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News Archives 2004
6/04 - Connecticut's Changing Landscape Project in the NewsConnecticut's Changing Landscape project got a bit of press this past winter. Below are several articles, originally printed in The Hartford Courant. • March
22, 2004 - The Hartford Courant, Editorial • March
21, 2004 - The Hartford Courant, Commentary by
Chester Arnold • January
4, 2004 - The Hartford Courant, Article By
Mike Swift • Or read the original electronic article posted on The Hartford Courant's ctnow.com website. Satellite Pinpoints State's Sprawl (you may need to sign up for a free e-subscription to access the article. Back to Top6/04 - NEMO Highlighted in the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy's Preliminary Report"Released by the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy on April 20, 2004, this document presents the Commission’s preliminary findings and recommendations for a new, coordinated, and comprehensive national ocean policy. Mandated by the Oceans Act of 2000, the Preliminary Report is now available for review and comment by the nation’s Governors and interested stakeholders." NEMO is highlighted in Section V, chapter 14: Addressing Coastal Water Pollution, page 170. Visit the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy website. View full report. 2/04 - New NEMO Program Coordinator Announced
After earning Master's degrees at the University of Arizona in Ecology and Land Use Planning, John worked as an environmental and community planner in Michigan for three years. In 1999 he came to UConn to lead the National NEMO Network, which at the time was just starting to take shape. Under John's tender ministrations, the Network has grown like a weed, going from 9 to 34 programs in four years. While John was nurturing the National Network, he was also delving into local planning in the Nutmeg State. He is a member of East Haddam's Planning and Zoning Commission, the East Haddam Village Planning Group and the Eightmile River Wild and Scenic Study Management Committee. In addition, John has provided many important contributions to Connecticut NEMO during his tenure as National Coordinator, including leading the development of the Community Resource Inventory educational module. With enthusiastic support of the rest of the team, John made the decision to focus on assisting Connecticut's communities, even though he'll miss the national program. Having recently celebrated our 10-year anniversary, the NEMO Program is at an important crossroads. With John at the helm, the NEMO Team will in short order reshape the program to keep all that has made it successful while adding new ideas, new services, new information and new partnerships into the mix. 2/04 - Steal Connecticut Land Cover Maps!No need for larceny, you can download the maps and information on Connecticut’s Changing Landscape Project for free on the CLEAR website. Here you will find more information on how the data were created, some preliminary interpretation, fact sheets, frequently asked questions, as well as ways to download the GIS information for those geospatially inclined. If you don't have the latest GIS software on your computer, no worries. The website also includes an interactive mapping section that allows you to view, query and print the maps using nothing more than your internet browser. So grab your favorite beverage and point your browser to the CLEAR website to learn more about Connecticut's changing landscape. 2/04 - Connecticut’s Changing Landscape PresentationWebsite isn't enough? Want to learn more about Connecticut's changing landscape right from the horse's mouth? Your friendly neighborhood NEMO Team has a 45 minute presentation about the project that we'd be glad to bring to your town. Call John Rozum at (860) 345-4511 or email nemo@uconn.edu. 2/04 - Connecticut's Changing Landscape Project, So What's Next?Connecticut's Changing Landscape is a project in several installments. Over the next year, CLEAR researchers will be applying several landscape analyses to the new 1985, 1990, 1995 and 2002 land cover datasets. Urban growth and forest fragmentation models will help us to further mine the land cover data. With this type of information, we hope to be able to better address some of the more qualitative issues involved with development—in other words, not just how much we've developed, but in what pattern, and with what implications for the health of our communities and natural resources. Another analysis will deal specifically with that nemesis familiar to NEMO veterans—impervious surfaces, an indicator of the impacts of urbanization on water resources. Using the developed category from the new land cover data as a “first cut” identifier, and then applying cutting-edge “subpixel” analysis that estimates the amount of impervious cover directly from the satellite data, CLEAR researchers will be able to accurately chart the growth in impervious cover from 1985 to the present. So what about the million dollar question: Does Connecticut's changing landscape present compelling evidence on sprawl in our state? We still don't know enough about what the data is telling us to say much in the way of definitive statements. What we do know is that the study is coming at an opportune time, given the debates on sprawl and “smart growth” that are taking place from the Capitol to town halls across the state. It's interesting to note that the first two organizations to request downloading of our data were the Connecticut Homebuilder's Association and The Nature Conservancy! Like those groups, we invite you to pour over the study results and come to your own conclusion. As we collectively absorb and debate the results of the study, the true take home messages may become clear. By the time of our next newsletter issue, you can expect some of the preliminary results of the next wave of studies to hit the web! 2/04 - GIS Training Workshop: Geospatial Technologies at WorkNext class June 14 - 18, 2004 - Interested in learning how to use GIS? For more information and to download the registration form, visit the Geospatial Technology website. Location: University of Connecticut, Main Campus, W. B. Young Building, Storrs, CT. 6/04 - CLEAR Launches New Series of Land Cover Data for ConnecticutThe University of Connecticut, College of Agriculture and Natural Resources
The Center for Land use Education And Research (CLEAR) has just released a new series of four dates of land cover data (1985, 1990, 1995 and 2002) for the state of Connecticut. These data, prepared from medium resolution satellite imagery, provide for the first time a consistently defined and interpreted set of land cover data that will allow state, regional and local planners to evaluate and study landscape changes over a seventeen year period. The data will be valuable to many organizations and government agencies as the state increasingly begins to deal with issues concerning development, sprawl, traffic congestion, forest loss and other aspects of landscape change. The land cover data were interpreted from Landsat satellite imagery. Sensors aboard the satellite detect radiation reflected from the earth’s surface and store these data as images. The images, which are made up of millions of squares with a ground resolution of 30 meters (~ 100 feet) on a side, are converted via computer programs and human expertise into land cover maps. Land cover, as its name implies, shows the "covering" of the landscape. This is to be distinguished from land use, which is what is permitted, practiced or intended for a given area. For example, an area of low-density rural residential land use, as permitted by local zoning, likely will appear as forest in a Landsat image – there are a lot more trees than houses. Similarly, downtown Hartford, which is classified mostly as a “Developed” land cover is a mixture of uses that include offices, restaurants, stores, apartments, roads, parking lots, etc. From the satellite image it’s not possible to determine what the land uses are but we can describe the area as being developed. The land cover data include eleven consistently defined classes and include: developed areas, turf and grass, other grasses and agriculture, deciduous forest, coniferous forest, water, non-forested wetlands, forested wetlands, tidal wetlands, barren areas, and utility rights-of-way. In preparing the data, care was taken to insure the accuracy of land cover classifications from one time period to the next thereby making it possible to conduct change analyses. The land cover maps and a number of interpreted products can be viewed on the CLEAR website and each of the four dates of data can be downloaded for use in geographic information systems. http://clear.uconn.edu/projects/landscape/index.htm |
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