A Review of “India and South Asia: Economic Developments in the Age of Globalization”

Any analysis of health service problems facing the world today must consider that these problems exist in a geographic context. This fact has led to an increased need for accurate and current information to support emergency planning and decision making. In this article we combine geographic information systems (GIS) and neural networks for performing health emergency assessments and generating hazard maps that show areas that are potentially at high risk for emergencies. Through the use of neural networks we predict the location of future emergency events. On these events we use a kernel density estimator to create maps of areas that have a high risk for future emergencies. As a result, emergency services will know in advance where there is a high possibility of an emergency event occurring and can formulate a response, thus improving incident management and health planning. For example, the service can locate ambulances in places near the expected emergency cases, minimizing response time. The approach was tested in stroke-event analysis in the city of Athens, Greece.     

Tactile-map output from geographical information systems: the challenge and its importance

Abstract

The incorporation of the technology of geographic information systems (GIS) into a wide range of planning decisions makes it important that the visually handicapped have access to GIS-based map products to participate more fully in community decision making. Fortunately, GIS contain many procedures useful to the design of tactile maps, including changes of scale and simplification. Developing research opportunities are outlined within the context of the general problem. Tactile maps using microcapsule paper can be produced quickly, but they must be tested using visually handicapped subjects to ensure that suitable symbolization and specifications are developed.     

Map Reading and Abuse

Abstract

The various advantages and limitations of geographical mapping known to map users can be functionally related to the few basic principles which constitute the very nature of the cartographic technique. Numerous map interpretation errors may be traced in large part to a common failure on the part of map users to grasp and effectively deal with these same mapping principles. Since it is possible to identify situations in environmental decision making and planning where the misuse of maps, or outright map reading abuses, could lead to adverse human and environmental impact, the problem is indeed serious. Strategies for minimizing the misuse or abuse of geographical maps appear to rely most heavily on a thorough understanding of basic mapping principles.     

Improvement of GIS graphics for analysis and decision-making

Abstract

Current geographical information systems (GIS) include functions to create cartographic output interactively or automatically. However, none of the systems presently incorporates mechanisms to ensure correct application of graphic functions. Many of today's users of GIS are not trained in the design and production of graphics and may create maps that confuse or mislead map users. Poorly-designed maps may obliterate the patterns in displayed information.

This article investigates ways to improve the quality of GIS graphical displays and increase their effectiveness for decision-making. Alternatives are presented for improving map design in GIS, ranging from non-technical efforts to enhancement of software functionality. Suggestions propose augmenting users' abilities to create maps in an automated environment, using an approach termed amplified intelligence: key decisions default explicitly to users, whose knowledge is amplified by a range of high-level tools to carry out map design operations automatically.     

AUTOMATED ISOCHRONES AND THE LOCATIONS OF EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES IN CITIES

A method is described for the automatic calculation and graphical reproduction of isochrones around emergency medical centers in large cities. The isochrones are set for different time standards and for varying traffic conditions. The technique is based on the concept of a velocity field. It permits a rapid evaluation of coverage standards under different operating conditions.     

Structuring image data within a multi-media information system

Abstract

This paper describes a generic structure model for large numbers of spatially-related images held within a multi-media information system. Applications vary from multi-scale map tilings underlying geographical information system user interfaces to sets of spatially-related visual data held in image form, such as ‘structured walks’ and sets of views with finder maps. The model enables an abstract structure to be soft-configured onto any indexed collection of images and related to standard databases of textual and graphical information at various levels. This is achieved by defining a number of customized ‘image structures’ and providing techniques for their manipulation. Key features of the model are defined in VDM-SL, a formal specification language being standardized by the International Organization for Standardization. The formal definitions are accompanied by explanations in English and by examples. Prototype implementations are described. A glossary of symbols, terms and expressions is given in the Appendix.     

Map Use by Adults with Visual Impairments

In this paper we summarize five experiments that were designed to investigate how tactile maps contribute to the cognitive maps of people with visual impairments. In two experiments we demonstrated that tactile maps can contribute to peoples' ability to learn a route through an unfamiliar area. From the results of two further studies, we argue that compared to people with sight, people with visual impairments have greater difficulty encoding information from a map. We considered this directly in a fifth experiment by investigating how people with visual impairments search and learn a map. We found that they used less efficient strategies than people with sight. We conclude that tactile maps are an important source of geographical information when people need to learn about new environments, but we also point out that to benefit most from tactile maps people need to encode the map information as effectively as possible. As people with visual impairments do not always use the most appropriate encoding strategies we suggest that tactile map users might benefit from greater experience and training in map encoding strategies.     

AffectRoute – considering people’s affective responses to environments for enhancing route-planning services

Humans perceive and evaluate environments affectively. Some places are experienced as unsafe, while some others as attractive and interesting. These affective responses to environments influence people’s daily behavior and decision-making in space, e.g., choosing which route to take, or which place to visit. In this article, we report on a methodology of using people’s affective responses to environments for enhancing computer-based route planning. More specifically, we explore a crowdsourcing approach to model and collect people’s affective responses to environments; an Affect-Space-Model and a mobile application are developed to facilitate this crowdsourcing approach; a routing algorithm (named AffectRoute) is then proposed to aggregate and integrate the collected data for automatic route planning. Evaluation with human participants shows that the routes generated by considering people’s affective responses to environments are significantly preferred over the conventional shortest ones, which are employed in car navigation systems and many online route planners. In conclusion, considering people’s affective responses to environments contributes to the improvement of automatic route planning. The proposed method can be integrated into existing route-planning services (e.g., location-based services) to provide users with more satisfying routing results.     

基于眼动实验方法的城市开敞空间视觉研究 ——广州花城广场案例

以广州花城广场为案例,通过设计以认知地图、照片拍摄以及眼动实验环节的视觉研究方法,对花城广场的空间感知进行分析。结果表明：1）通过分析认知地图以及眼动数据可以发现,认知地图中高频率出现的要素和眼动实验得出的参与者感兴趣要素相一致,花城广场的建筑物、边界、场所和区域是参与者比较感兴趣的要素,以上要素在眼动实验中首次进入时间短,在认知地图中出现频率高;2）通过分析注视点注视时间热点图,可以得出在城市开敞空间的规划中应注重建筑物、构筑物、装置和场地的合理结合,注重空间层次和空间秩序,注重营造场所的规划设计结论。在应用上,照片拍摄、眼动实验等视觉的神经科学研究方法的使用可以为城市开敞空间的规划设计提供公众参与的新思路。     

Negotiating invisible lines: Cross-border emergency care in the rural north of Scandinavia

ABSTRACT

Cross-border cooperation is increasingly practised as a spatial planning strategy in health care. This observation is emphasized in numerous reports on transboundary agreements in European border regions. While the projects hint at an ongoing contestation and reconfiguration of nationally bordered health care pathways, they have rarely been subject to critical geographical inquiry. Departing from contemporary border studies debates, the article addresses this gap by providing a nuanced perspective on the socio-spatial complexity of health care practices across Europe’s internal borders. The author demonstrates this empirically by focusing on a framework for emergency care assistance in the northernmost regions of Scandinavia. He uses a heuristic approach to borderscapes as assemblages, and conceptually argues that the strategic reconfiguration of emergency care provision through cross-border cooperation is not adequately captured by a narrative of dissolving topographically bordered sovereignty (i.e. the commonplace notion of overcoming national boundaries). Based on a qualitative analysis of motives, procedures and hurdles, the author concludes that the attempt to cope with demography and distance in rural northern health care formats a socio-spatial arrangement in its own right, a case-specific geography of emergency care that is characterized by a complex interplay between different sites and their multiple bordering trajectories.     

Land Classification Maps of Areas Basic to Agricultural Production

Abstract

Einevoll, O. 1968. Land Classification Maps of Areas Basic to Agricultural Production. Norsk geogr. Tidsskr. 22, 264–270.

In Norway, a detailed land survey, based on photogrammetry, is now proceeding for land classification maps of the scale 1:5,000 (for certain minor areas 1:10,000) covering agricultural areas and including forest land. The areas to be mapped are classified according to land capability and general conditions of management. Containing a great deal of additional information as well, these maps will serve as a valuable aid in land use planning. The survey is designed to be completed in 12–15 year's time.

More roughly designed maps for the entire country on the scale 1:100,000 and 1:250,000, printed in colour, will be produced within two years' time. Intermediate maps of 1:20,000, containing an extended number of land types, will be undertaken gradually, after the appearance of the large scale map series. Property boundaries recorded in connexion with the surveying for the large scale maps will serve as the basis for a complete land register containing exact information about size and land properties of individual holdings.     

INCORPORATING INHERENT MAP ERROR INTO FLOOD-HAZARD ANALYSIS

Maps are an important source of data for planning and land use analysis of flood-prone areas. Map users with inadequate training are not aware that map errors can lead to ineffective decisions. Although inherent errors introduced by transformation, map construction, and symbolization are never identified on maps, they limit the effectiveness of maps as sources of data. Additional vertical and horizontal errors can be introduced during map use. Knowledge of the sources and amounts of such errors should result in more effective decisions regarding flood hazards.     

Opportunistic natural experiments using digital telemetry: a transit disruption case study

ABSTRACT

In the past decade society has entered a technological period characterized by handheld computing that supports input and processing from numerous sensors. Today’s mobile phones offer the ability to integrate input from sensors monitoring various external and internal sources (e.g., accelerometer, magnetometer, microphone, GPS, wireless Internet, and Bluetooth). Furthermore, these raw inputs can be integrated and processed in ways that can offer novel representations of human behaviour. As a result, new opportunities to examine and better understand human spatial behaviour are available; one such application is the constant monitoring of a group of people over an extended period of time. Such a research setting lends itself to natural experiments that emerge as a result of regular and on-going observations. We report here on the observation of a natural experiment that took place in the context of a month-long monitoring study of 28 participants using mobile phone-based ubiquitous sensor monitoring. The implications for public health and transportation planning are discussed.     

Spatial Correlation between Traffic and Air Pollution in Beijing

Many studies have attempted to model the sophisticated influence of traffic emissions on air pollution, but most models only calculate the contribution of traffic emissions near monitoring sites. It is difficult to observe the near-surface dynamics such as wind, rain, and human activities and precisely distinguish traffic emissions. These obstacles make model simulation very expensive in practice. The regional distribution patterns that can help adjust policies and actions taken remain unknown. Therefore, this article proposes a grid-oriented geostatistics-based approach to overcome these obstacles. We chose central Beijing as the study area. An experiment implemented the approach on data collected from Global Positioning System navigation software, car rental companies, and meteorology stations. The results suggest that the northwest area of Beijing has high traffic-related air pollution (TRAP) and the southeast area has low TRAP. Unlike modeling-based methods, this work uses geostatistical methods to directly study the spatiotemporal connections between traffic and PM_2.5 (particulate matter with diameter less than 2.5?μm) from the phenomenon. The calculation is conducted under no hypotheses and has little risk of producing results contradictory to facts. This work provides a reference for future TRAP research on directly learning from the phenomenon and assists decision makers with seamless spatiotemporal heat maps of TRAP distribution. Key Words: Beijing, geospatial statistics, PM_2.5, spatial correlation, traffic-related air pollution.     

Visualisation and evaluation of flood uncertainties based on ensemble modelling

This study evaluates how users incorporate visualisation of flood uncertainty information in decision-making. An experiment was conducted where participants were given the task to decide building locations, taking into account homeowners’ preferences as well as dilemmas imposed by flood risks at the site. Two general types of visualisations for presenting uncertainties from ensemble modelling were evaluated: (1) uncertainty maps, which used aggregated ensemble results; and (2) performance bars showing all individual simulation outputs from the ensemble. Both were supplemented with either two-dimensional (2D) or three-dimensional (3D) contextual information, to give an overview of the area.

The results showed that the type of uncertainty visualisation was highly influential on users’ decisions, whereas the representation of the contextual information (2D or 3D) was not. Visualisation with performance bars was more intuitive and effective for the task performed than the uncertainty map. It clearly affected users’ decisions in avoiding certain-to-be-flooded areas. Patterns to which the distances were decided from the homeowners’ preferred positions and the uncertainties were similar, when the 2D and 3D map models were used side by side with the uncertainty map. On the other hand, contextual information affected the time to solve the task. With the 3D map, it took the participants longer time to decide the locations, compared with the other combinations using the 2D model.

Designing the visualisation so as to provide more detailed information made respondents avoid dangerous decisions. This has also led to less variation in their overall responses.     

Qualitative GIS to Relate Perceptions with Behaviors among Fishers on Risky,Rocky Coasts

This article presents an innovative mixed methodology that integrates qualitative geographic information systes (GIS) methods to expand the examination of space in the context of people’s lived experiences and risk. We emphasize the specific ways in which individuals perceive risk by treating risk as relational. Conceptualizing risk as relational challenges traditional assumptions of risk by rejecting that risk is the combination of physical and social elements. Instead, a relational understanding explores the socioenvironmental interactions that are perceived as hazardous, as they emerge in space. Such claims have long animated risk research, but only recently have methodological advances opened opportunities for relational analyses. Using hazardous coasts as the case, we analyze rock fishers’ risk perceptions and whether those perceptions influence their movement. Analytically, we relate rock fishers’ Global Positioning System movement with participant observations, video, semistructured interviews, and sketch maps anchored to questions focusing on spatial understandings of risk. In doing so, fishers’ perceptions of socioenvironmental stimuli are spatially represented, with sketch mapping as a window into the perception–environment interactions that produce risk. This methodology opens new possibilities for understanding human–environment systems that typically overlook how, where, and for how long risky human–environment interactions are perceived in space, if at all. Key Words: qualitative GIS, relational, risk, risk perception, space.     

A Project Study of Climate

Abstract

Atlas of American Women by Barbara Gimla Shortridge New York: Macmillan, 1987. xi and 164 pp., figs., tables, maps, biblio., and index. $85.00 cloth.

The Geography of Defence by Michael Bateman and Raymond Riley, eds. Totowa, NJ: Barnes &; Noble, 1987. xi and 237 pp., figs., tables, photos, maps, refs., and index. $33.50 cloth.

Zones of Conflict: An Atlas of Future Wars by John Keegan and Andrew Wheatcroft New York: Simon &; Schuster, 1986. xvii, 158 pp., and maps. $10.95 paper.

From Peasant to Farmers: The Migration from Balestrand, Norway to the Upper Middle Wets by Jon Gjerde Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Modern History Series, eds. R. Fogel and S. Thernstrom. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985. xiv and 319 pp., illus., figs., tables, photos, maps, refs., and index. $32.50 cloth.

Power and Place: Canadian Urban Development in the North American Context by Gilbert A. Stelter and Alan F.J. Artibise, eds. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1986. iv and 398 pp., figs., tables, photos, maps, and refs. $24.50     

Green Costs,Red Ink: Determinants of Municipal Defensive Expenditures inOntario

Book reviews are in these Articles.

Understanding Peasant Agriculture: An Integrated Land-Use Model for the Punjab Joseph H. Astroth, Jr. Chicago: University of Chicago, Committee on Geographical Studies, 1990. (Geography Research Paper No. 223). ix and 173 pp., maps, photos, figs., apps., biblio., and index; $12.00 paper (ISBN 0-89065-127-2).

National Integration in Indonesia: Patterns and Policies Christine Drake. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1989. xvi and 354 pp., maps, diags., tables, index, and biblio. $35.00 cloth ISBN 0-8248- 1229-8).

Urban Economic Theory: Land Use and City Size. Masahisa Fujita. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989. x and 366 pp., diag., graphs, biblio. notes, append, biblio., index. $65.00 cloth (ISBN 0-521-34662-2).

The Sugar Cane Industry: An Historical Geography from Its Origins to 1914. J. H. Galloway. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 1989. xiii and 266 pp., maps, tables, diags., index, and biblio. $44.50 cloth (ISBN 0-521-24853-1).

Government Policy and Industrial Change. David Gibbs, ED. New York: Routledge, 1989. xvi and 317 pp., 15 figs., 53 tables, index, and biblio. $59.95 cloth (ISBN 0-415-01032-2).

English Agriculture: An Historical Perspective. David Grigg. New York: Basil Blackwell, 1989. vii and 256 pp. $60.00 cloth (ISBN 0-631-16033-7).

London 2001. Peter Hall. London: Unwin Hyman, 1989. xii and 226 pp., maps, diags., index, and biblio. $34.95 cloth (ISBN 0-04-4451 61 -X).

The Land that Became Israel: Studies in Historical Geography. Ruth Kark, ED. Translated from the Hebrew by Michael Gordon. Jerusalem: The Magnes Press, The Hebrew University and New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1990. x and 332 pp., maps, diags., plates. $27.50 cloth (ISBN 0-300- 04718-5).

Die Farmer-Genossenschaften in den USA – Eine agrargeographie Untersuchung. Werner Klohn. Vechta, Federal Republic of Germany: Vechtaer Druckerei, 1990. Vechtaer Arbeiten zur Geographie und Regionalwissenschaft, Band 9. 285 pp., maps, photos, diags., and biblio. 39.80 DM paper (ISBN 3-88441-083-0).

Agricultural Development in Japan: The Land Improvement District in Concept and Practice. Gil Latz. Chicago, IL University of Chicago Press, 1989. vii and 135 pp., maps, diags., index, and biblio. $12.00 paper (ISBN 0-89065-129-9).

Land Use Planning Made Plain. Hok Lin Leung. Kingston, Ontario: Ronald P. Frye &; Company, 1989. xv and 237 pp., maps, diags., tables, append., index, and refs. $19.95 paper (ISBN 0-919741-98-3).

Computers in Geography. David J. Maguire. New York: Halsted Press, 1989. xv and 248 pp., maps, photos, diags., index, and biblio. $31.95 paper (ISBN 0-470-21 194-6).

Maps with the News: The Development of American Journalistic Cartography. Mark Monmonier. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1989. xii and 331 pp., maps, illus., index, and biblio. $24.95 cloth (ISBN 0-226-53411-1).

Geographic Information Systems and Cartographic Modeling. C. Dana Tomlin. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1990. xviii and 249 pp., maps, diags., review questions, selected readings, appendix, index, $44.20 cloth (ISBN 0-13-350927-3).     

Color map design for visualization in flood risk assessment

Visualizations of flood maps from simulation models are widely used for assessing the likelihood of flood hazards in spatial planning. The choice of a suitable type of visualization as well as efficient color maps is critical to avoid errors or bias when interpreting the data. Based on a review of previous flood uncertainty visualization techniques, this paper identifies areas of improvements and suggests criteria for the design of a task-specific color scale in flood map visualization. We contribute a novel color map design for visualizing probabilities and uncertainties from flood simulation ensembles. A user study encompassing 83 participants was carried out to evaluate the effects of this new color map on user’s decisions in a spatial planning task. We found that the type of visualization makes a difference when it comes to identification of non-hazardous sites in the flood risk map and when accepting risks in more uncertain areas. In comparison with two other existing visualization techniques, we observed that the new design was superior both in terms of task compliance and efficiency. In regions with uncertain flood statuses, users were biased toward accepting less risky locations with our new color map design.     

To Move or not to Move: Community Members’ Reaction to Surface Mining Activities in the Upper West Region of Ghana

Abstract

Despite the impact of mining-induced environmental change on community livability, we know little about how disparities in knowledge of health risks associated with mining influence residents’ response, especially in an already environmentally stressed context. Guided by theoretical insights from solastalgia, we examined residents’ decision to relocate due to increasing gold mining activities in the fragile Northern Savannah Ecological Zone of Ghana. Fitting complementary log-log regression models to cross-sectional data from the Upper West Region (UWR) of Ghana, we found that residents with limited knowledge of potential health impacts of mining and those who believe mining activities were not meeting environmental standards were more likely to consider relocating. Given the centrality of land in community health and wellbeing in the UWR, Ghana’s mining guidelines should promote local participation in the regulation of mining activities and guarantee the rights of indigenes to livable native lands.