Mark’s Geog. 355 Blog

For Lindsey, Julie and myself, the last few weeks have been spent finishing our section of our environmental justice project. We chose to look at delaware data and demographics that may affect certain aspects of the environment. Demographics show us where certain groups live, and if they are inadvertanly at risk because of some social factor. We looked at Population with ages from 0-9 and 65 and older. races that were white, and races other than white, and where they lived. We also looked at income, and plotted the averages on a map of Delaware. education was another factor that could adversly affect environmental justice, less education, lower wages, cheaper areas to live.

These chapter were nice because they broke up some of the repetiveness that the previous chapters had.  They talked more about creating maps that you design with your own features.

This dataset consists of all the farm lots in both the US Military and the Virginia Military Survey Districts of Delaware County.Here is a list of all the layers used in creating the DALIS project’s map of Delaware.

Annexations- This dataset consists of Delaware County’s Annexations and Conforming Boundaries from 1853 to present time.

Parcels- This dataset consists of all parcels within Delaware County.

Road Centerline- This dataset consists of all roads within Delaware County.

Railroads- This dataset depicts each railroad line running through Delaware County.

Municipalities- This dataset consists of all municipalities within Delaware County.

Townships- This dataset consists of 19 different townships that make up Delaware County.

Hydrology-This dataset consists of all the major waterways within Delaware County.

Subdivisions- This dataset consists of all subdivisions within Delaware County.

School Districts- This dataset consists of all school districts within Delaware County.

Farm Lots- This dataset consists of all the farm lots in both the US Military and the Virginia Military Survey Districts of Delaware County.

Topo/Spot Index- This dataset contains the index to the tiles for the topography and spot elevation data layers in Delaware County.

Soils- This dataset contains soil types within Delaware County.

Floodway- This dataset depicts the floodway within Delaware County.

Census Blocks- This dataset consists of the Census blocks within Delaware County.

Census Block Groups- This dataset contains the Census block groups within Delaware County.

Census Tracts- This dataset consists of the Census tracts within Delaware County.

DALIS-Data (DXF files)-This dataset contains countywide layers, indexed parcels, and indexed right-of-way layers in dxf format.

These fun to read chapters were all about map preparation and making a map.  Analyzing your data as well as how to combine data to make it more useful.  The chapters basically reminded you that you must assess your data and make it as functionable as possible.

We decided to drive around the south western part of the city, and then go westward out into the rural areas.  Pittsburgh dr. is part of a industrial complex that has many different factories and warehouses.  The two potentialy hazardous  businesses in our eyes were PPG and a plastic manufacturer of some kind located on S. Houk rd.  As we drove further out into the country we really didn’t see many large scale animal farms, but more agricultural farms.  On the edges of Delaware City are an abundance of newly developed residential neighborhoods that may contribute to lawn chemical runoff.  There are a few other pictures included, like the Scioto River, which we may utilize for this project, as well as the truck that was driving really slow.

Ch. 3 through 7 and the tutorial were all about familiarizing us with the basic programs and functions within ArcGIS.  I have already been keen to some of GIS capabiltiites and functions, but this book has everything.  All of the little things and intricities make me feel very under qualified to even use ArcGIS, but i know only some of this stuff will be applicable for our use.

Chapter in this book seemed a little repetitive of some areas we might have already gone over. It pretty much explains how GIS uses layers, as well as using vector and raster. The second chapter is mainly about the software used in GIS and how it works and when to use it.

I thought environmental justice was just providing safety for our environment and keeping it nice for future generations to enjoy, but boy was i wrong. Environmental Justice is the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies. EPA has this goal for all communities and persons across this Nation. It will be achieved when everyone enjoys the same degree of protection from environmental and health hazards and equal access to the decision-making process to have a healthy environment in which to live, learn, and work. <a href=”http://www.epa.gov/compliance/environmentaljustice/”>/epa>

Environmental justice cases like this from from La, show how people are affected by wastes left in the ground from years ago. this suburb was plagued by premature births and cancer cases. <a href=”http://www.umich.edu/~snre492/Jones/agstreet.htm”>/EJ cases>

progress in agriculture regulations are targeting smaller farms as well as the large manufactures of livestock. <a href=” http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/technical/ECS/environment/envjust.html”>livestock regs>

<a href=”http://eelink.net/pages/Environmental+Justice “>general info>

<a href=”http://www.sierraclub.org/policy/conservation/ “>Sierra Club>

Mitchell’s chapter 3 explains how mapping the most and least allows you to cross-reference material and data to fit your needs, or discover patterns and trends among your info.  Many companies use these tools to better allocate relief to certain areas, or to help improve their businesses productivity.  mapping the data based on quantities goes beyond just graphing data to a certain location, by adding the additional layers, you see what areas pertain to your question. 

Examples would include Public Health officials mapping the number of physicians in a region, to see if adequate health care is available.  Power companies also use these techniques when finding out which areas have the most service calls, and if there are patterns among the size of area and population of area, they can use them to provide better service in the future.

Features- Knowing what features you are mapping is also very important, because using a graduated color map or dot density map may be more helpful to revealing patterns among your data.  Graduated colors are used when there is continuous phenomenoa, or when the area is not simply defined.

To Broaden or to Generalize- this is referring to whether you are exploring the data, or presenting a map.  When exploring the map you may be seeing the information in individual maps, the example used would be to see areas of income, and where the poverty and wealth are.  When presenting a map, you probably will have to narrow down your data in to one map that can present your point clearly.  Instead of a bunch of data all on one map, you can divide the data into below poverty level, median income, and the wealthy. 

Counts and Ammounts-Counts and ammounts show you the total numbers.  A count is the actual number of features on the map.  An ammount is the total of a value associated with each feature.  You can use counts and ammounts to for discrete features such as the number of employees at each business, or average precipitaion.  Information like employees usually is mapped per square mile because by doing it per block group you get uneven data.  The block group may have the most empoyees, but it might be segregated to a certain area.

Ratios- show the raltionship between two quantities, and are created by dividing  one quantity by another.  Using ratios may seem simple, but it helps to even out information that may be too spread out to accurately graph.  The most common ratios are averages, proportions, and densities.  Densities show where features are concentrated, and to get density you must divide a value by the area of the feature.  A common example would be to find population by square mile.  If you divide the whole U.S. population by the toatl land area in Sq. miles, you get the value for population density in the U.S.

Ranks- are used to sort the importance of something from  highest to lowest, or vice versa.  Ranks can be anything from most scenic areas on a map, to the best kinds of soil for growing crops. 

Mapping Individual Data- This can be helpful when first examining data because you get an accurate view without all the other distratcions.  This view can be hindering as well, because you may have to look at a bunch of individual maps to see patterns.

Classes/Breaks-  Using classes and breaks unifies a group of info into a universal set of numbers that can be graphed.  Usually this is done when a variety of information needs to be broke down into classes evenly.  The data must be a set of breaks that has been created specifically to the data.  Many times creating classes and breaks is a trial and error process.  there are 4 types of classification schemes:

Natural Breaks- Classes are based on natural groupings of data values.  This system associates data where there are jumps in values, and pairs them in the same break value.

Quantile- Each class contains an equal ammount of features, but the values may be different.  Some values may be extremely high or lower than the norm, but could be placed in a class where the values are varied greatly due to the number of features.  Good for emphasizing the relative position of a feature among other features.

Equal Interval- the difference between the high and low values is the same for every class.  class breaks are an even, set number for all.  this type of classification is good for mapping continuous data, such as precipitaion and temperature.

Standard Deviation- This requires you to find the median of your information, as well as the standard deviation, and then break classes by adding or subtracting the standard deviation to the median.

Choosing a Classification Scheme- When choosing what scheme to choose, you must take into account many factors including, how your data is distributed accross it’s range, as well as looking at outliers, and finding how to best fit them in your class.  Most of the time natural breaks are good for taken care of outliers, which could throw your whole scheme off balance.  You also have to figure out how many classes you want, which pertains to how specific you want to get.  Your classes must be easy to read and distinguish, because having colors to similar to each other may make the map difficult to read. 

Making a Map- Once you have decided how to classify your data, you must find the correct map projection for it.  The types of maps used are: Graduated symbols, Graduated Colors, Charts, Contours, and 3-D Perspective Views. 

Graduated Symbols- used to map discrete locations or lines.  Graduated point symbols  are drawn at the locations of individual features to show the magnitude of the data value. 

Graduated Colors- used to map discrete areas, data summarized by area, or continuous phenomena.  Usually, you asign shades of one or two colors to the classes.  you pick the colors representing  the lowest and highest classes, then pick the intermediate colors.

Charts- used to map data summarized by area, or discrete locations or areas.  With charts, you can show patterns  or quantities and categories at the same time .  Allows you to show more information on the map, rather than showing each category on its own map.

Contour Lines- Shows the rate of change in values across an area for spatially continuous phenomena.  where the lines are clser together, the change is more rapid.  Commonly used in measuring elevation and barometric pressure.

3-D Perspectives- are most commonly used in continuous phenomena to chow the viewer the landscape in another dimension.  The added dimension allows the viewer to take in the geologic aspects that may affect the geographic data. 

Patterns- Now that you have created your maps, you can examine them to find any re-occurring patterns that may become evident.  You can begin by looking at high and low values with the area in which they take place.

Chapter 6 talks about know where things are, and how close they are pertaining to a certain area.  A emergency vehicle has to know the quickest route to aid a victim, and cities have to notify residents when a liquor store is being built within 500 ft of them.  chapter goes on to list all the ways thisis utilized, like making map directions by pinpointing two locations and then finding the best way to get there.

Chapter 7 is all about mapping changes and updates that are vital to keep GIS software running correctly.  Lives may be lost if updates aren’t made to existing areas that may have undergone severe change or where Something is no longer there.  Also there are changes in data such as values and populations that will affect the outcome of what you are trying to map.