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Evaluation of Visual Quality of Landscapes of Hyrcani Forests using Remote Sensing and Landscape Metrics. athar
URL: http://journal.richt.ir/article-1-75-en.html

The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between visual quality of Hyrcani forests and spatial pattern of land use in 9 locations in northern Iran. To do so, a significant portion of the area was photographed and ranked according to the views of a group of 150 viewers in terms of naturalness, cohesion, turbulence and complexity. The area map was prepared using Landsat 8- OLI image processing in 2016. Using the DEM layer and angle of view, their visible areas were identified and their spatial pattern of use was investigated using NP, PD, MPS, LSI, MNN, SHDI and PLAND land metrics. According to the results, forests near rangelands make up about 90% of the area. The results of MPS and LSI showed that the whole landscape was composed of patches ranging from 1 to 6 hectares. Landscape spots at location 6 are on average, more distant and forest patches at location 7 have the highest MNN. The lowest SHDI was obtained at point 2 and the highest at point 7. PLAND data showed that more than 50% of the landscapes were forest-related. The results of correlation analysis showed that there is a significant relationship between (R≥0.60, P>0.05), especially between viewers’ view of normality, cohesion, perturbation and SHDI and PLAND values. Visual preferences of people regarding recreational visits are areas with natural forest spots.