Watershed ecosystems are crucial to the overall sustainable development of a region, and a scientific and effective grasp of the characteristics of land-use change in a watershed, and the factors affecting land change, is an important prerequisite for the high-quality construction of watershed ecology, which needs to be emphasized. As the second largest inland river in the arid zone of Western China, the Heihe River Basin (HRB) has been affected by human and natural factors in recent years, and the ecological environment is relatively fragile, and there is an urgent need to analyze the ecological characteristics of the basin and to explore the relevant influencing factors in order to provide a basis for subsequent ecological management. Therefore, this article applies the landscape index, the landscape ecological risk index (ERI) model and the geodetector tools to analyze the land-use data from 2000 to 2020 in the Zhangye area of the HRB to study the characteristics of the ecological risk evolution and the driving forces affecting the ecological risk differentiation. The results show the following: (1) the area of the regional land-use change accounts for 4.99% of the total area, and the landscape pattern as a whole shows an increasing degree of fragmentation and a decreasing trend of aggregation; (2) the distribution of the ERI in the region shows a trend of being low in the center and high in the periphery, with an increase of 2.11% in the area of the lowest and lower risk and a decrease of 1.77% in the highest and higher, and the temporal change shows an increase followed by a significant decrease; (3) the human interference degree is the dominant factor influencing the spatial differentiation of the ERI in the basin area. There are significant differences between social factors, climate factors and land factors.

This study aimed to determine the characteristics and driving factors of spatial evolution in urban historical areas during urbanization and urban renewal and recommend how to protect these areas. The urban historical district of Zhangye, a famous historical and cultural city in China, was chosen as the study area. The research used a land transfer matrix, spatial design network analysis (sDNA), GIS analysis, and relevant statistical methods. It analyzed the spatial evolution characteristics of the district by considering the transformation of land use, the evolution of road networks, and the renewal of building profiles. GeoDetector was used to explore the effects of the factors. The study found that in the district, commercial and business land increased while industrial, manufacturing, logistics, and warehouse land decreased. The evolution speed at each stage had a wave-like development. The street pattern maintained the basic “cross” shape, with continuous improvements in the road system and overall accessibility. The building volume also increased gradually. The main types of architectural renewal included setback, integration, demolition, and addition. Meanwhile, economic and industrial factors had the most significant influence on the renewal of the district, whereas cultural factors had increasing influence. Finally, the dual-factor effects were more significant than the single-factor impacts.