Impervious surface extraction with Linear Spectral Mixture Analysis integrating Principal components analysis and Normalized Difference Building Index

Based on Landsat ETM+ data within the metropolitan area of Lanzhou, China, green vegetation(GV) and impervious surface was extracted by a constrained linear spectral mixture analysis (LSMA),together with single window algorithm to invert land surface temperature ,and the correlation analysis was then conducted to examine the relationship between urban heat island (UHI) effect and impervious surface. Four types of end members with high albedo, GV, soil and low albedo are selected to model complicated urban land cover, estimation accuracy is assessed using Root-Mean-Square (RMS)error and color aerial images, with the help of Mantel and Partial Mantel. Spatial relationship of land surface temperatures (LST), impervious surface and GV were analyzed. Results indicate that impervious surface distribution and GV can be derived from Landsat TM/ETM+ images with satisfactory precision. Impervious surface and GV were positively correlated with UHI, while LST has space dependence, it has high space dependence, and was higher correlated with impervious surface than GV.

Accurate estimations of impervious surface areas are essential for urban planning development. Linear spectral mixture analysis (LSMA) is commonly adopted to extract the impervious surface (IS) fraction in a mixed pixel at the subpixel scale. However, owing to errors in the spectra of pure pixels selected from remote sensing images, incorrect fractions of different land cover types often emerge after unmixing. In this study, two Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) images-acquired on 20 September 2019 (Path/Row: 121/44) and 14 November 2019 (Path/Row: 122/44)-of Guangzhou and Shenzhen were unmixed by LSMA using spectral indices in endmember selection. A post-processing model using the Dry Bare-soil Index (DBSI) and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) as thresholds was established to improve the IS fraction of the LSMA result. Comparative analysis reveals that LSMA with the post-processing model achieves better performance for IS fraction extraction (R <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> = 0.910 and 0.926 and root mean square error [RMSE] = 10.08% and 10.83% for Guangzhou and Shenzhen, respectively), and the distribution of IS is basically consistent with the IS of the actual areas. The post-processing model solves the problem of overestimation of pervious surface and underestimation of impervious surface.

Impervious surface is considered as a key indicator of urban environment quality and urbanization. Many studies have attempted to extract urban impervious surface using multispectral images of medium and high resolution, especially images acquired in summer, as they achieved higher accuracy. However, the use of summer images may underestimate impervious surface area, since some impervious surfaces are obscured by deciduous tree crowns in summer. This paper compared the results of impervious surface extracted using two-temporal Worldview-2 multispectral images acquired in summer and winter by linear spectral mixture analysis and analyzed the differences between the results. The results indicated that impervious surface extraction from winter image produced a similar accuracy with summer image. However, the area of impervious surface extracted from winter image was much higher than that from summer image by nearly 20% in study area.

Remote sensing estimation of impervious surface is significant in monitoring urban development and determining the overall environmental health of a watershed, and it has therefore attracted more interest recently in the remote sensing community. The main objective of this paper is to examine and compare the effectiveness of two advanced algorithms for estimating impervious surfaces from medium spatial resolution satellite images, namely, linear spectral mixture analysis (LSMA) and artificial neural network (ANN). Terra's Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer [(ASTER); acquired on June 16,2001] and a Landsat Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+) image (acquired on June 22, 2000) of Indianapolis, IN, were used for the analysis. The LSMA was employed to generate high- and low-albedo, vegetation, and soil fraction images (endmembers), and an image of impervious surfaces was then estimated by adding high- and low-albedo fraction images. Furthermore, an ANN model, specifically the multilayer-perceptron feedforward network with the back-propagation learning algorithm, was employed as a subpixel image classifier to estimate impervious surfaces. Accuracy assessment was performed against a high- resolution digital orthophoto. The results show that ANN was more effective than LSMA in generating impervious surfaces with high statistical accuracy. For the ASTER image, the root-mean-square error (RMSE) of the impervious surface map with the ANN model was 12.3%, and the one that resulted from LSMA was 13.2%. For the ETM+ image, the RMSE with the ANN model was 16.7%, and the one from LSMA was 18.9%. The better performance of ANN over LSMA is mainly attributable to the ANN'S capability of handling the nonlinear mixing of image spectrum. In order to test the seasonal sensitivity of satellite images for estimating impervious surfaces, LSMA was applied to two additional ASTER images of the same area, which are acquired on April 5, 2004, and October 3, 2000, respectively. The results were then compared with the ASTER image acquired in June in terms of RMSE. The June image had the highest accuracy, whereas the October image was better than the one in April. Plant phenology caused changes in the variance partitioning and impacted the mixing-space characterization, leading to a less accurate estimation of impervious surfaces.

Independent component analysis (ICA) has shown much success in blind source separation and channel equalization. Its applications to remotely sensed images are investigated in recent years. Linear spectral mixture analysis (LSMA) has been widely used for subpixel detection and mixed pixel classification in remote sensing image processing and already studied in Chapters 3, 8–10, . It models the spectral signature of an image pixel vector as a linear mixture of spectral signatures of targets present in the image data and the target abundance fractions are assumed to be unknown, but nonrandom constants. This chapter combines these two approaches to one, called ICA-based linear spectral random mixture analysis (LSRMA), which describes an image pixel vector as a random process resulting from a random composition of multiple spectral signatures of distinct targets in the image data. It differs from LSMA in that the abundance fractions of the target signatures in LSRMA are considered to be unknown random independent signal sources. Two major advantages can be benefited from LSRMA. First, LSRMA does not require any prior knowledge of the targets used in the linear mixture model. Second and most importantly, LSRMA models each of target signatures as an independent random signal source so that the spectral variability of target signatures can be captured more effectively in a stochastic manner. The only required knowledge for LSRMA is the number of signal sources, p assumed to be present in the image data. This number is estimated by Neyman-Pearson detection theory-based eigen-thresholding methods to be investigated in Chapter 17.

It is well known that urban impervious surface (IS) has a warming effect on urban land surface temperature (LST). However, the influence of an IS’s structure, components, and spatial distribution on LST has rarely been quantitatively studied within strictly urban areas. Using ETM+ remote sensing images from the downtown area of Shanghai, China in 2010, this study characterized and quantified the influence of the IS spatial pattern on LST by selecting the percent cover of each IS cover feature and ten configuration metrics. The IS fraction was estimated by linear spectral mixture analysis (LSMA), and LST was retrieved using a mono-window algorithm. The results indicate that high fraction IS cover features account for the majority of the study area. The high fraction IS cover features are widely distributed and concentrated in groups, which is similar with that of high temperature zones. Both the percent composition and the configuration of IS cover features greatly affect the magnitude of LST, but the percent composition is a more important factor in determining LST than the configuration of those features. The significances and effects of the given configuration variables on LST vary greatly among IS cover features.

Estimating impervious surfaces from medium spatial resolution imagery using the self-organizing map and multi-layer perceptron neural networks

This paper explores the potential to improve the impervious surface estimation accuracy using a multi-stage approach on the basis of vegetation-impervious surface-soil (V-I-S) model. In the first stage of Spectral Mixture Analysis (SMA) process, pixel purity index, a quantitative index for defining endmember quality, and a 3-dimensional endmember selection method were applied to refining endmembers. In the second stage, instead of obtaining impervious surface fraction by adding high and low albedo fractions directly, a linear regression model was built between impervious surface and high/low albedo using a random sampling method. The urban impervious surface distribution in the urban central area of Shanghai was predicted by the linear regression model. Estimation accuracy of spectral mixture analysis and impervious surface fraction were assessed using root mean square (RMS) and color aerial photography respectively. In comparison with three different research methods, this improved estimation method has a higher overall accuracy than traditional Linear Spectral Mixture Analysis (LSMA) method and the normalized SMA model both in root mean square error (RMSE) and standard error (SE). However, the model has a tendency to overestimate the impervious surface distribution.

The distribution of urban impervious surfaces is usually recognized as a significant environmental and an essential indicator of various urban problems. The typical methods of extracting impervious surfaces are Linear Spectral Mixture Analysis Method (LSMA), Exponential Method (EM), and Maximum Likelihood Classification Method (MLC). However, all of the above methods have their drawbacks. Therefore, we propose a new method for extraction of urban impervious surfaces based on Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and Random Forest (RF). The synthetic aperture radar data and hyperspectral data of Nanjing are employed to test and validate the proposed methodology. The result of this new method is compared with the results obtained by LSMA, EM, and MLC to evaluate feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed methodology to extract the urban impervious surface. Experiments show that the Kappa coefficient in the optimal random forest model can reach 0.9744 and the overall classification accuracy is 99.6402%, which has obvious advantages over other methods.

Impervious surfaces have been widely considered as the key indicator for evaluating urbanization and environmental quality. As one of the most widely applied methods, spectral mixture analysis (SMA) has been commonly used for mapping urban impervious surface fractions. When implementing SMA, the original multispectral remote-sensing reflectance images are served as the foundation and key to successful SMA. However, the limited spectral variances among different land covers from the original reflectance images make it challenging in information extraction and results in unsatisfactory mapping results. To address this issue, a new method has been proposed in this study to improve urban impervious surface mapping through integrating statistical methods and SMA. In particular, two traditional statistical methods, principal component analysis (PCA) and minimum noise fraction rotation (MNF) were applied to highlight the spectral variances among different land covers. Three endmember classes (impervious surface, soil, and vegetation) and corresponding spectra were identified and extracted from the vertices of the 2-D space plots generated by the first three components of each of the statistical analysis methods, PCA and MNF. A new dataset was generated by stacking the first three components of the PCA and MNF (in a total of six components), and a fully constrained linear SMA was implemented to map the fractional impervious surfaces. Results indicate that a promising performance has been achieved by the proposed new method with the systematic error (SE) of −3.45% and mean absolute error (MAE) of 11.52%. Comparative analysis results also show a much better performance achieved by the proposed statistical method-based SMA than the conventional SMA.

An understanding of the multifractal and long-range dependence of impervious surfaces (IS) spatiotemporal patterns is helpful for regional environmental assessment and urban planning. Linear spectral-mixture analysis has been applied to compute IS in the coastal city of Xiamen, China, based on Landsat TM/OLI/TIRS images, and then the long-term trends and multifractal characteristics of IS patterns have been investigated using two-dimensional multifractal detrended fluctuation analysis. The IS spatial distribution displayed similar positive long-range correlations in study areas during the 1994–2015 period. IS have a long-memory characteristic within a certain spatial range, with an increase in the value of a pixel likely to cause an increment in the value of its neighbors. The multifractality of the IS distribution increased in Xiamen City during 1994–2015, but was lower than those in Xiamen Island. The multifractal spectra in Xiamen City vary in shape between years, capturing its evolution from right truncation with a long left tail to left truncations and long right tails and then a symmetrical shape. The fractal structure for Xiamen Island exhibits similar patterns of long right tails and left truncations. Economic and political considerations coupled with natural geographic conditions dominate the long-range trends in the IS spatial patterns.

Estimating the distribution of impervious surfaces and vegetation is important for analysing urban landscapes and their thermal environment. The application of a crisp classification of land-cover types to analyse urban landscape patterns and land surface temperature (LST) in detail presents a challenge, mainly due to the complex characteristics of urban landscapes. In this article, sub-pixel percentage impervious surface areas (ISAs) and fractional vegetation cover (FVC) were extracted from bitemporal Thematic Mapper/Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (TM/ETM+) data by linear spectral mixture analysis (LSMA). Their accuracy was assessed with proportional area estimates of the impervious surface and vegetation extracted from high-resolution data. A range approach was used to classify percentage ISA into different categories by setting thresholds of fractional values and these were compared for their LST patterns. For each ISA category, FVC, LST, and percentage ISA were used to quantify the urban thermal characteristics of different developed areas in the city of Fuzhou, China. Urban LST scenarios in different seasons and ISA categories were simulated to analyse the seasonal variations and the impact of urban landscape pattern changes on the thermal environment. The results show that FVC and LST based on percentage ISA can be used to quantitatively analyse the process of urban expansion and its impacts on the spatial–temporal distribution patterns of the urban thermal environment. This analysis can support urban planning by providing knowledge on the climate adaptation potential of specific urban spatial patterns.

Quantifying the temporal and spatial patterns of impervious surfaces (IS) is important for assessing the environmental and ecological impacts of urbanization. In order to better extract IS, and to explore the divergence in urbanization in different regions, research on the regional differentiation features and regional change difference features of IS are required. To extract China’s 2013 urban impervious area, we used the 2013 night light (NTL) data and the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer Normalized Difference Vegetation Index and enhanced vegetation index (EVI) temporal series data, and used three urban impervious surface extraction indexes—Human Settlements Index, Vegetation-Adjusted NTL Urban Index, and the EVI-adjusted NTL index (EANTLI)—which are recognized as the best and most widely used indexes for extracting urban impervious areas. We used the classification results of the Landsat-8 images as the benchmark data to visually compare and verify the results of the urban impervious area extracted by the three indexes. We determined that the EANTLI index better reflects the distribution of the impervious area. Therefore, we used the EANTLI index to extract the urban impervious area from 2003 to 2013 in the study area, and researched the spatial and temporal differentiation in urban IS. The results showed that China’s urban IS area was 70,179.06 km2, accounting for 0.73% of the country’s land area in 2013, compared with 20,565.24 km2 in 2003, which accounted for 0.21% of the land area, representing an increase of 0.52%. On a spatial scale, like economic development, the distribution of urban impervious surfaces was different in different regions. The overall performance of the urban IS percentage was characterized by a decreasing trend from Northwest China, Southwest China, the Middle Reaches of the Yellow River, Northeast China, the Middle Reaches of the Yangtze River, Southern Coastal China, and Northern Coastal China to Eastern Coastal China. On the provincial scale, the urban IS expansion showed considerable differences in different regions. The overall performance of the Urban IS Expansion index showed that the eastern coastal areas had higher values than the western inland areas. The cities or provinces of Beijing, Tianjin, Jiangsu, and Shanghai had the largest growth in impervious areas. Spatially and temporally quantifying the change in urban impervious areas can help to better understand the intensity of urbanization in a region. Therefore, quantifying the change in urban impervious area has an important role in the study of regional environmental and economic development, policy formulation, and the rational use of resources in both time and space.

Urban heat island (UHI) attenuation is an essential aspect for maintaining environmental sustainability at a local, regional, and global scale. Although impervious surfaces (IS) and green spaces have been confirmed to have a dominant effect on the spatial differentiation of the urban land surface temperature (LST), comprehensive temporal and quantitative analysis of their combined effects on LST and surface urban heat island intensity (SUHII) changes is still partly lacking. This study took the plain area of Beijing, China as an example. Here, rapid urbanization and a large-scale afforestation project have caused distinct IS and vegetation cover changes within a small range of years. Based on 8 scenes of Landsat 5 TM/7ETM/8OLI images (30 m × 30 m spatial resolution), 920 scenes of EOS-Aqua-MODIS LST images (1 km × 1 km spatial resolution), and other data/information collected by different approaches, this study characterized the interrelationship of the impervious surface area (ISA) dynamic, forest cover increase, and LST and SUHII changes in Beijing’s plain area during 2009–2018. An innovative controlled regression analysis and scenario prediction method was used to identify the contribution of ISA change and afforestation to SUHII changes. The results showed that percent ISA and forest cover increased by 6.6 and 10.0, respectively, during 2009–2018. SUHIIs had significant rising tendencies during the decade, according to the time division of warm season days (summer days included) and cold season nights (winter nights included). LST changes during warm season days responded positively to a regionalized ISA increase and negatively to a regionalized forest cover increase. However, during cold season nights, LST changes responded negatively to a slight regionalized ISA increase, but positively to an extensive regionalized ISA increase, and LST variations responded negatively to a regionalized forest cover increase. The effect of vegetation cooling was weaker than ISA warming on warm season days, but the effect of vegetation cooling was similar to that of ISA during cold season nights. When it was assumed that LST variations were only caused by the combined effects of ISA changes and the planting project, it was found that 82.9% of the SUHII rise on warm season days (and 73.6% on summer days) was induced by the planting project, while 80.6% of the SUHII increase during cold season nights (and 78.9% during winter nights) was caused by ISA change. The study presents novel insights on UHI alleviation concerning IS and green space planning, e.g., the importance of the joint planning of IS and green spaces, season-oriented UHI mitigation, and considering the thresholds of regional IS expansion in relation to LST changes.

The Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect has been extensively studied as a global issue. The urbanization process has been proved to be the main reason for this phenomenon. Over the past 20 years, the built-up area of Zhengzhou city has grown five times larger, and the UHI effect has become increasingly pressing for the city’s inhabitants. Therefore, mitigating the UHI effect is an important research focus of the expanding capital city of the Henan province. In this study, the Landsat 8 image of July 2019 was selected from Landsat collection to obtain Land Surface Temperature (LST) by using Radiative Transfer Equation (RTE) method, and present land cover information by using spectral indices. Additionally, high-resolution Google Earth images were used to select 123 parks, grouped in five categories, to explore the impact factors on park cooling effect. Park Cooling Intensity (PCI) has been chosen as an indicator of the park cooling effect which will quantify its relation to park patch metrics. The results show that: (1) Among the five studied park types, the theme park category has the largest cooling effect while the linear park category has the lowest cooling effect; (2) The mean park LST and PCI of the samples are positively correlated with the Fractional Vegetation Cover (FVC) and with Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI), but these are negatively correlated with the Normalized Difference Impervious Surface Index (NDISI). We can suppose that the increase of vegetation cover rate within water areas as well as the decrease of impervious surface in landscape planning and design will make future parks colder. (3) There is a correlation between the PCI and the park characteristics. The UHI effect could be mitigated by increasing of park size and reducing park fractal dimension (Frac_Dim) and perimeter-area ratio (Patario). (4) The PCI is influenced by the park itself and its surrounding area. These results will provide an important reference for future urban planning and urban park design to mitigate the urban heat island effect.