Wildland fire fighting is complex due to climatic variation, risk and uncertainty, and the proximity of human and resource values. Information about fire environments, resource availability and logistics, fire behavior, and values at risk are important issues fire managers must consider in allocating scarce resources. Improved information thus, has value in reducing risk and costs and damages. Geospatial technology, which includes remote sensing tools, geographic positioning systems (GPS), geographic information systems (GIS) and various maps are widely used in wildland fire management. My research evaluates geospatial tools in three different ways: their role in risk reduction, their effect on wildland fire costs and damages, and wildland fire managers perceived costs and benefits.<p> A theoretical model was developed to analyze the role of geospatial tools in reducing the risk. Risk-averse fire managers were found to use more geospatial technologies compared to those who did not incorporate risk in their decision making, resulting in a creation of value for these technologies. A simultaneous equation system of fires was estimated using the two-stage and the three-stage least squares estimation methods to examine the impact of geospatial tools on fire size, cost and damages. The effect of geospatial technology on fire size was significant in the Full Response Zone. Fire size was positively related to drought and duff moisture codes. Damages and cost of suppression were not affected significantly by the use of digitized maps. The survey of wildland fire managers revealed that geospatial tools are useful in integrating information and provide more clarity, flexibility and accuracy in decision-making. It was also discovered in the survey that geospatial tools are most commonly used when multiple fires are burning at the same time and threatening high resource values. Overall, the findings from this research indicated that risk-averse fire managers use geospatial tools more intensively; that maps play a significant role in reducing the fire size in the Full Response Zone, and, finally, the fire managers view that these technologies are more economically efficient in the Full Response Zone makes a case for more investment in developing and employing them on fires. Record keeping and data collection as well as understanding the human element in terms of risk aversion will be important for future studies and for adopting new technology and allocating resources efficiently.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Dept. of Geosciences and School of Computing and Engineering. University of Missouri--Kansas City, 2006. / "A dissertation in geoscience and software architecture." Advisor: Wei Ji. Typescript. Vita. Title from "catalog record" of the print edition Description based on contents viewed Nov. 13, 2007. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 248-261). Online version of the print edition.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Texas at Dallas, 2007. / Includes vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 58-64)

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2005. / The entire dissertation/thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file (which also appears in the research.pdf); a non-technical general description, or public abstract, appears in the public.pdf file. Title from title screen of research.pdf file viewed on (November 15, 2006) Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Rock climbing is undergoing unexpectedly rapid growth across the United States and around the world. Industry estimations in the late 1990’s put the number of recreational rock climbers in the United States in the 400,000 range. In 2013, estimates placed the rock climbing population as larger than eleven million active climbers, an apparent expansion of two orders of magnitude in about twenty years. As the number of rock climbers utilizing protected areas to further their recreation goals increases, so goes the associated impacts those recreationists can have on the resources. From what is known about recreation impacts to soil and vegetative cover, these impacts grow non-linearly with the amount of use, but asymptotically compared to the number of users. In an era of difficult resource management budgeting and staffing, this use-impact dynamic can grow unchecked. Therefore, this thesis seeks to map existing climbs in a developed climbing area and combine those spatial data with user attribute data towards generating a predictive suitability map for climbs. As climbing grows in popularity, land managers and climbing advocacy organizations both stand to benefit from clearer understanding of the processes driving climb site location selection and ultimately the characteristics observed about the climbing routes created. Resource management is comparatively slow and hemmed in by regulation and planning requirements. What makes a particular area suitable for rock climbing route development is the end result of an extended career as a technical rock climber. A skilled rock climber would be able to explain why a particular site might be better or less suited for climbing development. However most land managers are not experienced rock climbers, requiring the investigation for indicators that would be discernable by a novice. Therefore, the need to link managers and activity participants is great, considering this knowledge gap we ask the question: “To what extent can onsite and user-defined climb characteristics be used to model location and extent of climbing routes’ development by climbers?” Distances (2-dimensional centroid-to-centroid) between climb sites’ areas of impact, associated approach trail, and ingress/egress points of the canyon area were computed to subsequently determine correlative relationships between number of bolts, as well as horizontal 2-dimensional linear distance between adjacent climbs. Non-spatial attributes of each climb were also assessed for correlations with the above spatial characteristics of each climb. There were statistical correlations found between the difference in climb quality ratings and the distance to nearest climbs as well as correlations between clustering of climbs and their quality rating. This combined with a willingness to travel the farthest distance possible in the area to reach high quality climbs has many resource management implications both for land managers and users.

This thesis studies the time evolution of a computer mediated community called FidoNet. The introduction explains what FidoNet is, briefly details its history and sociological significance and sets out research goals for the thesis as a whole. The second chapter-covering background and relevant literature-relates FidoNet to other social phenomena and reviews relevant sections of work on dynamic approaches to social systems. It also describes how FidoNet Nodelists were combined with geographic data on US telephone lines and 1990 Census data so that the geographic growth and decline of FidoNet could be mapped and analysed. The third through fifth chapters are substantive starting with an empirical analysis on the spatial growth of FidoNet in the United States, covering a variety of different ways in which distance could have mediated the contagiousness of FidoNet as a system. The fourth considers decline as a similarly contagious process, demonstrating that FidoNet's most obvious competitor-the internet-may in fact have discouraged its decline while the short-term influence of leaving events on current sysops fits the data far better as an explanation. The other explanatory variable of this section-long-term social influence-exhibits an unexpected sign, suggesting that perhaps there were incentives to maintain FidoNet that were most prevalent in the long-term. The fifth chapter attempts to tease out which different mechanisms may have been at work during decline, using an Agent-Based Modelling (ABM) approach and specifically considering individual rather than aggregated behaviour. The 6th and final chapter summarises the findings.

Geographic information systems (GIS) are increasingly being used in energy planning and by private sector practitioners. Through qualitative interviews with 49 leading practitioners in the public and private sector, this thesis establishes the data of most importance, current open access data sources for energy access along with the information currently lacking from open data sources. The interviews revealed grid infrastructure, population density, renewable power potential and energy expenditure to be the most sought after data for both practitioners’ groups. However, it was evident that the private sector had a stronger focus on land, water resource and climate data determining the renewable power potential for a specific area of interest, while the public sector focused on socioeconomic indicators and energy expenditure. A following data aggregation and analysis of the most desired datasets showed that a majority of the needed datasets were available with the exception of energy expenditure. A least-cost option electrification model developed by KTH-dESA has proven to be a powerful tool in assessing the cost of nationwide electrification. This thesis compares the average least-cost option electrification cost for each region in Tanzania with a projected average income. The comparison showed that the average household cost for least-cost option electrification as a share of projected household income varies between regions. The average share per household in the western regions of Tanzania were significantly higher compared to households in the central and eastern regions. The comparison was combined with the geographical location of donor-supported energy development projects showing that majority of the projects were located in the central parts of Tanzania and not targeting the most vulnerable households in regions furthest away from the national grid. In order to successfully introduce electricity nationwide in Tanzania, more support needs to be provided to the poorest regions.  Open data aggregation and coordination are the key to expand the support from GIS for energy access. Even though multiple data sources have been identified, they are scattered and leads to data being collected again. Coordinated efforts aimed to provide means to share aggregated updated and freely accessible data can help reduce high transaction costs, helping to alleviate energy poverty. / Geografiska informationssystem (GIS) används i allt större utsträckning inom energiplanering och av privata aktörer. Genom kvalitativa intervjuer med 49 ledande aktörer i offentlig och privat sektor redogör denna rapport för de viktigaste dataseten för aktörer, befintliga källor för öppen data och vilka informationsluckor som finns i dessa källor. Intervjuerna visade att dataseten gällande energiinfrastruktur, befolkningstäthet, potential för förnybar energi och energiutgifter var viktigast för både offentlig och privat sektor. Privat sektor hade ett större fokus på land, vatten och klimatdata, som alla är viktiga för att avgöra ett områdes potential för förnybar energi. Offentlig sektor hade ett större intresse av socioekonomiska faktorer och energiutgifter. En dataaggregation och analys visade att de mest eftertraktade dataseten fanns öppet tillgängliga med undantag för energiutgifter. En modell för energialternativ till lägsta kostnad utvecklad av KTH-dESA har visat sig vara ett kraftfullt verktyg för att kostnadsbedöma en landsomfattande elektrifiering. I en fallstudie för Tanzania jämför denna rapport den genomsnittliga kostnaden för hushåll för en implementering av en sådan elektrifiering med en beräknad genomsnittlig hushållsinkomst. Jämförelsen visade att kostnaden för hushållen som andel av total hushållsinkomst varierar kraftigt mellan regioner. Den genomsnittliga andelen av hushållsinkomsten som skulle läggas på elektricitet i de västra regionerna av Tanzania var betydligt högre jämfört med de centrala och östra regionerna. Jämförelsen kombinerade även detta resultat med den geografiska positionen hos biståndsstödda energiprojekt. vilken visade att majoriteten av dessa projekt fanns i de centrala delarna av landet och inte i de mest utsatta regionerna som präglas av låg genomsnittlig inkomst och långa avstånd till det nationella kraftnätet. För att framgångsrikt kunna genomföra en landsomfattande elektrifiering behöver mer stöd ges till dessa regioner. Aggregation av öppen data och koordinering är nyckeln till att framgångsrikt utveckla GIS som stöd vid framtida energiprojekt som syftar till att ge fler tillgång till elektricitet. Trots att flertalet datakällor kunde identifieras är dessa spridda vilket leder till att data behöver samlas in gång på gång. Koordinerade insatser för att öka möjligheten till att dela redan insamlad öppen och uppdaterad data kan bidra till att minska transaktionskostnader och därmed minska energifattigdomen

Although challenges in water and sanitation access are often assumed to be issues of low- and middle-income nations, over 400,000 homes in the United States still lack access to complete indoor plumbing. Previous research has demonstrated that the remaining plumbing challenges are more prevalent in communities with high Black and brown populations. This study hypothesizes that the 1930s practice of redlining by the Home Owners' Loan Corporation (HOLC), which systematically denied loans to minority populations, is linked to present-day inadequate plumbing access (i.e. defined as incomplete plumbing above the national average). Digitized HOLC maps for 202 urban areas across the country and US Census data from the 2016-2020 American Community Survey were combined to interpolate the modern-day plumbing access for historic neighborhoods (n=8871 communities). Analysis via binomial logistic regression demonstrated that nationally, redlined communities (HOLC Grade "D") are significantly more likely to have a rate of incomplete plumbing above the national average as compared to greenlined communities (HOLC Grade "A") (0.1352; CI= +0.036). This finding was also observed for three of the nation's four census sub-regions (Northeast, Midwest, West). Slight differences by region in relationships between the proportion of specific racial/ethnic populations on rates of incomplete plumbing demonstrate the need for targeted place-based interdisciplinary examinations of exclusionary practices. The demonstration of the present-day impacts of redlining after nearly 90 years emphasizes the need to intentionally mitigate past injustices to ensure modern-day equity. / Master of Science / Access to water is a prevailing issue in underserved communities. Over 400,000 homes in the United States still lack access to complete indoor plumbing. This condition is called incomplete plumbing which is defined by the US Census Bureau as not being able to use running water, or flush a toilet, or bath. Redlining is the historical practice of denying loans to homeowners in a certain area based on their race or economic status. Our study sought to discover whether redlining has negatively affected the presence of plumbing in homes. To do this we examined whether incomplete plumbing in 2020 was above the national average in areas that were previously redlined. We found that redlined communities are significantly more likely to have a rate of incomplete plumbing above the national average as compared to greenlined communities. The same trend was found in three of the nation's four census sub-regions (Northeast, Midwest, and West). These findings show that racist practices such as redlining have had a lasting effect on modern-day infrastructure such as plumbing.

We have developed a new approach to annotate the uncertainty information of geospatial data. This framework is composed of a geospatial platform and the data with uncertainty. The framework supports geospatial sources such as Geography Markup Language (GML) with uncertainty information. The purpose of this framework is to integrate the uncertainty information of data from the application users and thereby ease the development of processing uncertainty information of geospatial data. Having well organized data and using this framework, the end-users can store the uncertainty information on the current geospatial data structure. For example, a GIS user can share the error information for environmental and geospatial data to others. We have also reported the enhanced geographic information system function.

Presented at the 2016 American Libraries Association Annual Conference / The University of Arizona (UA) Libraries has been providing GIS services and access to geospatial data since the 1990's, first by providing access to US Federal Depository Program geospatial data on CD-ROMs and DVDs, later through the Arizona Electronic Atlas and more recently the UA Institutional Repository (UAiR) and the UA Campus Repository. Focus groups with faculty and staff confirmed our view that neither the UAiR nor the Campus Repository meet the needs of the UA's GIS community. To address their needs, the UA Libraries investigated various solutions for developing a geospatial data portal that would facilitate discovery, access, sharing, and retrieval of distributed geospatial data resources and consolidate several repositories at the University into one accessible and modern interface. An inventory was completed, interviews were conducted with relevant campus stakeholders and geospatial data portal managers at various academic libraries, and various options were investigated. Based on several factors, the UA decided to implement Open Geoportal (http://www.opengeoportal.org), a collaboratively developed, open source, federated web application for discovering, previewing, and retrieving geospatial data from multiple repositories. The UA Libraries released the resulting geospatial data portal, Spatial Data Explorer (SDE), in the fall 2015. In anticipation of the release, a survey was conducted in spring 2015 of faculty, staff, and students to gauge interest in contributing data to the SDE. The poster will include why we decided to implement Open Geoportal, screen shots showing the SDE interface and functionality, results of the survey and follow-up interviews with potential contributors, and use statistics.