Sustainable urban development based on an adaptive cycle model: A coupled social and ecological land use development model

With the emphasis of modern societal development on the ecological environment, urban environmental issues have been lessened. However, green space occupies a significant amount of land resources, leading to more prominent human-land conflicts in some areas, thus creating serious social issues that urgently require solutions. As a result, social and ecological factors must be integrated into urban sustainability planning. Using the Chinese city of Fuzhou as an example, this study constructed an adaptive cycle model framework for sustainable urban development based on adaptive cycle theory by coordinating three core characteristic attributes of sustainable urban development: potential (urban development potential), connectedness (conflicting land use), and resilience (suitability for sustainable development). This framework was used to identify the development stages (exploitation, conservation, release, reorganization) of different areas in the city. Finally, the ecological value of the landscape created by sustainable development was verified through a multi-scenario simulation. The results were as follows: 1) land expansion under the constraints of the sustainable development model had higher ecological value and could effectively mitigate conflicts in urban land use while balancing socio-ecological contradictions during urban development; 2) the model effects varied across urban areas in different stages of development; and 3) our proposed sustainable development planning pathway based on the adaptive cycle model divided land use into eight categories and proposed targeted development measures based on zoning characteristics. This study can effectively alleviate the contradiction of sustainability between urban social and ecological development. It can be used as a policy tool for managing land assessment and zoning during future urban development and land use.