Geography Commons^™

Expansion Of Major Urban Areas In The Us Great Plains From 2000 To 2009 Using Satellite Scatterometer Data, Lan H. Nguyen, Son V. Nghiem, Geoffrey M. Henebry

GSCE Faculty Publications

A consistent dataset delineating and characterizing changes in urban environments will be valuable for socioeconomic and environmental research and for sustainable urban development. Remotely sensed data have been long used to map urban extent and infrastructure at various spatial and spectral resolutions. Although many datasets and approaches have been tried, there is not yet a universal way to map urban extents across the world. Here we combined a microwave scatterometer (QuikSCAT) dataset at ~1 km posting with percent impervious surface area (%ISA) data from the National Land Cover Dataset (NLCD) that was generated from Landsat data, and ambient population data …

Final Internship Report: Gis Research And Analysis At The Center For Homicide Research, Paul Jeffrey Tatting

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

This final internship report is being submitted as an Alternate Plan Paper as partial fulfillment for the Degree of Master of Science in Geography at Minnesota State University, Mankato. The internship took place at the Center for Homicide Research (CHR) in Minneapolis, Minnesota from January through June of 2018.

This paper is organized into seven chapters. This chapter, Chapter 1, is the introduction to the internship. Chapter 2 examines the scope of the internship. It includes a background of CHR, the duties of a GIS Intern, and discusses the benefits of the internship. Chapter 3 details presentations that were made …

Preparing For Out Of Hospital Cardiac Arrests (Ohca) In Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: A Gis Scenario-Modeling Approach, Abubakr Abdelkafi Magzoub

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

This study employed location-allocation modeling and a geographic information system (GIS) to study the current placement of automated external defibrillators (AEDs) in relationship to neighborhoods in Riyadh City, Saudi Arabia, and to determine the optimal locations for additional AEDs in the city. Using GIS to mathematically locate additional healthcare facilities for the placement of AEDs is more reliable than to select them using informed guesses. The objective of this research was to elaborate a mathematical and GIS model for placing AED devices so that people who need to use these devices in the City of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, can access …

No. 09: The State Of Household Food Security In Nanjing, China, Zhenzhong Si, Taiyang Zhong

Hungry Cities Partnership

This report on the state of food security in Nanjing, China, is based on a 2015 city-wide survey conducted by Nanjing University and the Hungry Cities Partnership. The research found that most of the city’s residents are food secure, with access to desirable foods and high dietary diversity throughout the year. Nanjing has a high level of economic development, low unemployment, and spatially dense food supply networks. However, a high average level of food security obscures the finding that about one household in five is food insecure according to the Household Food Insecurity Access Prevalence indicator. Female-centred households, households that …

No. 10: The State Of Household Food Security In Maputo, Mozambique, Inês Raimundo, Cameron Mccordic, Abel Chikanda

Hungry Cities Partnership

The Hungry Cities Partnership aims to promote inclusive growth in urban food systems in Maputo and other cities of the Global South. The production of new empirical knowledge about the levels of household food security and the various facets of the urban food system is a core component of this effort. This report presents and analyses findings from a city-wide survey of 2,071 households that found that most Maputo households are food insecure and that more than a third can be categorized as severely food insecure. Dietary diversity in the city is extremely low and almost half of households had …

No. 13: The State Of Household Food Security In Mexico City, Mexico, Guénola Capron, Salomón Gonzalez Arellano, Jeremy Wagner, Cameron Mccordic

Hungry Cities Partnership

This report presents and analyzes the findings of a household food security survey conducted by Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana as part of the Hungry Cities Partnership in Mexico City from January 10-19, 2016. It is a supplement to HCP Report No. 7: The Urban Food System of Mexico City, Mexico (Capron et al 2017). HCP Report No. 7 discusses the history, demography and economy of Mexico City, and contains an overview of the existing literature on its changing food system. This report provides a foundation for future research of Mexico City’s food system, its food security and informal sector. It also …

No. 12: The State Of Household Food Security In Cape Town, South Africa, Jonathan Crush, Mary Caesar, Gareth Haysom

Hungry Cities Partnership

This research report presents and analyzes the findings of a household food secu-rity survey conducted in the City of Cape Town, South Africa, by the Hun-gry Cities Partnership (HCP) and the African Food Security Urban Network (AFSUN) in 2013 and 2014. It is a supplement to, and should be read in con-junction with, AFSUN Urban Food Series No. 11: The State of Urban Food Insecurity in Cape Town (Battersby 2011) and HCP Report No. 3: The Urban Food System of Cape Town, South Africa (Crush et al 2017).

The AFSUN report examines the results of a food security survey conducted …

No. 15: The Food Security Implications Of Gendered Access To Education And Employment In Maputo, Cameron Mccordic, Liam Riley, Inês Raimundo

Hungry Cities Partnership

The multiple linkages between gender and household food security in cities have been observed in diverse settings, at multiple scales, and through a variety of disciplinary lenses. The Hungry Cities Partnership is rooted in the importance of inclusive growth of cities, which includes a fundamental concern with genderbased injustices that reduce inclusivity, sustainability and food security by underpinning structural poverty. This discussion paper is motivated by the gap in policy-ready quantitative data needed to identify the ways in which gender inequality, food insecurity, and public policy are interconnected. Analysis of the 2014 survey of household food security in Maputo identified …

Data: Pre-Fire Disturbance History Modulates Relationships Between Ground Cover And Post-Fire Conifer Regeneration, Nathan Gill, Dan Jarvis, Tom Veblen, John Rogan, Dominik Kulakowski

Student Works

Understory vegetation and ground cover drive many important ecosystem processes, including tree seedling regeneration. The exact effect of ground cover on tree seedling establishment, survival, and growth depends on biophysical context. In subalpine forests, this context is largely determined by disturbances such as beetle outbreak, blowdown, and fire. Compounded disturbances that overlap in short succession can alter stand properties and trajectories in ways that are not predictable from the additive impact of individual disturbances. The aim of this study is to examine how compounded Dendroctonus rufipennis (spruce beetle; SB) outbreak followed by fire and compounded wind blowdown followed by fire …

From Icon Of Empire To National Emblem: New Evidence For The Fallow Deer Of Barbuda, Sophia Perdikaris, Allison Bain, Sandrine Grouard, Karis Baker, Edith Gonzalez, A. Rus Hoelzel, Holly Miller, Reaksha Persaud, Naomi Sykes

School of Global Integrative Studies: Faculty Publications

Barbuda and Antigua’s national animal is the fallow deer, Dama dama dama, a species native to the eastern Mediterranean that has been transported around the world by people during the last 8000 years. The timing and circumstances by which fallow deer came to be established on Barbuda are currently uncertain but, by examining documentary, osteological and genetic evidence, this paper will consider the validity of existing theories. It will review the dynamics of human–Dama relationships from the 1500s AD to the present day and consider how the meaning attached to this species has changed through time: from a …

Accuracy Of Unmanned Aerial System (Drone) Height Measurements, Daniel Unger, I-Kuai Hung, David Kulhavy, Yanli Zhang, Kai Busch-Peterson

Faculty Publications

Vertical height estimates of earth surface features using an Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) are important in natural resource management quantitative assessments. An important research question concerns both the accuracy and precision of vertical height estimates acquired with a UAS and to determine if it is necessary to land a UAS between individual height measurements or if GPS derived height versus barometric pressure derived height while using a DJI Phantom 3 would affect height accuracy and precision. To examine this question, height along a telescopic height pole on the campus of Stephen F. Austin State University (SFASU) were estimated at 2, …

Integrating Unmanned Aircraft Systems To Measure Linear And Areal Features Into Undergraduate Forestry Education, Reid Viegut, David Kulhavy, Daniel Unger, I-Kuai Hung, Brian Humphreys

Faculty Publications

The use of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) in undergraduate forestry education continues to expand and develop. Accuracy of data collection is an important aspect of preparation for "society-ready" foresters to meet the complex sustainable environment managing for ecological, social and economic interests. Hands-on use of a DJI Phantom 4 Pro UAS by undergraduates to measure the length and area of 30 linear features and areal features on Earth's surface were estimated. These measurements were compared (measured within the ArcMap 10.5.2 interface) to hyperspectral Pictometry imagery measured on the web-based interface and the Google Earth Pro interface. Each remotely estimated measurement …

Student Led Campus Desire Path Evaluation Using Pictometry® Neighborhood Imagery, David Kulhavy, Daniel Unger, I-Kuai Hung

Faculty Publications

A student led evaluation of desire paths (e.g., paths created by pedestrians on an open landscape) across the Stephen F. Austin State University (SFASU) campus was performed within a senior level spatial science course in order to create a method for mitigation of desire paths and for campus beautification. Each desire path on campus was identified with the length of each path measured in the field and categorized by the condition of the path in order to assess and determine a necessary solution for each path identified. In addition, Pictometry^® high spatial resolution digital imagery was used to determine …

Public Places And Empty Spaces: Dislocation, Urban Renewal And The Death Of A French Plaza, Roza Tchoukaleyska

Geography & Environment Publications

This article examines the dislocations produced when competing understandings of public space come into contact. Focusing on Montpellier, France, where an urban renewal program has seen portions of the city-centre renovated, the article considers the breaking apart of a North African commercial cluster under the guide of French heritage protection. Arguing that such action is tiedto municipal urban politics and wider trajectories that place diverse identities in a separate category, I trace the process through which a plaza encompassed in the urban renewal program has been labelled as “empty” and “dead” space. Suggesting that the relocation of a well-used outdoor …

Flume Tests On Fluvial Erosion Mechanisms In Tillbed Channels, L Pike, Peter Ashmore, S Gaskin

Geography & Environment Publications

Semi-alluvial stream channels eroded into till and other glacial sediments are common in areas of extensive glacial deposition such as the Great Lakes region and northern interior plains of North America. The mechanics of erosion and erosional weakness of till results in the dominance of fluvial scour and mass erosion due to spontaneous fracture at planes of weakness under shearing flow. There have been few controlled tests looking at erosional mechanisms and resistance of till in river channels.We subjected small blocks of till to unidirectional flows in a laboratory flume to measure the threshold shear stress for erosion and observed …

Transforming Toronto's Rivers: A Socio-Geomorphic Perspective, Peter Ashmore

Geography & Environment Publications

No abstract provided.

Reflection/Commentary On A Past Article: “A Practical Iterative Framework For Qualitative Data Analysis”, Prachi Srivastava, Nick Hopwood

Education Publications

This submission is a reflection by Srivastava and Hopwood on their earlier article, A Practical Iterative Framework for Qualitative Data Analysis, originally published in International Journal of Qualitative Methods in 2009, and selected for the journal’s special anniversary issue, “Top 20 in 20.” They discuss how they have applied the framework in their various studies since then, Srivastava, primarily in field-based international research in education and global development, and Hopwood, in education and health. Based on a brief analysis of the paper’s citations, they identify its impact to have been: in a wide variety of fields crossing disciplinary boundaries, studies …

Landscape Transformation During Ceramic Age And Colonial Occupations Of Barbuda, West Indies, Allison Bain, Anne-Marie Faucher, Lisa M. Kennedy, Allison R. Leblanc, Michael J. Burn, Rebecca Boger, Sophia Perdikaris

School of Global Integrative Studies: Faculty Publications

This research documented the history of landscape transformation on the island of Barbuda in the Lesser Antilles, Caribbean through cross-disciplinary research approaches. Excavations confirmed a human presence for the seasonal exploitation of conch meat and other mollusks during the Archaic Age (c.3000–500 BC), but more substantial impacts to terrestrial ecosystems likely began during the Ceramic Age (c.500 BC–AD 1500). Our combined sedimentary and charcoal records revealed that human-induced environmental transformations began with Ceramic Age peoples as they cleared vegetation for settlements and gardens with intentional burning. Sedimentary charcoal indicated a dramatic decline in fire during post-Ceramic Age abandonment, continuing through …

No. 22: Predictors Of Household Food Insecurity In Maputo And Matola, Mozambique, Cameron Mccordic, Ezequiel Abrahamo

Hungry Cities Partnership

The rapid growth of Maputo and Matola (neighbouring cities in Southern Mozambique) has dramatically changed each city’s demographic and food insecurity profile. Previous research in Maputo indicates that household access to infrastructure plays an important role in determining vulnerability to food insecurity. This paper investigates (a) whether this relationship is also true of Matola and (b) whether the demographic composition of households plays a role in defining vulnerability to food insecurity in either city. Using household survey data collected by HCP in 2014 in Maputo and Matola, the paper demonstrates that inconsistent access to water, electricity, medical care, cooking fuel …

No. 13: The Growth Of Food Banking In Cities Of The Global South, Daniel N. Warshawsky

Hungry Cities Partnership

As the number and size of food banks increase globally, it is critical to research how food banks fit into existing food systems and their role in reducing food insecurity and food waste. After examining the political ecology of urban food waste in food systems, this discussion paper examines the globalization of food banking and its growth in the Global South. Through a case study of FoodForward SA, it critically analyzes the roles that urban food banks play in cities of the Global South. Since many countries in the South have both the highest levels of food insecurity and the …