Modelling dynamic urban expansion processes incorporating a potential model with cellular automata

Dynamic spatial models are useful tools to understand the urbanization process and support urban planning and management policies. Macro-scale contributing factors to urban expansion including population and capital are not fully integrated in many current cellular automata (CA)-based urban expansion models. We present a new urban expansion dynamic (UED) model that incorporates a potential model into a CA model in order to effectively capture the urban expansion process. The implementation of the UED model in Beijing, China demonstrated its ability to trace past urban development and to predict future expansion. The advantage of the UED model lies in its feature to link the individual cell evolution, overall urban pattern and spatial interaction of total population and capital at different scales.