Residential Development Dynamics in Port Harcourt Metropolis: Implication for Efficient Urban Planning

Since 1980s the rate of expansion of Port Harcourt city has been very rapid with attendant accelerated housing development within the metropolis. This paper examines the residential development dynamics in Port Harcourt metropolis using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) approach. In order to achieve this objective, two Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) and Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+) multi-seasonal images of 19 December 1986 and 22 December, 1990 and NigeriaSat1 image of April 2004 for the Study area were acquired for this study. The Landsat TM, ETM+ and NigeriaSat1satellite data were processed using ERDAS IMAGINE 9.2 image processing software. The result from the land use changes between 1986 and 2004 shows prominent conversion of agricultural land to residential land uses. This implies that residential area has become one of the most important land use types within the periods under review. The paper recommended the need to invigorate planning machinery and activity in Port Harcourt metropolis to incorporate and integrate new planning paradigm into planning of the city and to introduce measures to manage smart growth. Keywords: Residential development dynamics; GIS, Efficient urban planning; Metropolis