location of urban expansion occurring near the
installation. Landsat data were acquired during leaf-off conditions for the following
dates: Dec 1999, Jan 2001, Jan 2003, and Dec 2003. To assess urban growth over
time, a trend analysis was performed based on urban delineations from these periodic
time intervals beginning in Dec 1999 and continuing to Dec 2003. Urban growth
has steadily increased by a rate of about three percent per time interval. This paper describes the procedures used to extract
characteristic urban features from the available satellite imagery and
evaluates relative change and urban growth over time.