Mediterranean urban-forest interface classification (MUFIC): A quantitative method combining SPOT5 imagery and landscape ecology indices

Due to demographic growth over the last few decades, urban development and its impacts on wildland areas (diversity loss, fire risk) has become a major concern in developed communities and among others in Mediterranean France. We aim to classify urban-forest interfaces types in order to discuss the impact of urban landscape development on wildland areas. Urban-forest interface types were computed using landscape pattern metrics. We used 3 landscape indices, which quantified both the proportion and configuration of land-cover classes, to classify various relationships between houses and forests: percentage of landscape (PLAND), landscape shape index (LSI) and Shannon diversity (SHDI). Results consisted of an aggregated map of landscape indices which differentiated five urban-forest interface types as follows: houses without forest contact (type I), compact subdivisions (type II), compact subdivisions in forested areas (type III), dispersed subdivisions in forested areas (type IV), and scattered houses in forested area (type V). Types III–V urban-forest interfaces representing 65% of urban interfaces. It supposes that major part of urbanization is dispersed in forest area while only 38% of urban areas were in contact with other land-cover classes (agricultural and schrubland).