Making our neighborhoods,making our selves

In this paper, we explore a “grassroots” neighborhood revitalization effort engendered at the national scale without regard to local geographies of race and class. Specifically, we examine the Harambee Great Neighborhood Initiative, convened by the well-known nonprofit Habitat for Humanity together with Milwaukee’s Local Initiatives Support Corporation, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Drawing from participant observation, analysis of print and digital media, volunteer surveys, and interviews with area residents and local nonprofit representatives, we demonstrate the ways in which the six-year program of planning and neighborhood development was conceived and driven by an extra-local nonprofit with significant blind spots to local and organizational politics of race and without sufficient collaboration with the Harambee community. Our analysis points to the importance of race in nonprofit governance and community revitalization efforts. Moreover, we contribute to urban geographic scholarship on nonprofit governance by examining the dynamics of privilege, inclusion, and exclusion as they relate to practices of engagement and volunteerism in nonlocal “grassroots” projects.     

Graduated incarceration: The Israeli occupation in subaltern geopolitical perspective

This paper highlights the importance of analysis of the microgeographies of occupation, and the spatially-differentiated means that the Israeli Occupation Forces use to maintain the occupation and create spaces of graduated incarceration for Palestinians. Using the examples of the hinterlands of Qalqiliyah and the old city of Al-Khalil (Hebron) in the occupied West Bank, this paper exposes the microgeographical differentiation the occupation mobilizes in its attempt to enact a panoptic sovereignty over the population, in the process of dispossession. This study challenges geopolitical formations of the state as primary actor, and focuses instead on narratives of Palestinians describing their own experiences of occupation by a hostile state. By relying on popular media, semi-structured interviews, and participant observation, this paper seeks to incorporate a Palestinian vision of life under occupation to challenge traditional geopolitical visions of the Palestinian Israeli conflict, in effect creating a subaltern geopolitical narrative.     

RXTE spectroscopy of GRS 1915+105

The galactic superluminal motion source GRS 1915+105 has been extensively observed with the RXTE satellite over the last two years. More than 250 RXTE pointings have been performed until mid-May 1998 with more than 1.5 Msec exposure time on roughly a weekly basis. Here we report on first results of our spectral analysis of a major part of these pointed RXTE observations. We establish the existence of at least 5 spectral components and present the changes of these components over the last two years.     

Migration velocity analysis using a genetic algorithm

Migration velocity analysis, a method for determining long wavelength velocity structure, is a critical step in prestack imaging. Solution of this inverse problem is made difficult by a multimodal objective function; a parameter space often vast in extent; and an evaluation procedure for candidate solutions, involving the calculation of depth-migrated image gathers, that can be prohibitively expensive. Recognizing the global nature of the problem, we employ a genetic algorithm (GA) in the search for the optimum velocity model. In order to describe a model efficiently, regions of smooth variation are identified and sparsely parametrized. Region boundaries are obtained via map migration of events picked on the zero-offset time section. Within a region, which may contain several reflectors, separate components describe long and short wavelength variations, eliminating from the parameter space, models with large velocity fluctuations. Vital to the success of the method is rapid model evaluation, achieved by generating image gathers only in the neighbourhood of specific reflectors. Probability of a model, which we seek to maximize, is derived from the flatness of imaged events. Except for an initial interpretation of the zero-offset time section, our method is automatic in that it requires no picking of residual moveout on migrated gathers. Using an example data set from the North Sea, we show that it is feasible to solve for all velocity parameters in the model simultaneously: the method is global in this respect also.     

Assessing “Urban Karst” Effects from Groundwater–Storm Sewer System Interaction in a Till Aquitard

Storm sewer systems and their associated utility trenches may strongly influence the effects of urbanization on a groundwater system. This study was undertaken to identify the causes of district-wide basement infiltration in an aquitard system. It comprised widespread continuous monitoring of utility trench wells and dye tracing from storm sewer system exfiltration tests. The results indicate that a major effect of urbanization on shallow groundwater is related to storm sewer system exfiltration, which is marked by a characteristic pattern of head variations in the aquitard unrelated to distributed surface infiltration. The aquitard constrains flow from storm sewer system exfiltration to the utility trench, creating an urban flow path for groundwater discharge. Temporary buildup of water levels in the utility trench drives relatively high-velocity flow through the permeable sewer bedding material of the utility trench to a separate foundation drainage collector system, ultimately causing a severe “urban karst” effect that produces system surcharging and widespread basement water infiltration. The main conditions causing the “urban karst” are the large hydraulic conductivity ratio between the utility trench material and the aquitard, and the shallow depth and low gradient of the storm sewer system imposed by a very flat drainage basin.     

Fine-Scale Measurements Of Turbulence In The Lower Troposphere: An Intercomparison Between A Kite- And Balloon-Borne, And A Helicopter-Borne Measurement System

Two state-of-the-art, high-resolution, in situ turbulence measurement systems, which can be deployed at altitudes well above the atmospheric surface layer, are compared: the Tethered Lifting System (TLS) of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES)at the University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado, and the helicopter-borneturbulence measurement system HELIPOD of the Technical UniversityBraunschweig, Germany, and the University of Hanover, Germany. Whilethe CIRES TLS is a fixed-point platform, HELIPOD is a moving platform.On the basis of data taken with the two systems in separate field campaigns,the system capabilities are quantified and discussed. Criteria for instrumentalrequirements are presented. It is shown that both the CIRES TLS and HELIPODare well suited for measuring fine-scale turbulence that is characterized by very small temperature structure parameters 10⁶ K² m^–2/3 and smaller) and very small energy dissipation rates (10^-7 m² s^-3 and smaller). The authors are not aware of any other turbulence measurement systems that have similar capabilities and can be deployed at altitudes of up to several kilometres. The HELIPOD is ideal for high-resolution horizontal measurements while the TLS is ideal for high-resolution vertical measurements using multiple sensors attached to a suspended line.     

Development of daily spatial heat unit mapping from monthly climatic surfaces for the Australian continent

In absence of other limitations, the growth rate of a plant is dependent upon the amount of heat it receives. Each species, whether a crop, weed or disease organism, is adapted to grow at its optimum rate within a specific temperature range. Within this range, the growing degree days (GDD) is the heat accumulation above a given base temperature for a specific time period, such as a crop's growing season or phenological stage. In this paper we detail a methodology to predict GDD for synthetically generated average growing seasons derived from long term average climate data over the Australian continent. An application of these techniques has been made using the GEODATA 9 second DEM, with temperature threshold values estimated to characterize optimum growth in citrus (Citrus sinensis (L.) Osbeck). Three major determinants of the annual growth cycle of Citrus sp. were established and predicted on a spatial basis including the starting day of the growing season, the GDD for a growing season, and the time required to accumulate an arbitrarily selected 2000 GDD from the estimated starting day. When these critical environmental factors are expressed on a spatial basis, covering the Australian continent, the combination can be used to identify locations where new crop varieties can most effectively be grown to maximize fruit quality and productivity, or to extend the harvest season. Likewise, new germplasm introduced to Australia from overseas can be horticulturally assessed at sites climatically matched to the source location.     

Structural analysis of soil microrelief in palaeosols of the Lower Jurassic “Laterite Derivative Facies” (Mishhor and Ardon formations) Makhtesh Ramon,Israel

A sequence of palaeosols developed on exposed overbank sediments of successive alluvial cycles of the Lower Jurassic “Laterite Derivative Facies” (LDF) at Makhtesh Ramon, contains well-developed, penecontemporaneous soil microrelief structures. The folded structures commonly show overthrusting, and vary in wave length and amplitude.They are characterized by slickensided surfaces, cuspate in cross section with the curviplanar deformed surfaces oriented concave up. The palaeosol stratigraphy is well established over the entire Makhtesh Ramon area and this afforded the opportunity of obtaining controlled structural measurements on the folded surfaces and their associated slickensided striae as a means of providing data for reconstruction of the fold geometry.Stereographic projection of the poles to the LDF fold surfaces, on two separate palaeosol horizons from several localities, together with the slickensided striae, were plotted on the lower hemisphere of a Schmidt equal-area net. The LDF folds were seen to be symmetrical and asymmetrical structures with a gently plunging fold axis of 4–10°. Maximum and minimum dip values of the cuspate curviplanar surface (SP₁) were well emphasized by the plots (20° and 30° for symmetrical structures) and data from the two horizons obtained from several localities showed remarkable uniformity.A second slickensided, curviplanar surface of deformation (SP₂) shows the same range of dip values as SP₁ and intersects the SP₁ surface normal to the SP₂ fold axis. The internal arrangement of symmetry elements within the LDF folds remains approximately constant regardless of the large variation between the gross morphological parameters such as amplitude and wavelength, and this appears to be a reflection of the response of a soil with inherent anisotropies, to stress.The geometry of the LDF structure resembles that of linear or wavy gilgai. The SP₁ surface therefore is most likely the result of upthrusting on the edges of drainage rills affected by differential wetting. The SP₂ surface bears a constant geometric relationship with SP₁ and is therefore considered to have formed penecontemporaneously during the upthrusting of the SP₁ blocks. A rectangular surface fracture pattern parallel to and normal to topographic slope, is considered to be an alternative means of initiating the upward growth of the soil microrelief features.     

Relationship of Water Chemistry to Serum ThyroidHormones in Captive Sharks with Goitres

Captive whitetip reef sharks, Triaenodon obesus,at Sea Life Park (SLP) Hawaii, Waimanalo, Hawaii develop goitre, whereas, T. obesus at the Waikiki Aquarium (WAQ), Honolulu,Hawaii do not develop goitre. To determine theeffects of natural concentrations of iodine on thereduction of goitre, two sharks from SLP with goitrewere placed in an enclosed coastal lagoon with naturalseawater. Using ultrasound measurements the twogoitres were initially 11.4 cm and 14.6 cm in depthand after 3 months decreased to 4.7 cm and 5.7 cm. Radioimmunoassay analysis of the thyroid hormoneT3 sera concentrations were initially 0.22 ng/mland 0.33 ng/ml and increased to 1.84 ng/ml after beingplaced in the lagoon. Sera T4 were initially0.93 ng/ml and 0.99 ng/ml and increased dramaticallyto 17 ng/ml and 56 ng/ml. Over the six month samplingperiod, two resident sharks in the lagoon with normalthyroids had sera T3 concentrations from 0.89ng/ml to 1.1 ng/ml, and sera T4 concentrationsfrom 3.1 ng/ml to 7.9 ng/ml. The hypothyroidcondition in the SLP goitred-sharks is likely linkedto the low environmental iodide (<0.005 M), andhigh nitrate (111 M) of SLP water. The WAQwell-water facility was characterized by anoxic waterwith high iodide (0.60 M), total iodine (1.90M), and typical nitrate (24.6 M)concentrations of interstitial groundwater. Thedifference of iodide concentration of SLP and WAQ tankwater (<0.005 M versus 0.60 M) wasdirectly related to the hydrogeology of the well-watersources. To avoid goitre in marine aquarium systems,we recommend maintaining iodide concentrations of atleast 0.15 M.