This study observes the socio-spatial dynamics in the suburbs of a medium-sized city, particularly considering the extent to which shifting land use has influenced people’s welfare. This case study selected suburban Surakarta, a medium-sized metropolitan city in Central Java Province, Indonesia. The methods employed were descriptive statistics and spatial analyses. Considering the data availability, unit of analysis was urban or rural villages (kelurahan or desa). The results show that the development follows the pattern of a regional network, but the spatial dynamics are quite different in each direction. Besides, the shift of land use from agriculture to urban land has not directly affected poverty reduction. In the study area, the increase in industrial land use showed a weak positive correlation with the addition of pre-prosperous families. On this basis, local governments should pay more attention to the existence of the native residents in developing suburbs so that they are not harmed by the shift in land use from agricultural to developed urban land.

The Semarang Metropolitan Region (SMR) dynamic is difficult to control and related to the urban sprawl phenomenon. This study aimed to explore the relationship between land use/land cover changes (LULCC) diversity with an urban dispersion pattern of the SMR in 2010-2020 using Shannon Entropy. The SMR experienced significant urban growth in the last ten years. The built-up area spread from the downtown area to the peri-urban area of 14,285 ha (53%). Here, the normalised entropy of LULCC was found to be greater than 0.5 in the peri-urban area, indicating more heterogeneous LULCC dynamics. In addition, with a 12% growth rate per year, the SMR has the largest built-up patch area of 16,088 ha out of 25,793 ha, which means that 37% of the built-up area was a dispersed growth. This indicates that the built-up area spread sporadically with an irregular development pattern. Meanwhile, the built-up area increased in a more compact and orderly pattern in the downtown area. This study showed that LULCC diversity affects the spatial dynamics of urban growth in the SMR. The greater the LULCC diversity value, the greater the urban dispersion pattern, which is becoming increasingly dispersed.