The rapid urban growth of the cities is a result of the population growth and the negative effects on human health and quality life are obvious which makes the monitoring of the urban growth very important. In this study monitoring over the city Tetovo in the northwestern part of Republic of Macedonia was made using remote sensed satellite images from Landsat archive that is widely used for monitoring the Earth's surface. An attempt of mapping the urban area on an annual basis from the period of 1984 to 2015 was made. Change detection in rapidly growing areas was made using the NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) values that were classified for distinguishing the differences between urban and vegetated areas. The study area covers nine cadaster municipalities with 14.6 km 2 . The results showed significant urban growth of 21.3% and 17.7% vegetation loss in the study area from 1984 to 2015.Keywords: Remote Sensing, Urban growth, NDVI, Landsat, Time series, Change detection.
INTRODUCTIONUrbanization is increasing rapidly all around the globe. With the population growth, land cover is exposed to changes mostly with negative influence over the natural resources. Effective management and monitoring of land cover require spatial data at various scales in order to incorporate land use patterns, topography, hydrologic and vegetation parameters [1]. Land cover described the materials such as vegetation, rocks or water that are presented on the surface. Current information of land use and land cover is essential for many planning activities. Remote sensing methods are becoming increasingly important for mapping land use and land cover [2]. Landsat series of satellite provides the longest continuous record of satellite-based observation. The Landsat program has provided earth observation data since 1972. Landsat provides the only inventory of the global land surface over time on a seasonal basis, observing requirements for revealing both natural and human inducted landscape changes [3]. In this paper, using five Landsat 5 images and one Landsat 8 image, starting from 1984, until 2015, a 32-year land cover changes based on NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) values has been made over nine populated cadaster municipalities (Dzepchishte, Poroj, Tetovo 1, Tetovo 2, Tetovo 3, Mala Rechica, Golema Rechica, Gorno Palchishte, Dolno Palchishte) in the city Tetovo in northwestern part of Republic