Final Lab; Due 12/8/10

This map shows that there are "Asian alone" concentrations on the east and west coasts. This makes sense, as immigrants choose gateway cities as their entry portal into the United States. (Such "gateway" cities are New York, San Francisco, Chicago, etc.) There is an especially high concentration in the Bay Area, which is reasonable; there are quite a few Asian neighborhoods in the Bay. It surprises me that there is such a high concentration in one area of Texas. This concentration is right outside Houston however, so perhaps there are ample job opportunities.

This map shows that there is a considerable "black alone" concentration in the southeastern United States. States like Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana are known for their exceptionally high African American populations--I would expect my map to show concentrations there. History is probably the reason for this concentration, as the South owned many African slaves during the Antebellum. Big cities across the US also exhibit high black alone populations, highlighting the diversity found in urban centers.

 This map shows concentrations of "some other race" (not white, black, Asian, Hispanic) in the southwest. Such an obvious spatial correlation denotes some sort of pattern, but I can't be sure as to what it is. Since there is a focus in California's central valley, maybe these "other races" work in the agricultural sector. (Texas also has high agricultural yields and high "other race" concentrations.) I chose to color ramp this map to red and green for the holiday season--an example of mapmaker's bias.

This census map series was my favorite GIS exercise. It seemed the most useful, but perhaps that's because I'm taking a demography class in tandem with this one. I really enjoyed setting the color ramps! Earlier in the class I complained that there weren't enough colors to choose from, but that's because I was only looking at the pre-made colors. There are unlimited color choices. The census has an extremely large data collection--you can literally make hundreds (if not thousands) of thematic maps with this counties shapefile and the census data website.

My GIS experience in general was kind of a roller coaster ride. In the beginning I think I expected it to be really interesting, all the time, but in reality a lot of GIS work is tedious. Finding data is extremely frustrating, though I got better at it eventually. The way this class was formatted, the way it was SUPPOSED to frustrate you, ended up really helping. The only way you can really learn about ArcGIS is to play with it--to lose data, get those red exclamation marks, click around, use the help function. I recognize that there is so much more to this program than I've been exposed to, and that's exciting. I think overall, I have a love-hate relationship with Arc; I hate it when I'm working with it, but in retrospect, the things I do with it seem uniquely applicable to everyday life. (What analysis software could be more worthwhile to learn about?) Intermediate GIS is sure to be a challenge, but that's alright. I look forward to it.

Lab 7; Due 11/23/10

Chaparral, Landslides and The Station Fire

California is unique in that it contains almost every ecosystem in the world (aside from tropical ecosystems). Coastal Southern California is made up almost entirely of the chaparral (or Mediterranean) ecosystem, a shrubland characterized by hot, dry summers, cool, wet winters and high levels of endemism. Most importantly for this report, the chaparral ecosystem is specially adapted to fire. For example, plants have unusually high levels of oil in their leaves, helping them to burn quickly. Though this may seem counter intuitive, it helps to ensure the survival of the plant by not allowing the fire to get hot enough to burn its roots. The plant (say, sagebrush) then epicormically resprouts—it resprouts from its roots.

Because of chaparral’s pleasant climate (think San Diego, Italy, South Africa) it has been a coveted place to live for centuries. Unfortunately, chaparral people are not as adapted to fire as plants are. When fire season rolls around in late summer, when those Santa Ana winds kick in, and when lightning strikes on oil-laden sagebrush, fires spread rapidly and people don’t know how to handle it. Not only do they not know how to handle the fires themselves, but they don’t know how to cope with the after effects. They can’t just epicormically resprout, so to speak.

The Station Fire (8/26/2009-10/16/2009) started in Angeles National Forest and burned over 150,000 acres in Los Angeles County. Though the fire was started by arson and was not a result of natural processes, it nevertheless took advantage of chaparral’s ideal fuel conditions and ripped through LA, causing millions of dollars in damage, thousands to evacuate their homes and even loss of life.

Station Fire burn scar from Dave's Landslide Blog
(image originally from NASA) 

Of particular interest to this report are the ways in which the Station Fire affected soil integrity. When chaparral burns, the aforementioned oil present in Mediterranean vegetation wafts into the air, settles, and forms a water impermeable layer on the surface of the soil. This, coupled with the lack of vegetation to hold the soil in place, can create a very undesirable outcome when it rains: landslides. Landslides were especially threatening after the Station Fire because of the hilly topography that was razed.

Debris flow scars in the greater Los Angeles area
from (http://www.eoearth.org/article/Landslide)

In 2010, storm warnings for southern California threatened flooding and mudslides. In February, unexpected heavy rainfall hit La Canada Flintridge, which had been burnt by the Station Fire a few months prior. 43 homes were damaged by a “niagra falls” of mud that came rolling down from the burnt hills surrounding the area. Luckily no one was injured; this is mostly due to the evacuation orders mandated by the cities of La Canada-Flintridge, Sierra Madre, La Crescenta and Acton. These evacuation sites are depicted in the map below. Arroyo Seco also experienced significant debris flow, but as it is not populated it did not need to be evacuated.

Example of 2/2010 mudslide in La Crescenta from (http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2010/US/weather/02/10/california.mudslides/t1larg.mudslide.gi.jpg)

The USGS has installed instruments around the Station Fire burn scar to monitor debris flow in those areas. These instruments measure rainfall, soil moisture, flow stage and bed pore pressure and are intended to “advance the understanding of post-fire runoff, erosion, and debris-flow generation processes and to provide information from the burned area to the National Weather Service for warning decision-making” (http://landslides.usgs.gov/monitoring/). There are three such sites in Southern California, two in Dunsmore Canyon and one in Arroyo Seco, and are demarcated on the map below. Directly below is an example of soil moisture and rainfall data collection from http://landslides.usgs.gov/monitoring/.

Southern California’s Mediterranean/chaparral ecosystem is attractive to settlers because of its exceptionally mild climate characterized by hot, dry summers and cool, wet winters. However, chaparral is also very prone to fire; after an area burns it is also very prone to landslides. People are tying to adapt to these natural disasters, but evacuations are sometimes the only way in which to ensure safety. We are continually advancing our knowledge through monitoring sites and scientific data collection, and perhaps we will be better able to cope with fire (and landslides) in the future.

Bibliography

Landslide Hazards Program. Web. 20 Nov. 2010. (http://landslides.usgs.gov/).

"Landslide." Encyclopedia of Earth. Web. 20 Nov. 2010. (http://www.eoearth.org/article/Landslide).

"Latest Storm Prompts Evacuations for Station Fire Burn Areas | 89.3 KPCC." KPCC. Web. 20 Nov. 2010. (http://www.scpr.org/news/2010/02/19/storm-friday/).

"Malibu Surfside News: Rambla Pacifico Is Closed by Landslide." Malibu Surfside News. Web. 20 Nov. 2010. (http://malibusurfsidenews.com/blog/2010/02/rambla-pacifico-is-closed-by-landslide.html).

"Mudslides Occur in the Areas Affected by the 2009 Station Fire in Los Angeles." Dave's Landslide Blog. Web. 20 Nov. 2010. (http://daveslandslideblog.blogspot.com/2010/02/mudslides-occur-in-areas-affected-by.html).

"Mudslides Threaten California Hillside Communities After Station Fire | AHN." All Headline News. Web. 20 Nov. 2010. (http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/7016614039?

Mudslides%20Threaten%20California%20Hillside%20Communities%20After%20Station%20Fire).

"'Niagara' of Mud Hits Homes." Featured Articles From The Los Angeles Times. Web. 20 Nov. 2010. (http://articles.latimes.com/2010/feb/07/local/la-me-rain7-2010feb07).

Lab 6; Due 11/16/10

I chose an area in eastern Tennessee to focus my DEM on. The Appalachians are notorious for their strange formations, and thus I thought they would produce an interesting model. I kept the same color scheme for each map in order to maintain uniformity. The extent of my data can be understood as having corners at N 35.40965, S 34.95264, W -83.97316 and E -83.44494. Also, there is a 50% transparency for the Shaded Relief Model map.

The final product--a 3D depiction of my data.

Lab 5; Due 11/9/10

Map projection is the process by which a three dimensional datum is "projected", or shown, on a two dimensional surface. There are three surfaces onto which a map can be projected: the cone, the cylinder and the plane. Each of these projections has a certain amount of (unique) distortion; to save certain relationships between area, distance or angles one must sacrifice other relationships. Here I will denote the significance, perils and potential of (the below) map projections. First I will explain them and discuss their significance. Then I will move into the perils of projections, finally ending on a positive note with their potential. 

The two below Mercator maps are examples of conformal projection, which preserves angles locally. This is important if one is navigating by sea or air and needs to keep a standard bearing on the land. The two below equidistant projections preserve distance. That is, they preserve the integrity of distance from one standard point or line. Obviously, this is good for knowing exactly how far away places are. The reason Washington D.C. and Kabul are different distances apart in my two equidistant projections is because one measurement runs across the Atlantic while the other runs across the Pacific. My final two maps preserve area, that is, the map images are proportional to the area of the landforms which they represent. 

The perils of map projection are great. As I mentioned earlier, no map is able to preserve every relationship and must instead sacrifice the integrity of some relationships for others. You'll notice that in the Mercator Projection, Greenland is huge. (It's even bigger than Australia.) If you then look at either of the two Equal Area projections, you'll notice that Greenland looks much smaller. This is because in the "equal area" projection, area is preserved. On the other hand, if one attempts to navigate angles with an equal area map, it will be very difficult to succeed. (The conformal projection should instead be used in this case.) When choosing a map projection, one has to take into account what the map will be used for, and choose the projection accordingly. Otherwise you could end up in Sudan when you really wanted to hit Kenya.  

The potential of map projections is infinite. There are countless ways in which to represent the world datum, and if you know what you're doing, you could personalize a map projection to meet your specific needs. 50% distance, 25% angles, 25% area? There must be a projection for that. Navigating? Use this one. Making a topo? Use another one. Learning the countries in Africa? Use this one. Want to inflate the importance of Greenland? Use that one. Projection has the potential to enhance any set of research, or aid in any travel, or really accomplish any spatial goal. (One can even manipulate projections to show a specific point of view.) As we grow in our map knowledge, perhaps there will be some all-encompassing map, able to preserve every relationship phenomenally. In fact, I'm almost positive there will be a map like this some day. Until then, we need to choose a projection very carefully. 

Lab 4; Due 11/1/10

This week I was afforded the unique privilege of working with the program ArcGIS. Overall, I found the experience to be tedious and dry. Granted, I wasn't working on my own project and was completing a general tutorial, so perhaps my lack of interest stems from my lack of engagement with the topic of study. The tutorial was, however, very explicit in its instructions and very easy to follow. After completing it thrice, I felt like I could complete the exercise a fourth time from memory. I attempted to connect my Mac remotely to complete the lab, but after many failed attempts I ended up having to come to campus to finish. In retrospect, I should have come to the SSC labs first instead of attempting to connect remotely; connecting remotely was a sufficient waste of time and the labs are a phenomenal resource.

Logistics aside, the ArcGIS program is pretty amazing. It seems like it has unlimited potential to overlay spatial data and present it in an understandable format. I had no idea how much it can do. It can make roads, legends, scales, spit out formulas, merge data tables--thousands of other things, I'm sure. I enjoyed seeing the end product of my work: the maps. It was nice to see that tangible output, that visual aid. GIS goes beyond data tables, beyond Excel, and shows people what they want to see. Who wants to analyze tables of data? No one. Let Arc do it for you, and analyze the picture. People always love pretty pictures.

ArcGIS is a computer program, and thus dealing with its pitfalls takes a large amount of patience. Computers are tricky; one click of the mouse can delete everything or ruin all that you've worked to finish. I suppose all that can be avoided by saving with frequency, but it was still frustrating at times. Little glitches are inevitable in any software, and I ran into them occasionally when working through the tutorial. Zooming was particularly troublesome, and the colors were limited. (Granted these are trivial, personalized complaints.)

I'm excited to work more with the program, as I know it has the capacity to accomplish amazing things. I can't wait to input my own data, and work with issues that apply directly to me or what I'm interested in studying. As a geography student, I recognize the potential GIS has for improving/adding to research projects and papers. As a person in society, I feel lucky to play with and learn about this expensive and widely used program. My brother in law works with GIS daily, and he loves his job. GIS is an up-an-coming field; the job market loves to see "ArcGIS" under the skills section of a resume.

I guess what I'm saying is that GIS has different potentials and pitfalls for everyone depending on their personality and their place in the world. For me, it probably doesn't mean a career in spatial data analysis and overlay. It's kind of dry, tedious and frustrating. Still, I'm happy to be learning about it. It's an integral part of a well-rounded geographic education, and it has the capacity to help me in life. Maybe.
Check out my maps below. (Note that when saving as a jpeg file, the graph lost its color profile.) Stay posted for next time, loyal reader!

Lab 3; Due 10/18/10

WWF's Ten to Watch 2010

The World Wildlife Fund's "Ten to Watch" is a list of animals which will likely become more threatened in the near future. This map allows the user to see where they are, what they look like and what plagues them. All included information was obtained from www.wwf.org/ on October 12, 2010. Be sure to zoom in on China to see panda population detail.

View WWF's Ten to Watch 2010 in a larger map


On Neogeography:
The biggest pitfall of neogeography is the potential for reduced accuracy levels. When VIG (volunteered geographic information) is utilized to create a data set, it is rarely edited for correctness and thus can lead to imprecision. There have been studies about such publically controlled sites as Wikipedia showing that they are accurate most of the time. Nevertheless, the chance of error in neogeography is greater than that of a government-issued map and remains its biggest pitfall.

The potential of neogeography is limitless. The general public now has the opportunity to create whatever maps it wants, whenever and wherever it wants to—on a mobile phone or a desktop or in a library. Neogeography will lead to more public sharing of information, from restaurant reviews to traffic reports to Toys ‘R Us sites. It has the potential to meet every person’s private wants while satisfying the needs of the public, because the private is becoming public.

Neogeography is changing our expectations of technology; a sort of democratization of mapping is about to ensue. As people become more comfortable with maps, the world will be a lot easier to navigate—not only physically but also socially. People can find all information they need on the internet, and now they can learn where to find it in the real world. Neogeography is merging information with location for the everyday citizen. The consequences of that are sure to be unalterable.   

Lab 2; Due 10/12/10

1. Beverly Hills Quadrangle

2. The adjacent quadrangles are as follows, starting from the NW corner and continuing clockwise: Canoga Park, Van Nuys, Burbank, Hollywood, Inglewood, Venice, (ocean), Topanga.

3. The above-used map was first created in 1966.

4. The North American Datum of 1927 and the North American Datum of 1983.

5. The scale is 1 : 24,000.

6. At the scale 1 : 24,000,
a) 5 centimeters is equivalent to (1200) meters on the ground.
b) 5 inches on the map is equivalent to (1.91) miles on the ground.
c) 1 mile on the ground is equivalent to (2.62) inches on the map.
d) 3 kilometers on the ground is equivalent to (12.5) centimeters on the map.

7. The contour interval is 20 feet.

8. The approximate geographic coordinates in both degrees/minutes/seconds and decimal degrees of:
a) the Public Affairs Building; 34° 4' 23" N, 118° 26' 30" W or 34.073° N, 118.44° W
b) the tip of Santa Monica pier; 34° 0' 30" N, 118° 29' 30" W or 34.01° N, 118.49° W
c) the Upper Franklin Canyon Reservoir; 34° 6' 0" N, 118° 24' 45" W or 34.1° N, 118.413° W

9. What is the approximate elevation in both feet and meters of:
a) Greystone Mansion (in Greystone Park); 560 ft, 170.688 m
b) Woodlawn Cemetery; 140 ft, 42.672 m
c) Crestwood Hills Park; 700 ft, 213.36 m

10. The UTM zone of the map is 11.

11. The UTM coordinates for the lower left corner of the map are north 3,759,900 and east 361,500.

12. 1,000,000 square meters are contained within each cell of the UTM gridlines.

13. 

14. The magnetic declination is 14°.


15. The intermittent stream between the 405 freeway and Stone Canyon Reservoir runs north.

16. 

Lab 1; Due 10/5/10

This map was uploaded from http://www.fws.gov/midwest/wolf/images/maps/CURRENT_RANGE.jpg, which is a US Fish and Wildlife Service site. It portrays current gray wolf populations in the United States; the blue areas are where Alaskan gray wolf roams, and the tan areas are where the Mexican gray wolf roams. This map is interesting for a number of reasons, one being that it allows us to see how successful wolf recovery has been in the US since the reintroduction of wolves into Yellowstone in  the early 1990's. (Prior to this reintroduction, wolves were almost extinct in America due to over-hunting and habitat destruction.) Now wolf populations are large enough in some states to sustain legal wolf hunts. This map chronicles one of the most successful wildlife reintroduction stories to date.

This map was uploaded from http://terpconnect.umd.edu/~nazang/HIV_AIDS_image004.jpg, which is a Cameroon sponsored site for "living and learning". It shows the distribution of AIDS throughout the world, with progressively darkening colors measuring progressively larger percentages of the AIDS virus in each country. This map is interesting because it displays (one of) the largest health issues we face today--one that kills millions of people annually. What's interesting is that Africa, which is classically the place we think of when we think of the AIDS epidemic, is only one color level above the United States. It's easy for us to place our focus on Africa, easy for us to forget that we have a very pertinent AIDS crisis here in the United States. This map shows us that the epidemic is everywhere, and that it often transcends poverty stricken or less-educated populations. It's everyone's problem.

This map was uploaded from http://www.zook.info/Wal-Mart/Figure2-2-US-distribution-by-store-type.jpg, a website which holds selected maps created by geography professors from the University of Kentucky. It shows the distribution of Wal-Marts (and Wal-Mart Supercenters) across the United States. It also includes neighborhood markets and Sam's Clubs, which allows for the contrasting of such shopping institutions to Wal-Mart. What's obvious is that Wal-Mart is taking over, which in turn tells us that many small mom-and-pop type operations are going out of business. Also, the concentration of Wal-Marts can tell us something about the social structure of a place, such as it's income level and/or population density.