Geography Commons^™

The Development Of Dark Hyperspectral Absolute Calibration Model Using Extended Pseudo Invariant Calibration Sites At A Global Scale: Dark Epics-Global, Padam Bahadur Karki

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This research aimed to develop a novel dark hyperspectral absolute calibration (DAHAC) model using stable dark targets of "Global Cluster - 36" (GC-36), one of the clusters from "300 Class Global Classification." The stable dark sites were identified from GC-36 called "Dark EPICS-Global" covering the surface types viz; dark rock, volcanic area, and dark sand. The Dark EPICS-Global shows a temporal variation of 0.02 unit reflectance. This work uses the Landsat-8 (L8) Operational Land Imager (OLI) , Sentinel-2A (S2A) Multispectral Instrument (MSI) , and Earth Observing One (EO-1) Hyperion data for the DAHAC model development, where well-calibrated L8 and S2A …

“For Posterity, It’S Something Important To Do”: Festivals, Digital Practices, And Conserving Community Heritage, Enya Moore Dr.

Presentations

This presentation highlights the importance of preserving arts festival activities and uses empirical evidence to underline the significance of the digital turn for archiving this kind of intangible heritage. As Del Barrio et al (2012, pp. 235) argue, cultural festivals are an emblematic example of immaterial cultural heritage, 'since they are experience goods which expire at the moment they are produced and not only express artistic innovations in the field but also draw on previous cultural background, perceived as accumulated cultural capital’ . Data gathered through qualitative fieldwork with rural festival makers are used to explore the potential that digitising …

Grain-Washing: The Issue With Corn Ethanol As A Sustainable Aviation Fuel, Emily J. Rinn

Scripps Senior Theses

Decarbonizing the aviation sector remains one of the most prevalent obstacles in reducing the United States’ significant contribution to global greenhouse gas emissions. Launched in 2021, the Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) Grand Challenge aims to supply enough fuel to meet 100% of demand by 2050 through reducing its production costs and enhancing its sustainable practices. Corn ethanol feedstock has been proposed to make up as much as half of all SAF production in the 2030 benchmark. This thesis explores the assemblage of corn ethanol – from its true environmental impacts, role in the future SAF market, to research claiming corn …

Developing A Standard Operating Procedure For Irrigated Agricultural Field Delineation And Irrigation Identification Using Examples From The Oregon-Idaho Border And Central California, Scott Milleson

Masters in GIS Practicum Reports

This practicum draws from experience working as an intern for The Freshwater Trust (an environmental nonprofit organization based in Portland, Oregon) from June to December of 2022. The work performed in this internship involved the delineation of agricultural fields using ArcGIS Online, an online collaborative mapping tool, as well as identifying and assigning irrigation type attributes on the Oregon-Idaho border along the Snake River, and the Deschutes Basin.

The purpose of this practicum project is to create a generalized guide for the delineation of agricultural fields and identification of irrigation type using a standard operating procedure for GIS interns, mapathon …

Migrant-Activist Evidentiary Practices In The Aegean Sea, Beatrice A. Abbott

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

This project examines digital maps and images made by migrants and activists traversing or helping others to traverse the Greek-Turkish maritime border in 2015 and early 2016, when over a million people arrived to European shores, mostly by way of the Aegean Sea. These maps were made using applications such as Google Maps, Bing Maps, Maps.me, and WhatsApp and circulated on public Facebook groups and pages. Through a visual analysis of these digital artifacts, I look at how they can be read to witness and contest deadly border geographies produced through migratory policies and practices of deterrence. Further, I argue …

Hoarding Lifesaving Knowledge While Millions Die: The Political Economy Of Global Covid-19 Vaccine Apartheid, Kenneth Stancil

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

Coronavirus vaccines saved millions of lives, but experts estimate that the suboptimal production and inequitable distribution of shots resulted in nearly 3 million preventable Covid-19 deaths in 2021 and 2022 as well as millions of indirect deaths during the pandemic. These avoidable fatalities are inseparable from the grotesquely unequal vaccination rates between rich and poor nations. Dose hoarding by high-income countries contributed to vaccine inequality, but the “vaccine apartheid” inflicted on low-income countries reflects an even more fundamental injustice: knowledge hoarding by profit-maximizing pharmaceutical corporations—aided and abetted by wealthy governments—which deprived generic manufacturers of the right to produce additional lifesaving …

The Rise Of Native Lordships At Pashash, A.D. 200–600, North Highlands Of Ancash, Peru, George F. Lau, Milton Luján Dávila, Jacob L. Bongers, David Chicoine

Faculty Publications

This article examines the rise of native, segmentary lordships in the highlands of north-central Peru. It reports on new excavations and mapping at the seat of a prehispanic polity, Pashash (Recuay culture), a large hilltop center that developed after the collapse of Chavín civilization. Fieldwork revealed monumental constructions and two special activity contexts radiocarbon-dated to ca. a.d. 200–400: an offering area in a large palatial compound and a room-complex with chambers closed off and sealed with feasting refuse. Multiple lines of evidence help reconstruct a regional picture for the establishment of wealthy local elites. Cultural innovations explicitly link new leaders …

Briquetage And Brine: Living And Working At The Classic Maya Salt Works Of Ek Way Nal, Belize, Heather Mckillop, E. Cory Sills

Faculty Publications

Systematic flotation survey and spatial analysis of artifacts at the submerged salt work of Ek Way Nal reveal evidence of a residence, salt kitchens, and additional activities. Ek Way Nal is one of 110 salt works associated with a Late to Terminal Classic (A.D. 600-900) salt industry known as the Paynes Creek Salt Works. Wooden posts that form the walls of 10 buildings are remarkably preserved in a peat bog below the sea floor providing an opportunity to examine surface artifacts in relation to buildings. Numerous salt kitchens have been located at the Paynes Creek Salt Works by evidence of …

Disparities In Spatial Accessibility Of Primary Care In Louisiana: From Physical To Virtual Accessibility, Fahui Wang, Yutian Zeng, Lingbo Liu, Tracy Onega

Faculty Publications

Telehealth has been widely employed and has transformed how healthcare is delivered in the United States as a result of COVID-19 pandemic. While telehealth is utilized and encouraged to reduce the cost and travel burden for access to healthcare, there are debates on whether telehealth can promote equity in healthcare services by narrowing the gap among diverse groups. Using the Two-Step Floating Catchment Area (2SFCA) and Two-Step Virtual Catchment Area (2SVCA) methods, this study compares the disparities of physical and virtual access to primary care physicians (PCPs) in Louisiana. Both physical and virtual access to PCPs exhibit similar spatial patterns …

A Cyclically Adjusted Spatio-Temporal Kernel Density Estimation Method For Predictive Crime Hotspot Analysis, Ya Han, Yujie Hu, Haojie Zhu, Fahui Wang

Faculty Publications

This paper presents a new method for predictive crime hotspot analysis that further improves the kernel density estimation (KDE) method and the spatio-temporal kernel density estimation (STKDE) method by accounting for temporal crime cycles and is therefore termed the ‘cyclically adjusted STKDE (cSTKDE) method’. The case study on robbery incidents in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, shows a temporal cycle with a 6-month period of statistical significance from January 2010 to May 2018. This identified period is incorporated into the temporal kernel function of the new cSTKDE method. For validation, the Forecast Accuracy Index (FAI) and Forecast Precision Index (FPI) are used …

Exploring The Spatial Autocorrelation In Soil Moisture Networks: Analysis Of The Bias From Upscaling The Texas Soil Observation Network (Txson), Yaping Xu, Cuiling Liu, Lei Wang, Lei Zou

Faculty Publications

Microwave remote sensing such as soil moisture active passive (SMAP) can provide soil moisture data for agricultural and hydrological studies. However, the scales between station-measured and satellite-measured products are quite different, as stations measure on a point scale while satellites have a much larger footprint (e.g., 9 km). Consequently, the validation for soil moisture products, especially inter-comparison between these two types of observations, is quite a challenge. Spatial autocorrelation among the stations could be a contribution of bias, which impacts the dense soil moisture networks when compared with satellite soil moisture products. To examine the effects of spatial autocorrelation to …

A Peculiar Institution: White Supremacy And The Black Guides Of Mammoth Cave, Seth Garcia

Libraries Award for Undergraduate Scholarship

Intensive tourist operations at Mammoth Cave began in 1838 when Frank Gorin purchased the cave property. He brought with him Stephen Bishop, an enslaved person who would become famous across the Western world for his explorations of the cave and his knowledge of its geology. Gorin would also lease Nicholas and Matterson Bransford, and these three men would begin a 100-year history of black guides at Mammoth Cave. This essay utilizes source material written by white visitors in diaries, guidebooks, and travelers’ accounts to better understand white supremacy during the mid to late 19th century. The guides were in a …

Village Of Grand Ridge Gis Utility Mapping: Effective Decision Making And Cost Benefits, Nick Harsted

Geography and the Environment: Graduate Student Capstones

According to Worldpopualtionreview.com, “As of 2018, there are 19,495 incorporated cities, towns and villages in the United States. Of those, 14,768 have populations below 5,000. Only ten have populations above 1 million and none are above 10 million. There are 310 cities considered at least medium cities with populations of 100,000 or more.” According to the U.S Census Bureau stats, “about 80% of the United States population lives in urban areas.” Within these cities or towns are underground utility infrastructures such as water lines and sewer pipes. For years cities have stored in files and boxes these construction plans explaining …

Comparison Of Gis Methods For Estimating The Social Vulnerability In Response To Natural Hazards In The West Part Of The City Of Tualatin, Alex Troy

Geography Masters Research Papers

The influence of natural hazards on social vulnerability is an important topic in the risk analysis of natural disasters in the human-environment system. Due to the difficulty of directly measuring social vulnerability, composite indexes are used as a surrogate. Social vulnerability indexes attempt to characterize access to societal and local social services during or after disastrous events, using various indicators such as age, gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, housing organization, access to shelters, and medical facilities. Geographic information systems (GIS) are used for vulnerability analysis due to their visualization methods and demographic data analysis. However, limitations in GIS applications for social …

Smoke, Air, Fire, Energy (Safe) In Rural California: Critical Reflections On An Interdisciplinary Research Collaboration, Deepti Chatti, Carisse Geronimo, Cassidy Barrientos, Jana Ganion, Malcolm Moncheur, Peter Alstone Phd, Shawn Bourque, Tanya Garcia, Tesfayohanes Yacob

Humboldt Journal of Social Relations

This article provides a synthesis of the interconnected problems of tenuous energy access, wildfires, and exposures to high air pollution in Indigenous communities in rural California through the lens of ongoing collaborative research being carried out by researchers at Cal Poly Humboldt, Schatz Energy Research Center, Karuk Department of Natural Resources, and the Blue Lake Rancheria Tribe. The collaboration is funded by the Strategic Growth Council of the state of California, and we hope is the beginning of a longer term relationship between all partners. We are an interdisciplinary team of researchers drawing on energy engineering, air pollution science, and …

Lidar-Change-Based Mapping Of Sediment Movement From An Extreme Rainfall Event, Silvia E. Piovan, Michael E. Hodgson, Paolo Mozzi, Dwayne E. Porter, Bryan Hall

Faculty Publications

Mapping landscape change at fine scales (e.g. < 1.0 m resolution) using airborne LiDAR data from manned aircraft is a significant challenge. This challenge is magnified in disaster response contexts. A combination of collection and processing factors contributes to horizontal and vertical errors (and resulting uncertainty) in each pre- and post-LiDAR derived digital elevation model (DEM). Subsequently, the errors in the change surface from the two (or more) DEMs are an accumulation of the errors in the individual DEMs. Thus, reliable mapping erosion/deposition changes at sub-meter precision in change detection studies using LiDAR data is largely the domain of terrestrial LiDAR or sUAS with LiDAR scanners rather than manned aircraft. Unfortunately, terrestrial and sUAS LiDAR scanners are not well suited for mapping large areas and sUAS collections are subject to additional airspace constraints compared to manned aircraft. In this study, we probed one of the significant issues in airborne LiDAR change projects–vertical height errors from sequential flight lines. A simplified solution for determining flight line vertical biases in areas of low topographic relief with natural cover types was developed and tested for normalizing point clouds. The approach was tested in a fine-scale erosion/deposition study from an extreme rainfall event that eroded and deposited sand at depths of about 1.0 m. Airborne LiDAR had been collected prior to the rainfall event, and another airborne LiDAR collection was made 1 month after the event. Eleven field campaigns to collect reference data and visit anomalies in the change surface were conducted in a 15-month period after the event, beginning 25 February 2016 and ending 8 May 2017. The validation results indicate accuracies for the pre-event and post-event LiDAR derived DEMs were 7.8 cm and 13.0 cm RMSE, respectively. After modeling vertical errors and corrections applied to the post-event point clouds, the RMSE for the post-event DEM was 8.3 cm. In the depositional use case, 27 locations were sampled with auger boreholes/sand pits and compared with LiDAR-based change. The LiDAR-based change detection analysis resulted in predicted sand depth accuracies of 94% with a mean error of 4.7 cm.

Picturing The Future City: Digital Mediation And Creative Placemaking, Jessica Mccallum Breen

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

Creative placemaking is an arts-oriented community development policy that focuses on the potential for art, artists, and cultural organizations to generate social, economic, and cultural vibrancy in their communities and is a primary tool of culture-led (re)development practices (Markusen & Gwada, 2010). Despite the focus of creative placemakers on the local impacts of their work, creative placemaking is more than local, it is both translocal and transcalar. In this dissertation, I examine the role that digital mediation plays in creative placemaking and how it makes visible these translocal and transcalar connections. I begin by outlining a methodology for tracing replicated …

The Psycho-(Geo)Political Driving Forces Of Comfort Women Social Movements In South Korea, Jaeyeon Lee

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

"Comfort women" refers to the estimated 80,000 to 200,000 women who were forced to serve the Japanese imperial army sexually, physically, and mentally during WWII in and beyond the Asia-Pacific region. Since 1992, Korean activists have held the Wednesday Demonstration, which is the weekly protest in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul, to call for an official apology and legal compensation from the Japanese government. Since 2011, Korean activists have also installed comfort woman statues in and outside of South Korea.

This dissertation examines the psycho-political driving force behind the Wednesday Demonstration and comfort woman statue movements in South …

Property Protocols And The Spatial Relations Of Real Estate Technologies, Ian Spangler

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

The dissertation contributes to our understanding of the technologically mediated, professionally managed social relations of private property, and specifically, their consequences for housing and home. I analyze standards and protocols for real estate data transfer, such as the multiple listing service, arguing that these standards play an increasingly important role in how real estate capital authenticates property relations. Focusing on technologies that leverage these standards in order to manage, exchange, and marketize housing, I show how standards often derive from moral values grounded in rubrics of white upper-class masculinity and national border-making. In making this argument, I draw on interviews, …

The Impact Of Subjective Risk Analysis On Real Estate Prices In The Nisqually Region Following The 2001 Nisqually Earthquake, Ryan Espedal

All Master's Theses

Earthquakes are an environmental hazard that pose great risks to communities almost every day. With earthquakes, the main cause of concern is physical destruction of property, however, there are also psychological effects that are researched and discussed much less. In 2001, the Nisqually area of western Washington experienced a substantial earthquake that produced minimal physical damage but caused a significant decrease in real estate prices. Studying single-family homes from 1986-2012, this research utilizes hedonic property models to measure the change in consumer’s subjective risk calculations with reference to real estate purchases after the Nisqually earthquake, measure the relationship between earthquake …

Best Practices For Integrating Climate Change Into Protected And Conserved Area Management Plans And Planning Processes In Canada, Stephanie Barr, Christopher J. Lemieux, Pamela Wright, Jen Hoesen, Claudia A. Haas

Geography and Environmental Studies Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Impacts Of Land Cover Change On Urban Heat Island (Uhi) In Denver From 1985 To 2020, Sadia Islam Ritu

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Rapid urbanization due to land use and land cover change has become one of the major problems in the fastest-growing cities during the past few decades. Land surface temperature has changed dramatically due to urban expansion, and it is a major driver of urban eco-environmental change. Increasing temperature leads to the Urban Heat Island (UHI) problem in rapidly growing cities like Denver, contributing to global warming at multiple scales. UHI study is significant to monitor and mitigate the urban heat islandrelated problem in the study area Denver. Satellite remote sensing analysis ready data (ARD) with 30 m resolution based on …

Artisanal Mining River Dredge Detection Using Sar: A Method Comparison, Marissa A. Alessi, Peter G. Chirico, Marco Millones

Geography Articles

Challenges exist in monitoring artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) activities, given their dynamic and often informal nature. ASM takes form through various techniques and scales, including riverine dredging, which often targets the abundant alluvial gold deposits in South America. Remote sensing offers a solution to improve data collection, regulation, and monitoring of the more mobile and elusive ASM activities and their impacts. Mapping ASM riverine dredges using Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) is one of the application areas least explored. Three semi-automated detection approaches using Sentinel-1 SAR are compared on their ability to identify dredges with minimal false positives. The methods …

College Of Natural Sciences 2022 Year-End Publication, College Of Natural Sciences

College of Natural Sciences Newsletters and Reports

This is the 2022 issue of the annual College of Natural Sciences year-end publication.

Contents:
[Page] 2 Dean's message
[Page] 3 Department highlights
[Page] 4 Overview of Bold & Blue Campaign
[Page] 5 Dr. Edward Hogan recognition & endowment
[Page] 6 Career milestones
[Page] 7 Student travel and research
[Page] 8 $11 million COBRE grant
[Page] 9 Professional Science Masters & Research highlights
[Page]10 Outreach highlights throughout the state
[Page] 11 2022 events recap – join us in 2023!
[Page] 12 Updates on our VR initiative
[Page] 14 Overview of awards and recognitions from 2022

Modeling Debris Flow Hazard Risk Post Wildfire In Northern Colorado: A Spatial Approach, Ashleigh Boyd

Geography and the Environment: Graduate Student Capstones

The 2020 Cameron Peak Fire, the largest in Colorado’s History, impacted over 200,000 acres of land, including vital watersheds close to population centers in Colorado, such as the towns of Estes Park and Loveland. Runoff and debris flows are a continuous hazard for approximately five years post-fire. This study takes a spatial approach to modeling runoff potential of the Big Thompson Subbasin Watershed, using curve number methodology to approximate runoff potential by combining land cover, soil data, slope, and burn severity. Field work indicated possible uncertainty in the model due to discrepancies with field sample soil hydro groups compared to …

A Lack Of Inclusive Playgrounds And How Gis Can Bridge The Gap: A Case Study In Metro Denver, Brittny N. Wagner

Geography and the Environment: Graduate Student Capstones

Inclusive and accessible playgrounds are a vital component to a sustainable and healthy community. These types of playgrounds encourage interactions between children of all abilities, which is a key component of social, emotional, and physical development. Playgrounds are often outdated or built without considering the needs of different types of community members. This is often due to lack of research about what it means to build an accessible playground and lack of awareness of the need for this type of play coming from city officials and park planners. Many parents and caregivers are left wondering where accessible playgrounds are located, …

Understanding Delays And Improving Emergency Response With Gis - Evergreen Fire Department In Evergreen, Colorado, Adrien Hoff

Geography and the Environment: Graduate Student Capstones

It is expected that both the PSAP and the responders in the field react quickly and arrive on the scene to emergency events as soon as possible. Fire agencies have been held to standards set in place reflective of where the emergency occurs and how quickly responders are expected to reach that location. Calls that experience delays in meeting these standards should be carefully examined and learned from for future events. Utilizing National Fire Protection (NFPA) population zone recommendations, population zones previously established with 2010 census data and unknown methods were recreated for Evergreen Fire Protection District. Then, utilizing SQL …

Carnivore And Ungulate Occurrence In A Fire-Prone Region, Sara J. Moriarty-Graves

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Increasing fire size and severity in the western United States causes changes to ecosystems, species’ habitat use, and interspecific interactions. Wide-ranging carnivore and ungulate mammalian species and their interactions may be influenced by an increase in fire activity in northern California. Depending on the fire characteristics, ungulates may benefit from burned habitat due to an increase in forage availability, while carnivore species may be differentially impacted, but ultimately driven by bottom-up processes from a shift in prey availability. I used a three-step approach to estimate the single-species occupancy of four large mammal species: mountain lion (Puma concolor), coyote …

Disaster Risk Assessment In The Context Of Social Justice Using Geospatial Data Analytics, Behrang Bidadian

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Disaster Risk Assessment in the Context of Social Justice Using Geospatial Data Analytics

Behrang Bidadian

In recent decades, urban areas have witnessed a rise in floods which have posed a significant threat to human life and wealth, due to the effects of global warming. While researchers have conducted extensive studies on natural disaster risk focusing on components such as hazard, exposure, and vulnerability, certain aspects of this field have remained inadequately understood. To fulfill this need, the primary objective of this dissertation was to enhance our understanding of flood risk in urban areas, considering it a crucial example of natural …

Production, Best Management Practices, And Market Impacts Of Forest Biomass Harvest And Collection In The Mid-Atlantic Region, William E. Smith

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Time motion studies were conducted at five mid-Atlantic sites that spanned various operations in West Virginia, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. The harvest systems included integrated harvests where chips were produced in the forest, roundwood systems where only roundwood was produced, and a centralized chipping system. The study collected overall productivity and machine utilization data at the various harvesting operations. The cost per green ton of woody biomass ranged from $18.46 to $39.8 resulting in an average of $30.33 among the five systems. Hauling had the highest average price per green ton at $9.10, while loading had the lowest at $1.73 per …