Athanasios Alexandru GAVRILIDIS¹, Simona Raluca GRĂDINARU¹, Ioan Cristian IOJĂ¹, Elfrida Maria CÂRSTEA² & Ileana PĂTRU-STUPARIU^3,4
1University of Bucharest, Faculty of Geography, Center for Environmental Research and Impact Studies, Bd. Nicolae Bălcescu Nr. 1, cod postal 010041, Sector 1, Bucureşti, athanasiosalexandru.gavrilidis@g.unibuc.ro, simona.gradinaru@g.unibuc.ro, cristian.ioja@g.unibuc.ro
²National Institute of R&D for Optoelectronics, Atomistilor 409, Magurele, 077125, Bucharest, Romania, frida@inoe.inoe.ro
³Research Institute of University of Bucharest, ICUB; Transdisciplinary Research Centre Landscape-Territory – Information Systems, CeLTIS, Splaiul Independenței, nr. 91 – 95, 050095 Bucharest, România ileana.stupariu@geo.unibuc.ro
⁴Departament of Regional Geography and Environment, Faculty of Geography, University of Bucharest, Bd. N. Bălcescu, 1, 010041, Bucharest România, ileana.stupariu@geo.unibuc.ro

LAND USE AND LAND COVER DYNAMICS IN THE PERIURBAN AREA OF AN INDUSTRIALIZED EAST-EUROPEAN CITY AN OVERVIEW OF THE LAST 100 YEARS

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Landscape is in continuous change since the human society started to exploit it. The driving forces for land-use and land-cover (LULC) changes might be considered divers, but one of the main cause is the natural resources accessibility. Oil resources shaped, indirectly, the landscape worldwide, being a direct driving force for LULC change patterns for oil oriented cities. Diachronic analysis of LULC dynamics in such an urban settlement shows how the urban and periurban landscape has changed from the beginning of oil extraction and processing activities to present days. Ploieşti city, from Romania is a traditional oil center from Eastern Europe that faced a continuous evolution, under different planning policies, due to its oil based industrial activities. The study focused on the city’s urban and periurban area and covered a timeframe of 105 years of landscape changes, divided in three periods (The Royal Period, The Socialist Period and The Post-communist Transition) characterized by different political ideologies. The study emphasized the fact that oil oriented cities are more independent of political planning, the resources being the main driving force for landscape patterns.