The relationship between the irrigated agricultural areas and the urbanization in Çanakkale and Kepez settlements

In the studies of planning, it is important to protect and improve the irrigated agricultural areas which can also be expressed as “irrigated absolute agricultural areas”. These areas are particularly important areas among the agricultural areas because of their higher production potential. Nowadays, agricultural areas are faced with the danger of becoming built up areas due to population growth and resident requirements owing to this growth. This study handles the loss of agricultural areas due to spatial growth processes of Çanakkale and Kepez settlements, these areas are irrigated by Atikhisar Dam located at 15 km distance to Çanakkale city centre. Moreover, the problem of becoming built up area for irrigated agricultural areas in Turkey and the world were also undertaken according to legal regulations. In this research the irrigated areas, growing processes with respect to built up periods in Çanakkale and Kepez cities and the loss of irrigated agricultural areas during these periods were monitored using Geographical Information Systems (GIS). According to results, the 16,54 km² (i.e. 37,87%) of irrigation field of Atikhisar Dam (i.e. 43,67 km² ) had become to a built up area. Using the data of 2012, it is obtained that the 48.78 % (i.e. 16,54 km² ) of the total built up areas (i.e. 33.91 km²) are located on the irrigated agricultural areas.