Observations · city growth

City growth 1975 → 2030

The built-up surface of 4 cities, epoch by epoch — 1975, 1990, 2000, 2010, 2020 and the JRC projections for 2025 and 2030 — rendered by WaiMAP from the GHS-BUILT-S R2023A grid. Every number on this page comes from the same file as the animations.

Built-up km² = Σ (built-up share of each 30" cell × cell area) inside a square window around the city centre (cell area from the latitude). 2025 and 2030 are JRC projections. The window is a fixed square, not an administrative boundary.

Istanbul

Epoch	1975	1990	2000	2010	2020	2025*	2030*
Built-up surface, km²	182	199	254	282	310	317	321

* JRC projection. Window: 90 × 90 km around 41.03, 28.95 (a fixed square, not a city boundary).

LinkedIn-ready caption (numbers from the data file)

Istanbul: the built-up surface in a 90 × 90 km window around the city grew from 182 km² in 1975 to 310 km² in 2020 (+70.2 %, × 1.70). The JRC projection gives 321 km² for 2030 (+3.4 % on 2020). Data: GHS-BUILT-S R2023A, European Commission, JRC (CC BY 4.0). Rendered with WaiMAP - Spatial Intelligence. #UrbanGrowth #GIS #WaiMAP

WebM 1280 × 720 Square 1080 × 1080 (LinkedIn) Poster PNG km² series (JSON) Explore in WaiMAP

Ankara

Epoch	1975	1990	2000	2010	2020	2025*	2030*
Built-up surface, km²	56	62	83	105	127	132	135

* JRC projection. Window: 60 × 60 km around 39.93, 32.82 (a fixed square, not a city boundary).

LinkedIn-ready caption (numbers from the data file)

Ankara: the built-up surface in a 60 × 60 km window around the city grew from 56 km² in 1975 to 127 km² in 2020 (+126.1 %, × 2.26). The JRC projection gives 135 km² for 2030 (+6.4 % on 2020). Data: GHS-BUILT-S R2023A, European Commission, JRC (CC BY 4.0). Rendered with WaiMAP - Spatial Intelligence. #UrbanGrowth #GIS #WaiMAP

WebM 1280 × 720 Square 1080 × 1080 (LinkedIn) Poster PNG km² series (JSON) Explore in WaiMAP

Bucharest

Epoch	1975	1990	2000	2010	2020	2025*	2030*
Built-up surface, km²	65	80	95	118	140	144	147

* JRC projection. Window: 50 × 50 km around 44.43, 26.10 (a fixed square, not a city boundary).

LinkedIn-ready caption (numbers from the data file)

Bucharest: the built-up surface in a 50 × 50 km window around the city grew from 65 km² in 1975 to 140 km² in 2020 (+116.3 %, × 2.16). The JRC projection gives 147 km² for 2030 (+5.4 % on 2020). Data: GHS-BUILT-S R2023A, European Commission, JRC (CC BY 4.0). Rendered with WaiMAP - Spatial Intelligence. #UrbanGrowth #GIS #WaiMAP

WebM 1280 × 720 Square 1080 × 1080 (LinkedIn) Poster PNG km² series (JSON) Explore in WaiMAP

Lagos

Epoch	1975	1990	2000	2010	2020	2025*	2030*
Built-up surface, km²	273	322	351	470	598	611	619

* JRC projection. Window: 70 × 70 km around 6.55, 3.38 (a fixed square, not a city boundary).

LinkedIn-ready caption (numbers from the data file)

Lagos: the built-up surface in a 70 × 70 km window around the city grew from 273 km² in 1975 to 598 km² in 2020 (+119.3 %, × 2.19). The JRC projection gives 619 km² for 2030 (+3.5 % on 2020). Data: GHS-BUILT-S R2023A, European Commission, JRC (CC BY 4.0). Rendered with WaiMAP - Spatial Intelligence. #UrbanGrowth #GIS #WaiMAP

WebM 1280 × 720 Square 1080 × 1080 (LinkedIn) Poster PNG km² series (JSON) Explore in WaiMAP

Data: GHS-BUILT-S R2023A, European Commission, JRC (CC BY 4.0). No basemap: no licence-safe coastline or country outline at city scale is available on the build machine (the only local outline, Natural Earth 1:110m, is too coarse for these windows). No third-party map tiles are used in the media. Stamp: WaiMAP - Spatial Intelligence. Generated 2026-10-13 by tools/growth/build_growth_media.py — the numbers: growth.json.