J. S. Rawat, Manish Kumar, Ravindra Nath Pathak

The present study illustrates an integrated approach of remote sensing and GIS (Geographical Information System), i.e., Geospatial techniques for measuring physical growth of Almora town of district Almora in the Kumaun region of Central Himalaya. Landsat satellite imageries of three different time periods, i.e., Landsat TM of 1990, Landsat TM 1999 and Landsat TM of 2010 were acquired and quantify the changes in the Almora town from 1990 to 2010 over a period of 20 years. Supervised Classification methodology has been employed using Maximum Likelihood Technique in ERDAS 9.3. The images of the study area were categorized into three different classes, viz., built-up area, vegetation and others. The results indicate that during the last two decades (i.e., 1990-2010), built-up area of the Almora town area has been increased about 80.73% (i.e. 2.04 km²) while areas under vegetation and other land categories have decreased about 43.42% (i.e. 1.32 km²) and 37.31% (i.e. 0.72 km²), respectively. The results of the paper on digital change detection techniques shall be helpful in proper land use planning for a sustainable and uniform urban growth of the Almora town area.