ASSESSING THE JOINT INFLUENCE OF ECOLOGICAL AND SOCIOECONOMIC DETERMINANTS OF INCREASES IN THE BUILT-ENVIRONMENT: A STUDY OF TRENDS IN CENTRAL NORTH CAROLINA

This paper advances an empirical model assessing how, over both time and space, changes in land-use respond to changing economic and ecological conditions. Focusing on Central North Carolina, a region that has undergone extensive changes in forest cover and agricultural lands over the past two decades, landscape dynamics are modeled by exploiting a spatial database that links several satellite images spanning the years 1975-1999 to a suite of socioeconomic, institutional and GIS-created explanatory variables.Environmental Economics and Policy, Land Economics/Use,

Urban sprawl in the state of Missouri : current trends, driving forces, and predicted growth on Missouri's natural landscape

Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on March 5, 2013).The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file.Dissertation advisor: Dr. Hong S. HeIncludes bibliographical references.Vita.Ph.D. University of Missouri--Columbia 2012."December 2012"Missouri reflects a full range of sprawl characteristics that include large metropolitan centers, which led growth in 1980s, and smaller metropolitan and rural areas, which led growth in 1990s. In order to study the historical patterns of sprawl, there is a need to quantitatively and geographically depict the extent and density of impervious surface for three time periods of 1980, 1990, and 2000 for the entire state of Missouri. Mapped impervious surface is the best candidate of ancillary data for dasymetric mapping of population in several comparison studies. The current research examines the performances of dasymetric mapping of population with imperviousness as ancillary data and regression analysis of population using imperviousness as a predictor Results from this work can be aggregated to any geographical unit (hydrologic boundaries, administrative boundaries, etc.). A pilot future urban growth study for the two decades of 1980s and 1990s was done in Missouri. The historical urban growth of the two decades were analyzed then coupled with various predictor variables to investigate the influence of each predictor variables towards the process of urban growth. The knowledge learned from the process is then used to build an urban growth simulation model that is GIS-based with open framework for ease of management and improvement. Pixel level urban growth was simulated for year 2010, 2020 and 2030. This model framework is developed with the ultimate goal of simulating urban growth for the entire state of Missouri.Includes bibliographical reference

Spatial Analysis of Post-Hurricane Katrina Thermal Pattern and Intensity in Greater New Orleans: Implications for Urban Heat Island Research

In 2005, Hurricane Katrina’s diverse impacts on the Greater New Orleans area included damaged and destroyed trees, and other despoiled vegetation, which also increased the exposure of artificial and bare surfaces, known factors that contribute to the climatic phenomenon known as the urban heat island (UHI). This is an investigation of UHI in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, which entails the analysis of pre and post-hurricane Katrina thermal imagery of the study area, including changes to surface heat patterns and vegetative cover. Imagery from Landsat TM was used to show changes to the pattern and intensity of the UHI effect, caused by an extreme weather event. Using remote sensing visualization methods, field data, and local knowledge, the author found there was a measurable change in the pattern and intensity of the New Orleans UHI effect, as well as concomitant changes to vegetative land cover. This finding may be relevant for urban planners and citizens, especially in the context of recovery from a large-scale disaster of a coastal city, regarding future weather events, and other natural and human impacts

Effects of rapid urbanisation on the urban thermal environment between 1990 and 2011 in Dhaka Megacity, Bangladesh

This study investigates the influence of land-use/land-cover (LULC) change on land surface temperature (LST) in Dhaka Megacity, Bangladesh during a period of rapid urbanisation. LST was derived from Landsat 5 TM scenes captured in 1990, 2000 and 2011 and compared to contemporaneous LULC maps. We compared index-based and linear spectral mixture analysis (LSMA) techniques for modelling LST. LSMA derived biophysical parameters corresponded more strongly to LST than those produced using index-based parameters. Results indicated that vegetation and water surfaces had relatively stable LST but it increased by around 2 °C when these surfaces were converted to built-up areas with extensive impervious surfaces. Knowledge of the expected change in LST when one land-cover is converted to another can inform land planners of the potential impact of future changes and urges the development of better management strategies

REMOTE SENSING OF FOLIAR NITROGEN IN CULTIVATED GRASSLANDS OF HUMAN DOMINATED LANDSCAPES

Foliar nitrogen (N) concentration of plant canopies plays a central role in a number of important ecosystem processes and continues to be an active subject in the field of remote sensing. Previous efforts to estimate foliar N at the landscape scale have primarily focused on intact forests and grasslands using aircraft imaging spectrometry and various techniques of statistical calibration and modeling. The present study was designed to extend this work by examining the potential to estimate the foliar N concentration of residential, agricultural and other cultivated grassland areas within a suburbanizing watershed. In conjunction with ground-based vegetation sampling, we developed Partial Least Squares (PLS) models for predicting mass-based foliar N across management types using input from airborne and field based imaging spectrometers. Results yielded strong predictive relationships for both ground- and aircraft-based sensors across sites that included turf grass, grazed pasture, hayfields and fallow fields. We also report on relationships between imaging spectrometer data and other important variables such as canopy height, biomass, and water content, results from which show strong promise for detection with high quality imaging spectrometry data and suggest that cultivated grassland offer opportunity for empirical study of canopy light dynamics. Finally, we discuss the potential for application of our results, and potential challenges, with data from the planned HyspIRI satellite, which will provide global coverage of data useful for vegetation N estimation

The Long-term Impact of Land Use Land Cover Change on Urban Climate: Evidence from the Phoenix Metropolitan Area, Arizona

abstract: This dissertation research studies long-term spatio-temporal patterns of surface urban heat island (SUHI) intensity, urban evapotranspiration (ET), and urban outdoor water use (OWU) using Phoenix metropolitan area (PMA), Arizona as the case study. This dissertation is composed of three chapters. The first chapter evaluates the SUHI intensity for PMA using Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) land surface temperature (LST) product and a time-series trend analysis to discover areas that experienced significant changes of SUHI intensity between 2000 and 2017. The heating and cooling effects of different urban land use land cover (LULC) types was also examined using classified Landsat satellite images. The second chapter is focused on urban ET and the impacts of urban LULC change on ET. An empirical model of urban ET for PMA was built using flux tower data and MODIS land products using multivariate regression analysis. A time-series trend analysis was then performed to discover areas in PMA that experienced significant changes of ET between 2001 and 2015. The impact of urban LULC change on ET was examined using classified LULC maps. The third chapter models urban OWU in PMA using a surface energy balance model named METRIC (Mapping Evapotranspiration at high spatial Resolution with Internalized Calibration) and time-series Landsat Thematic Mapper 5 imagery for 2010. The relationship between urban LULC types and OWU was examined with the use of very high-resolution land cover classification data generated from the National Agriculture Imagery Program (NAIP) imagery and regression analysis. Socio-demographic variables were selected from census data at the census track level and analyzed against OWU to study their relationship using correlation analysis. This dissertation makes significant contributions and expands the knowledge of long-term urban climate dynamics for PMA and the influence of urban expansion and LULC change on regional climate. Research findings and results can be used to provide constructive suggestions to urban planners, decision-makers, and city managers to formulate new policies and regulations when planning new constructions for the purpose of sustainable development for a desert city.Dissertation/ThesisDoctoral Dissertation Geography 201

Extraction and Analysis of Impervious Surfaces Based on a Spectral Un-Mixing Method Using Pearl River Delta of China Landsat TM/ETM+ Imagery from 1998 to 2008

Impervious surface area (ISA) is considered as an indicator of environment change and is regarded as an important input parameter for hydrological cycle simulation, water management and area pollution assessment. The Pearl River Delta (PRD), the 3rd most important economic district of China, is chosen in this paper to extract the ISA information based on Landsat images of 1998, 2003 and 2008 by using a linear spectral un-mixing method and to monitor impervious surface change by analyzing the multi-temporal Landsat-derived fractional impervious surface. Results of this study were as follows: (1) the area of ISA in the PRD increased 79.09% from 1998 to 2003 and 26.88% from 2003 to 2008 separately; (2) the spatial distribution of ISA was described according to the 1998/2003 percentage respectively. Most of middle and high percentage ISA was located in northwestern and southeastern of the whole delta, and middle percentage ISA was mainly located in the city interior, high percentage ISA was mainly located in the suburban around the city accordingly; (3) the expanding direction and trend of high percentage ISA was discussed in order to understand the change of urban in this delta; High percentage ISA moved from inner city to edge of urban area during 1998–2003 and moved to the suburban area that far from the urban area mixed with jumpily and gradually during 2003–2008. According to the discussion of high percentage ISA spatial expanded direction, it could be found out that high percentage ISA moved outward from the centre line of Pearl River of the whole delta while a high ISA percentage in both shores of the Pearl River Estuary moved toward the Pearl River; (4) combining the change of ISA with social conditions, the driving relationship was analyzed in detail. It was evident that ISA percentage change had a deep relationship with the economic development of this region in the past ten years. Contemporaneous major sport events (16th Asia Games of Guangzhou, 26th Summer Universidad of Shenzhen) and the government policies also promoted the development of the ISA. Meanwhile, topographical features like the National Nature Reserve of China restricted and affected the expansion of the ISA. Above all, this paper attempted to extract ISA in a major region of the PRD; the temporal and spatial analyses to PRD ISA demonstrated the drastic changes in developed areas of China. These results were important and valuable for land use management, ecological protection and policy establishment

Monitoring urban sustainability based on an integrated indicator model using geospatial technique and multiple data sources: a case study in the city of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada

A comprehensive understanding of urban development is critical for moving towards the goal of sustainability. Despite a collection of urban sustainability indicator (USI) conceptual frameworks proposed and explored in practical urban sustainability assessment, establishing an integrated, well-quantified, spatially characterized USI model is still a challenging task. Therefore, based on a manuscript-style format this thesis develops a subjectively weighted integrated USI model and then applies it to the city of Saskatoon, SK, Canada, as a case study, based on quantifying a hierarchical index system. In addition, urban environmental sustainability is spatiotemporally investigated for an improved understanding of Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect. Results show that the proposed integrated USI model improved urban sustainability measurement by overcoming the shortages in existing USI models. Geospatial statistics demonstrated disparity in urban sustainability across residential neighbourhoods for Saskatoon in 2006 based on the significant clusters and outliers. It also found that population increases can possibly improve intellectual and economic well-being and promote urbanization, but may cause environmental degradation and lead to a decline in overall urban sustainability. This research also demonstrates that satellite imagery can be used to study environmental sustainability at different spatiotemporal scales. This research reveals that both urban water and green spaces had significant cooling effects on the surrounding urban LST within specific ranges. Urban surface temperature can be estimated based on a multiple linear regression model with sustainable traveling mode index and land use information as input variables. The overall significance of this research has three folds. First, it lays a preliminary theoretical foundation for a comprehensive understanding of urban sustainability based on a well-quantified integrated USI model. Second, it is relatively original with respect to improving urban sustainability measurements through the incorporation of subjective information into objective data. Third, this research has explored spatiotemporal analysis to detect urban sustainability patterns based on compiling multiple data sources using geospatial techniques. The proposed USI model is highly suitable for comparison analysis at different spatial scales as well as continuously tracking the dynamic changes. Therefore, this research can be a good practice of applying the spatiotemporal philosophy to urban geographical problems

Monitoring the impact of land cover change on surface urban heat island through google earth engine. Proposal of a global methodology, first applications and problems

All over the world, the rapid urbanization process is challenging the sustainable development of our cities. In 2015, the United Nation highlighted in Goal 11 of the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) the importance to "Make cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable". In order to monitor progress regarding SDG 11, there is a need for proper indicators, representing different aspects of city conditions, obviously including the Land Cover (LC) changes and the urban climate with its most distinct feature, the Urban Heat Island (UHI). One of the aspects of UHI is the Surface Urban Heat Island (SUHI), which has been investigated through airborne and satellite remote sensing over many years. The purpose of this work is to show the present potential of Google Earth Engine (GEE) to process the huge and continuously increasing free satellite Earth Observation (EO) Big Data for long-term and wide spatio-temporal monitoring of SUHI and its connection with LC changes. A large-scale spatio-temporal procedure was implemented under GEE, also benefiting from the already established Climate Engine (CE) tool to extract the Land Surface Temperature (LST) from Landsat imagery and the simple indicator Detrended Rate Matrix was introduced to globally represent the net effect of LC changes on SUHI. The implemented procedure was successfully applied to six metropolitan areas in the U.S., and a general increasing of SUHI due to urban growth was clearly highlighted. As a matter of fact, GEE indeed allowed us to process more than 6000 Landsat images acquired over the period 1992-2011, performing a long-term and wide spatio-temporal study on SUHI vs. LC change monitoring. The present feasibility of the proposed procedure and the encouraging obtained results, although preliminary and requiring further investigations (calibration problems related to LST determination from Landsat imagery were evidenced), pave the way for a possible global service on SUHI monitoring, able to supply valuable indications to address an increasingly sustainable urban planning of our cities

Land use land cover change and land surface emissivity in Ibadan, Nigeria

There are many drivers of climate change. The urbanization process has been adjudged to be one of the major factors influencing spatial variation in land use and land cover change (LULC), land surface temperature (LST), land surface emissivity (LSE), increasing greenhouse gases emission, and climate change. This article uses a multispectral satellite remote sensing and survey-based approach to examine the nexus of LULC and LSE in the Ibadan city region, Nigeria. The spectral reflectance, the sun angle spectral radiance of the Landsat imageries (2000, 2010, 2018) was corrected and converted from digital number. The LULC, Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), Normalized Difference Built-Up Index (NDBI), LSE and LST were obtained from the analysis of Landsat imageries. From the findings, temperature increase was identified as a peculiar environmental issue. Analysis of the Landsat imageries revealed that the NDVI value increased from 0.44 in 2000 to 0.47 in 2018. The NDBI values showed that built-up areas in the core of the urban areas have the highest NDBI values (0.023-0.602). The spatio-temporal trends of LST were related to the changes in LULC, and the built-up area had the highest LSE. The maximum LST (43°C) was observed in the year 2018 at the core area of the city where building density was highest. The study suggests an application of cool pavements, green development, and urban forest regeneration for sustainable development