Land development is the alteration of landscape in any number of ways such as:Changing landforms from a natural or semi-natural state for a purpose such as agriculture or housing
Subdividing real estate into lots, typically for the purpose of building homes
Real estate development or changing its purpose, for example by converting an unused factory complex into a condominium.
Since their invention, heavy equipment such as bulldozers have been useful for earthmoving in land development.
Motorway construction in Ireland
Building construction
In Argentina and Bolivia, the Chaco thorn forest (A) is being felled at a rate considered among the highest in the world (B), to give way to soybean cultivation (C)
Land change science refers to the interdisciplinary study of changes in climate, land use, and land cover. Land change science specifically seeks to evaluate patterns, processes, and consequences in changes in land use and cover over time. The purpose of land change science is to contribute to existing knowledge of climate change and to the development of sustainable resource management and land use policy. The field is informed by a number of related disciplines, such as remote sensing, landscape ecology, and political ecology, and uses a broad range of methods to evaluate the patterns and processes that underlie land cover change. Land change science addresses land use as a coupled human-environment system to understand the impacts of interconnected environmental and social issues, including deforestation and urbanization.
Imaging by NASA of the effects of deforestation on rainfall in Brazil, an example of land change science modeling
Remote sensing images show changes to the extent of the Aral Sea from 1989 (left) to 2014 (right).
Rainforest deforestation for land use conversion
An aerial image of New Delhi, India, one of the world's largest urban areas
