Monitoring urban sprawl is a controversial topic among scholars. Many studies have tried to employ various methods for monitoring urban sprawl in cases of North American and Northern and Western European cities. Although numerous methods have been applied with great success in various developed countries, they are predominantly impractical for cases of developing Mediterranean European cities that lack reliable census data. Besides, the complexity of the methods made them difficult to perform in underfunded situations. Therefore, this study aims to develop a new multidimensional method that researchers and planners can apply readily in developing Mediterranean European cities. The new method was tested in the Famagusta region of Northern Cyprus, which has been experiencing unplanned growth for the past half-century. In support of this proposal, a detailed review of the existing literature is presented with an emphasis on urban sprawl characteristics. Four characteristics were chosen to monitor urban sprawl’s development in the Famagusta region. The method was structured based on a time-series (2001, 2006, 2011, and 2016) dataset that used remote sensing data and geographical information systems to monitor the urban sprawl. Based on the findings, the Famagusta region experienced rapid growth during the last 15 years. The lack of a masterplan resulted in the uncontrolled expansion of the city in the exurban areas. The development configuration was polycentric and linear in form with single-use composition. Together, the expansion and configuration manifested as more built-up area, scattered development, and increased automobile dependency.

Most of the cities around the world are dealing with different kinds of problems such as social, environmental, economic and others. However, for many years, urban planners have attempted to find solutions that fit within the context and have put them into practice in order to shape the form of a city accordingly. One of the controversial problems which most of the developing and developed countries deal with it is urban sprawl, which affects everything and everyone in different scales. In T.R.N. Cyprus urban sprawl didn’t promote auto-dependency. Despite urban sprawl in T.R.N. Cyprus have many repercussions, one of the important impacts which are considered in this articles are the psychological impact of urban sprawl, also this article attempt to divide urban sprawl leaving condition into three phases, and promote the contemplate phase which makes sprawl inhabitants think and return to the inner-city neighbourhood again.

The sprawl as a result of rapid population growth appears when the city expands unplanned in the form of low-density development. The ...