Coupling coordination and spatiotemporal heterogeneity between urbanization and ecological environment in Shaanxi Province, China

Rapid urbanization destroys the structure and function of the ecosystem and causes severe ecological and environmental problems. Consequently, the deterioration of the ecological environment also hinders the quality of urban development and restricts the sustainable development of cities. To deeply explore the coordination measurement and the temporal and spatial heterogeneity between urbanization and ecological environment, we used the statistical data of Shaanxi Province from 2005 to 2019 as an example, and applied the index system construction method to evaluate the comprehensive level of urbanization and ecological environment. Further, we used the coupling coordination degree model (CCDM), relative development degree model (RDDM), and geographically and temporally weighted regression (GTWR) to explore the dynamic changes and spatiotemporal heterogeneity of the coupling relationship between urbanization and the ecological environment in the study area. The results show that: (1) the overall urbanization and ecological environment of Shaanxi Province show a steady upward trend. The level of urbanization remains stable, and the growth rate of the ecological environment is lower than that of urbanization. (2) The CCD of Shaanxi Province generally presents the evolution law of “basic disharmony-basic coordination-medium coordination-high coordination.” The spatial difference of coupling and coordination development state in different regions is significant, generally shown as “lagging urbanization-synchronous development-lagging ecological environment.” (3) During the study period, there was a significant interaction between urbanization and the influencing factors of the ecological environment, which regulate against each other. The contribution of the ecological environment to urbanization was suitable as a whole, while the construction of urbanization inhibited the ecological environment to varying degrees. This study provided a scientific basis for analyzing the coordination degree and the temporal and spatial differences between urbanization and the ecological environment, and offered practical guidance for formulating and implementing regional urbanization and sustainable environmental development countermeasures.