Research on Spatiotemporal Land Deformation (2012–2018) over Xi’an, China, with Multi-Sensor SAR Datasets

The ancient city of Xi’an, China, has been suffering severe land subsidence and ground fissure hazards since the 1960s, mainly due to the over-withdrawal of groundwater and large-scale urban construction. This has threatened and will continue to threaten the stability of urban infrastructure, such as the construction and operation of high buildings and subway lines. It is necessary to map the spatiotemporal variations of land subsidence over Xi’an, and to analyze their causes and the correlation with underground water level changes and ground fissure deformation. Time series of land subsidence were observed with the interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) technique, using multi-sensor SAR datasets from 2012 to 2018. Four land subsidence rate maps over Xi’an city were retrieved from TerraSAR-X, ALOS/PALSAR2, and Sentinel-1 data, each with different tracks. The InSAR derived results were then cross-validated with three independent SAR data stacks, and calibrated with GPS and leveling observations. Next, the spatiotemporal evolutions of three main regional land subsidence zones were quantitatively analyzed in detail, and the surface deformation of the Xi’an subway network was spatially analyzed. Third, the correlations between land subsidence and ground water withdrawal, ground fissure deformation, landforms, and faults were intensively analyzed. Finally, a flat lying sill model with distributed contractions was implemented to model the InSAR deformation over one typical subsidence zone, which further suggested that the ground deformation was mainly caused by groundwater withdrawal. This systematic research can provide sound evidence to serve decision-making for land subsidence mitigation in Xi’an, and may also guide land subsidence research in other cities