Objective  The analysis of the Productive-Living-Ecological (PLE) land evolution characteristics and its driving factors in Hengyang City could provide a reference basis for the optimization of land use allocation and sustainable land development in the city.

  Method  The intensity characteristics of PLE land changes in Hengyang City from 1995 to 2020 were identified through a combination of change components and Intensity Analysis methods, and a patch-generating land use simulation (PLUS) model was adopted to reveal the driving mechanism of PLE land change in the area.

  Result  Ecological land and productive-ecological land were the main category in the study area, showing a decreasing trend. The overall change components of PLE land changed from quantity to exchange, and the change components of various categories were obviously different. The change intensities of PLE land from 1995 to 2015 were lower than those from 2015 to 2020, which showed a faster change. Productive-living land and ecological-productive land changed actively. The gain of living-productive land mainly derived from ecological land and productive-living land from 1995 to 2020. The transition intensities indicated that the stable targeting for the transition was from productive-ecological land to productive-living land, and a stable avoiding for the transition was from ecological land to productive-living land.

  Conclusion  The expansion intensity of the living-production land is continuing to rise, which mainly is driven by the construction of transport infrastructure, resulting in the encroachment of a large amount of land for production and ecological functions. In the future, the region should optimize structure of the PLE land through overall planning and policy guidance.