Thesis (M. Env. St.)--University of Adelaide, Mawson Graduate Centre for Environmental Studies, 1992. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 159-173).

Thesis (M.Arch.)--University of Detroit Mercy, 2009. / "April 24, 2009." Includes bibliographical references (p. 77).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Antioch University New England, 2008. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed March 26, 2010). "A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Environmental Studies at Antioch University New England (2008)."--from the title page. Advisor: Alesia Maltz, Ph.D. Includes bibliographical references (p. 289-308).

Thesis (B.Soc.Sc.(Hons.)) - University of Queensland, 2004. / Includes bibliographical references.

No description available.

Thesis (MA (Geography and Environmental Studies))--University of Stellenbosch, 2005. / Scenic beauty, or landscape aesthetics, should be regarded as a valuable resource, to be protected and enhanced in order to generate income. Current environmental impact assessment (EIA) studies do not include the evaluation of scenic beauty as a resource properly, due to the lack of effective evaluation methods. A general dilemma lies in objectively evaluating beauty. If scenic preferences can be associated consistently with the physical landscape features, the latter can be used as predictors of the former. Analysis of aesthetics can therefore be done with a degree of objectivity, based on these general preferences. A large number of these preferences are morphologically measurable. In other words, these preferences can be mapped in a Geographical Information System (GIS), rated, and evaluated quantitatively. The first step in objectively evaluating landscape aesthetics entailed identification and compilation from the literature of conceptual components in a landscape, i.e. the units defining a landscape. Four components were identified: landform, vegetation, water features and man-made features. Each of the four components can be subdivided into several elements. Secondly, scenic preferences that can be consistently associated with landscape features were identified. It was found that any subjective experience of landscape aesthetics would be either one of calmness or one of excitement. The presence or absence of the landscape elements, and specific combinations of elements and element variables within the context of an individual landscape, will determine the type and extent of the aesthetic experience of the viewer. Finally, this theory was put into practice. Coverages were created of a test region, with landscape elements as the features of the coverages, and element variables or characteristics as feature attributes. These landscape elements, as they enhance either calmness or excitement, were quantified by assigning value ratings to the elements according to the extent of the influence of the elements on the aesthetic value of the landscape. ArcInfo GRID functionality was used to convert the coverages to raster (or grid) overlays, using the element variables enhancing both calmness and excitement. A simple cumulative summing function was used to derive an aggregate Calm Aesthetic Experience map by adding grids enhancing calmness. An aggregate Exciting Aesthetic Experience map was constructed by adding grids enhancing excitement. Finally, these two grids were summed in order to construct a Total Aesthetic Experience map, which is an indication of the total aesthetic value of the test region. The outcome of this research was a method for analysis and objective evaluation of a landscape, using a GIS for data creation, analysis and map construction. The resultant map is an indication of aesthetic value, showing the test region graded according to intrinsic aesthetic value.

Chromá, L.: Environmentally friendly forms of tourism in the protected landscape areas of Šumava with a specific focus on agrotourism. Master thesis. Department of Landscape Management, Faculty of Agriculture, University of South Bohemia, České Budějovice, 88 s. Gentle forms of tourism can be defined as tourism that focuses on nature, culture and historical wealth. The theoretical part includes a literary research focused on the description and geography of tourism, tourism psychology, motivation and travel experience. An important part is the issue of the negative impacts of tourism, where afterwards the gentle forms of tourism are highlighted. The presented work is focused mainly on the attractiveness of agrotourism as a form of leisure time, where it is mainly about the trace of public interest. Another, no less important goal is to find out the contribution of agro-tourism to the participants and the village, the attractiveness of the Šumava for visitors, the reason for the establishment of agrotourism farms and the support of the state.

Context: Understanding spatial patterns of biodiversity and species’ distributions is important for scientific theory, and for conservation and management of the natural world. Climatic variables are widely recognised as strong correlates of species richness over large spatial extents. Correlates of species richness at smaller extents (regional and landscape scales) are less well established, but environmental heterogeneity is widely thought to be important. A large number of environmental heterogeneity measures have been used, but in particular there is a growing interest in ‘geodiversity’, which I define here as the diversity of abiotic terrestrial and hydrological nature, comprising earth surface materials and landforms. Recent research has emphasised both geodiversity’s inherent value and its potential as a correlate and predictor of spatial biodiversity and species’ distribution patterns. However, despite this clear potential of geodiversity for improving our understanding of how patterns of life relate to environmental heterogeneity, its incorporation into biodiversity and species’ distribution modelling is substantially underdeveloped. In this thesis, using a macroecological approach I begin to address some of these knowledge gaps by analysing the relationships between geodiversity data, and its constituent ‘geofeatures’, and species richness and distributions for multiple taxa and across several scales (grain size and extent) and geographic locations. My main aims in this thesis are to more fully evaluate geodiversity itself, and improve our understanding of its role with respect to the spatial patterning of biodiversity, both conceptually and empirically. Locations and Spatial Scales Analyses were carried out within and across Great Britain (England, Scotland, and Wales) and Finland. The order of the four quantitative papers generally reflects the largest spatial extent (i.e. size of the study area) at which they were conducted, from national (PAPERS II and III) through landscape (PAPER IV), to the local scale (vegetation plots within a small upland river catchment; PAPER V). PAPER II is a study across several spatial extents (from landscape to national) and uses two grain sizes (1 km2 and 100 km2). PAPER I is a review paper that considers multiple scales and geographic locations conceptually. Time period Present day: data were from between 1995 and 2016 across all of the quantitative studies. Taxa Multiple: alien and native vascular plants across Great Britain (PAPER II); threatened bryophytes, beetles, fungi, lepidoptera, lichens, mammals, molluscs, and vascular plants across Finland (PAPER III); common and rare vascular plants across the Cairngorms, Scotland (PAPER IV); angiosperms, conifers, fungi, lichens, liverworts, lycophytes, mosses, and pteridophytes (and productivity) across an upland river catchment within the Cairngorms (PAPER V); and conceptual consideration of multiple taxa (PAPER I). Methods: For studies in Great Britain, plant data were provided by the Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland (BSBI) for PAPERS II and IV, and by the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (CEH) for PAPER V. The threatened species data in Finland were from Finnish Environment Institute (PAPER II). Species richness (PAPERS II, III, and IV), rarity-weighted richness (RWR; PAPER III), species’ distributions (PAPERS IV and V), and productivity (measured using NDVI from colour infrared aerial imagery; PAPER V) were all analysed using Boosted Regression Tree (BRT) modelling, allowing comparisons between studies. For geodiversity data in the British studies, I compiled geodiversity data on landforms, soils, hydrological and geological features using existing national datasets (e.g. British Geological Survey), and used a geomorphometric method to extract landform coverage data (landforms included: hollows, ridges, valleys, and peaks). These data were analysed alongside environmental data, which varied between papers, relating to climate, standard topography (e.g. slope; elevation), land use, and human population. The sources of other geodiversity data in Finland, and environmental data on topography and climate, came from a variety of sources, which are detailed within each paper. Results: Geodiversity improved biodiversity and species’ distribution models throughout all of the quantitative analyses and generally declined in importance as spatial scale coarsened beyond the landscape scale. At most spatial scales and in most places, the roles of climate and/or coarse topography dominated, and geodiversity played a relatively small role, as was expected. Geodiversity, however, made consistent positive contributions to the models independently of traditionally used topographic metrics such as standard deviation of elevation and slope. Taxonomically, geodiversity: (i) was slightly more relevant for native vascular plants than alien in Great Britain (PAPER II); (ii) of similar relevance to common and rare vascular plants in the Scottish Highlands, except that the coverage of soil parent material was especially important for rare species’ distributions (PAPER IV); of similar relevance to most sessile taxa (angiosperms, fungi, mosses, liverworts, lichens, pteridophytes, and lycophytes; conifers were not related to geodiversity) in an upland Scottish river catchment (PAPER V); and more important for threatened vascular plants and bryophytes over other studied taxa in Finland (PAPER II). Geodiversity also improved models of productivity, and the variability in productivity, in PAPER V. Main conclusions and Future Directions: Geodiversity improves our understanding of, and ability to model, the relationship between biodiversity and environmental heterogeneity at multiple spatial scales, by allowing us to get closer to the real-world conditions and processes that affect life. I found that the greatest benefit comes from measuring ‘geofeatures’, which describe the constituent parts of geodiversity separately, rather than as one combined variable. Automatically extracted landform data, the use of which is novel in ecology, biogeography and macroecology, proved particularly valuable throughout this body of work, and as too did data from expert geological and hydrological maps. The idea of ‘Conserving Nature’s Stage’ (CNS), and identifying areas that are most capable of supporting high biodiversity into the future, the benefits and caveats of which are discussed in this thesis, has recently emerged. It requires a sound empirical and conceptual basis, to which my research contributes. In this thesis, I have gone some way towards demonstrating the conceptual and empirical value of incorporating geodiversity into ecological analyses across multiple spatial scales, paving the way for this recent approach to be more extensively used for theoretical and applied purposes. I accomplished this by carrying out an assessment of existing geodiversity literature and, importantly, looking forwards to consider the prospects of geodiversity within ecology (PAPER I), supported by four quantitative studies. The conservation significance is emphasised in PAPER III. Much remains to be done, however, and future research directions are detailed in PAPER I. We need to develop predictive models to test the role of geodiversity across an array of geographical and taxonomic domains, as well as to assess metrics beyond species richness and species’ distributions. One example may involve beta diversity: does spatial turnover in species relate to spatial turnover in geofeatures? Fully analysing the role of geodiversity through time will also be important, including in relation to refugia, given predicted environmental changes in climate. In progressing with this line of enquiry, we will improve our knowledge and understanding of patterns of life on Earth and, specifically, how the geophysical landscape helps shape them.

Typology of Nature Parks in the Czech Republic Nature parks cover about one tenth of the Czech Republic. They are classified under general protection of nature and landscape in the nature and landscape system of our state and primarily serve to protect the landscape character with significant aesthetic, natural and cultural values. Nature parks are currently set up by a law regulation by regional authorities. This thesis provides comprehensive information about all nature parks in the Czech Republic, describes their history and their present form. The thesis deals with the research of landscape protection and landscape character. The main result of the thesis is the creation of a typology of natural parks of the Czech Republic, rated by their landscape coverage and selected natural conditions - altitude, typological division of the relief, climatic conditions and height vegetation levels. All map outputs are processed in a GIS program. Keywords: nature park, landscape protection, landscape character, landscape typology

This thesis deals with the matter of regulation concerning undeveloped landscape protection. The focus here is an analysis of the legal regulation and instruments governing serving to protection of land in terms of its quantity and quality both from the perspective of environmental law and in terms of town and country planning. Land as a key resource is not unlimited and its unreasonable and irresponsible exploitation might have serious impact to the future generations. In this thesis, which is divided into three chapters I focus on various aspects of legal protection of undeveloped landscape from the perspective of different laws governing the matter. The first chapter contains definitions of key terms used for the purpose of the thesis. The second chapter focuses on different instruments of undeveloped landscape protection, which are town and country planning, general protection of nature, special protection areas and protection of soil, especially on farmlands and forests. The third chapter analyzes the conflict of the right of ownership and the Constitutionally guaranteed right to a hospitable environment. Special attention is given to expropriation for the purpose of nature protection.