Abstract: Urban expansion encroaches on the ecological space. It has led to fragmentation of ecological space and continuous decline of the ecosystem service capacity, giving rise to a series of ecological environment problems, which is the main reason for the imbalance of urban human-land relationship. Protecting and repairing urban ecological space is the only access to coordination of the human-land relationship. The proportion of ecological space in mountainous cities is large and the terrain is complex. Thus the coordination of human-land relationship faces greater challenges. Under the guidance of the ecological wisdom and based on ecological gradient analysis, this paper constructs a logical and practical framework to coordinate the human-land relationship through ecological space protection, aiming at multi-level protection of ecological space based on the ecological gradient. Taking Shiyan City, an important mountainous city on the middle line of the south-to-north water diversion project, as an example, this paper analyzes the ecological problems in the city and diagnoses the root cause as the fragmentation of the ecological space. The main ecological factors and core ecological functions are protected as a whole, and the spaces threatened by human activities are identified. Finally, this paper defines the pattern of multi-gradient ecological protection and puts forward corresponding practical guidelines to coordinate the contradiction between man and land in urban development for sustainable development.