In the late 1960s, the Islamic Republic of Pakistan’s capital shifted from Karachi to Islamabad, officially named Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT). In this aspect, the ICT is a young city, but undergoing rapid expansion and urbanization, especially in the last two decades. This study reports the measurement and characterization of ICT land cover change dynamics using Landsat satellite imagery for the years 1976, 1990, 2000, 2010, and 2016. Annual rate of change, landscape metrics, and urban forest fragmentation spatiotemporal analyses have been carried out, along with the calculation of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) indicator 11.3.1 Land Consumption Rate to the Population Growth Rate (LCRPGR). The results show consistent increase in the settlement class, with highest annual rate of 8.79% during 2000–2010. Tree cover >40% and <40% canopy decreased at an annual rate of 0.81% and 0.77% between 1976 to 2016, respectively. Forest fragmentation analysis reveals that ‘core forests of >500 acres’ class decreased from 392 km2 (65.41%) to 241 km2 (55%), and ‘patch forest’ class increased from 15 km2 (2.46%) to 20 km2 (4.54%), from 1976 to 2016. The LCRPGR ratio was 0.62 from 1976 to 2000, increasing to 1.36 from 2000 to 2016.

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