The Impact of Urbanization Expansion on the Geomorphology of the Southern Coastal Sabkhas from Ras Al-Jailiaha to Al-Khiran, South Kuwait

Abstract

Kuwait is considered one of the desert regions of the Arabian Peninsula, that subjected to geomorphological processes forming the earth’s surface features. The anthropogenic activities through urbanization affected the earth geomorphology in the southern coastal sabkhas of Kuwait such as (Al-Jailiaha, Az-Zor and Al-Khiran). This study aims to monitor the geomorphological changes on the southern coastal sabkhas due to the urbanization expansion. Geographic information systems (GIS) and remote sensing (RS) techniques were used to study these changes, determine the areas of the coastal sabkhas in the southern part of Kuwait, following the developments, and identifying land cover in the area and its coastal strip including tourist resorts, sand dunes, and smooth sand sheets. The satellite images used in this study based on the data of Landsat-5 (TM) 1985, and Landsat-5 (TM) 1990, Landsat-7 (ETM+) 2001, visuals Landsat-8 (OLI) 2016 covering the years of (1985, 1990, 2001, 2016), in order to detect changes in the sabkhas and the extension of urbanization in the region. Digital Maps were made to show how extent the study area was affected by urbanization. Urbanization mostly expanded to the south in the study area on the account of the coastal sabkhas, where the area of the coastal sabkhas in 1985 was about 103.1 km 2 and in 1990 it was about 84.1 km 2 . This led to the shrinking of the sabkhas area and extension of the resort area within the areas of sabkhas and sand dunes, particularly in Al-Khiran coastal area exposing it to the problem of sand drift and sand encroachment, which resulted in changes of the characteristics of the sabkhas, shrinkage of their area, and adverse impacts on their geomorphology.