LEED neighborhood development assessment: the Fountain District

The Fountain District of Bellingham, Washington offers the perfect location for a LEED-ND development project. In 2007 residents from the Columbia, Cornwall Park and Lettered Streets Neighborhoods launched an outreach to revamp the commercial area commonly known as the Fountain District (City of Bellingham, 2009). Since 2007 the City of Bellingham has been formulating an Urban Village master plan for the Fountain District and based on those plans we developed our site design proposal. The Fountain District encompasses the area of Meridian Street beginning at the intersection of Illinois and running south to the intersections of Girard and Broadway, providing great connectivity throughout the district and into neighboring neighborhoods. The area is already developed therefore offering a perfect location for LEED-ND based redevelopment. The site is an ideal candidate for development to deal with the projected growth Bellingham will face in the years to come. Redevelopment will revitalize the Fountain District by providing new amenities in an urban village form, as well as increasing the overall aesthetics of the neighborhood and the overall usefulness of the area. In addition redeveloping the Fountain District will help to protect Whatcom County\u27s valuable farmland from sprawl by reducing land consumption. The Fountain District provides a smart location for infill development because of its proximity to public transportation as well as jobs in the commercial core along Meridian Street. The proximity to public transportation as well as bicycle and pedestrian friendly streets offer the potential for a more walkable community. Encouraging public transportation and the use of bicycles and walking will lower resident\u27s dependence on motor vehicles and lower the congestion around the area as well as lower the community\u27s dependence on fossil fuels. The proposed alternative development will include the addition of six new buildings as well as the renovation of three existing buildings from which the design was based on citizen input. In addition, several street improvements have been added to increase the walkability of the neighborhood including lowering the speed limit and adding crosswalks. See Appendix C for design proposals. With the proposed design the Fountain District could potentially reach GOLD LEED Certification

Rethinking Habitat Occupancy Modeling and the Role of Diel Activity in an Anthropogenic World

Current methods to model species habitat use through space and diel time are limited. Development of such models is critical when considering rapidly changing habitats where species are forced to adapt to anthropogenic change, often by shifting their diel activity across space. We use an occupancy modeling framework to specify the multistate diel occupancy model (MSDOM), which can evaluate species diel activity against continuous response variables that may impact diel activity within and across seasons or years. We used two case studies, fosas in Madagascar and coyotes in Chicago, Illinois, to conceptualize the application of this model and to quantify the impacts of human activity on species spatial use in diel time. We found support that both species varied their habitat use by diel states—in and across years and by human disturbance. Our results exemplify the importance of understanding animal diel activity patterns and how human disturbance can lead to temporal habitat loss. The MSDOM will allow more focused attention in ecology and evolution studies on the importance of the short temporal scale of diel time in animal-habitat relationships and lead to improved habitat conservation and management

Public Complaints Reflect Rat Relative Abundance Across Diverse Urban Neighborhoods

Preventing infestations of rats is crucial for minimizing property damage and the transmission of rat-associated pathogens to humans. Due to the logistical challenges in assessing rat abundance over large areas, public officials must often use the number of public rat complaints to estimate the relative abundance of rats and the subsequent need for rodent control. However, the likelihood of reporting complaints may be driven by socioeconomic factors and therefore may not accurately reflect rat abundance. In this study, we tested whether the number of rat complaints reflect rat relative abundance and if rat complaints and abundance are higher in alleys with greater levels of harborage, food attractants, and poor structural integrity. We conducted this study in Chicago, IL, USA where public rat complaints have risen by 39% from 2008 up to 45,887 in 2017, and where socioeconomic factors vary considerably across neighborhoods. We assessed municipal rat complaints, census data, and land cover data for 77 community areas across Chicago. In collaboration with pest management professionals, we trapped brown rats (Rattus norvegicus) in alleys in 13 community areas that varied from low to high measures of household income and urban development. At trapping sites, we recorded signs of rat activity, attractants, and infrastructure condition. Based on candidate model comparisons using linear models, we found that rat complaints were most associated with rat trap success. Rat trap success was most associated with increasing complaints, percent of rented housing units, and decreasing vacant land. At a local scale, alleys with more complaints and higher trap success also had more uncontained garbage. Our results demonstrate that, at least in Chicago, public reporting can serve as a useful tool to identify areas of greater rat activity for targeted control efforts. Our study also suggests the need for habitat modification to minimize access to attractants. Finally, our results highlight how partnerships between researchers and private practitioners can facilitate large-scale projects on rat infestation risks in urban areas

Mammals adjust diel activity across gradients of urbanization

Time is a fundamental component of ecological processes. How animal behavior changes over time has been explored through well-known ecological theories like niche partitioning and predator–prey dynamics. Yet, changes in animal behavior within the shorter 24-hr light–dark cycle have largely gone unstudied. Understanding if an animal can adjust their temporal activity to mitigate or adapt to environmental change has become a recent topic of discussion and is important for effective wildlife management and conservation. While spatial habitat is a fundamental consideration in wildlife management and conservation, temporal habitat is often ignored. We formulated a temporal resource selection model to quantify the diel behavior of 8 mammal species across 10 US cities. We found high variability in diel activity patterns within and among species and species-specific correlations between diel activity and human population density, impervious land cover, available greenspace, vegetation cover, and mean daily temperature. We also found that some species may modulate temporal behaviors to manage both natural and anthropogenic risks. Our results highlight the complexity with which temporal activity patterns interact with local environmental characteristics, and suggest that urban mammals may use time along the 24-hr cycle to reduce risk, adapt, and therefore persist, and in some cases thrive, in human-dominated ecosystems

The red, white, and great blue

For the last three years I have conducted bird counts throughout Lincoln Park, Chicago to compare to historic records collected over one hundred years ago. Last year I came across this great blue heron with an American flag caught around its beak for about one week. While this species is quite common to Lincoln Park both historically and today, the city itself has changed considerably. This has been to the benefit of some species, but not all, and this image truly illustrates some of the costs associated to human-dominated habitats. I never did find out what exactly happened to this bird

Urban Wildlife Through Space and Time

Much of my work is focused on developing techniques and methods to get the most ecologically relevant information as possible from observational data. First, I illustrate common approaches used to analyze camera trap data with the analysis of a single species, the Virginia opossum (Didelphis virginiana), and show that this species has different habitat requirements throughout Chicago as urbanization increases. My next study shows how to estimate species associations and co-occurrence rates with camera trap data, which I then validate with extensive use of simulations. Following this, I apply the model I developed to estimate rates of co-occurrence between coyote (Canis latrans), raccoon (Procyon lotor), and the Virginia opossum. While I predicted coyote would negatively influence the two smaller mesocarnivores, I found no evidence of this relationship in the data. In my next chapter, I develop an approach to estimate periodic trends in the spatiotemporal distribution of species by incorporating Fourier series into dynamic occupancy models. Overall, this approach accounts for between 30-73% of the temporal variability in the colonization rates of the species I analyzed. This approach also outperforms other more commonly used approaches that estimate temporal dynamics. In my final chapter, I develop an approach to quantify values and perceptions towards wildlife through comments made on social media. Collectively, I see my dissertation as setting a foundation for future empirical research through the creation of generalizable and robust statistical methods that can be used to answer both basic and applied problems in ecology

Fidino_MEE

See README for description of contents

gallo_et_al_2019_AnimalEcology

R script, JAGS models, and data used to assess how urbanization changes predator avoidance behaviors in Chicago, IL US

Data from: A multi-state dynamic occupancy model to estimate local colonization-extinction rates and patterns of co-occurrence between two or more interacting species

1. Although ecology is rife with theory that explores how multiple species co-occur through space and time, the field lacks robust statistical models to parameterize this theory with empirical data, particularly when species are detected imperfectly and data are collected as a time-series. 2. We address this need by developing an occupancy model that estimates local colonization and extinction rates for two or more interacting species when data are collected across multiple sampling occasions. This model estimates how community composition at a site may change across sampling occasions by assuming the latent occupancy state is a categorical random variable. We used a multinomial-logit model to parameterize species-specific parameters and pairwise interactions between species, both of which can be made a function of covariates. These transition probabilities between community states can then be converted to occupancy or co-occurrence probabilities to determine how community composition varies along an environmental gradient or through time. 3. As an example, we estimate patterns of co-occurrence between coyote (Canis latrans), Virginia opossum (Didelphis virginiana), and raccoon (Procyon lotor) in Chicago, Illinois, USA with data from a multi-year camera trapping study. Models with pairwise interactions between species greatly out performed models that assumed independence between species. Opossum and raccoon, for example, were far less likely to go extinct in habitat patches where coyotes were present. 4. Community composition at a site depends on species interactions and the local environment. Our model can separate such effects by estimating the underlying processes that define species occurrence patterns. As a result, our model can more explicitly quantify a wide range of ecological dynamics and therefore be used to empirically test ecological theory, such as estimating priority effects at a site or turnover rates between species, both of which can be made to vary as a function of covariates

Data from: Urbanization alters predator avoidance behaviors

1. Urbanization is considered the fastest growing form of global land use change and can dramatically modify habitat structure and ecosystem function. While ecological processes continue to operate within cities, urban ecosystems are profoundly different from their more natural counterparts. Thus, ecological predictions derived from more natural ecosystems are rarely generalizable to urban environments. 2. In this study we used data from a large-scale and long-term camera trapping project in Chicago IL, USA to determine whether urbanization alters predator avoidance behavior of urban prey species. 3. We studied three behavioral mechanisms often induced by the fear of predation (spatial distribution, daily activity patterns, and vigilance) of white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) and eastern cottontail (Sylvilagus floridanus) when coyote (Canis latrans) – an urban apex predator – was present in the same habitat patch. 4. We found no evidence of spatial segregation between coyote and either prey species. Furthermore, neither white-tailed deer nor eastern cottontail changed their daily activity or increased vigilance in urban areas when coyotes were present. Eastern cottontail, however, had their uppermost level of vigilance in highly urban sites when coyotes were absent. 5. Our study demonstrates that predator-prey dynamics might be modified in urban ecosystems – moving from what is traditionally thought of as a two-player system (predator and prey) to a three-player system (predator, prey, and people)