Lab 8: Mapping the Station FIre in ArcGIS

My focus in this mini-project is to look into the Station Fire in LA County in August/September 2009, specifically, I want to look at where are communities at risk and how human actions (built of highway and possible accessibility) are involved in the fire. 

For the first map, I have downloaded all available station fire perimeters in the months of August and September in 2009. All the fire perimeters overlap somewhat in a concentrated region in LA county, and it is actually away from the built highways. However, in this first map, it is hard to tell where the fires are and why the region is away from highways. The possible question I could ask is why is this region the community suffered from fire? Since the region is away from highways, does it mean the region of fire has low accessibility for firemen to reach? Thus, I have went on to create a second map. 

In the second map, I have included layers of data. The first layer is the US base map, marking all the roads and cities in the county. I then confirmed the highway again by adding the data of major US highways. The third layer is the fire parameters in the year of 2009. It confirms with the monthly parameters that I have included in the first map. The purple region inside of the LA County of the year of 2009 fire parameter overlap with the monthly fire parameters in the first map. I then would like to compare it with the data of RMRS wild land fire potential to see if they are consistent. This way, I could see if the area of fire is consistent with the fire potential naturally occurring without other major human actors that could ignite and start the fire. Interestingly, in the layer of the RMRS wild land fire potential, it shows that the area of the fire parameters are in the category of low and moderate. This is very interesting, because base on the previous data given, it is easy to assume that where the fire occurs would be the area of the greatest potential to fire occurrence. One possible explanation to explain this phenomenon is that the area of red color, with very high fire potential West of the cities and the concentrated highways actually has low fire perimeter is that the region is still human accessible. And the LA county puts a lot of efforts to eliminate all the possible occurrence of fire, since one major highway runs through this region. Any fire occurred in the region would be hard to put out, especially in the summer month. And any fire near the highways would means a huge damage and danger to possible human casualty, property loss, traffic shutdown of transportation, and delay in economic activities such as shipping and delivery. Thus, even though the red region West of the concentrated highways and major cities have a great potential of fire, the actually occurrence of fire is low due to human fire control. 

Now shifting our focus back to the fire perimeter region in the color of purple. One possible explanation to explain the phenomenon that at the region with comparably lower fire potential occurs the most frequent of fire is the limited accessibility for human and the natural factor of life and vegetation. The area of the purple region, if you zoom in, that is the area of Angeles National Forests. And this proves characteristics of the California fires. Fires in California are usually wildfires tends to happen in the dry summer, due to the Mediterranean climate. Vegetation in California, the species that survive here actually rely on the fire to spread their seeds to start another cycle of life. Thus, in the National Forests where a concentrated vegetation occurs, naturally it makes sense that there are a higher occurrence of fire. Another reason of this is due to the human actors. At the same time we are trying to preserve nature, we have minimizing our interference into the region, such as clearing the vegetation for building major roads that firemen could easily drive in. Thus, when there is fire occurring, it is already easy for the fire to spread out due to the concentration of fire. On top of that, firemen cannot just simply drive in their trucks following the road and starting to put off the fire. To provide another conclusion support, major highways are where cities and population gathers. Firemen could easily access into the area, despite the dense population, because they are able to access and build systems such as fire hydrants on the sides of the road to be prepared for fires. From the information I obtained from inciweb.org, the station fire was the tenth largest fire in California since 1933, and the burning area was 160557 acres. This would be the largest wild fire in the modern Los Angeles County history. Even though the numbers are scary and it sounds like there are a lot of damage due to the fire, there are also natural factors involved in the occurrence. 

One last observation is out of my own curiosity, I added the last layer of LA Critical Biological Area on the second map. This once again confirms my previous conclusion, that fire occurs at the natural areas and where human have low accessibility and influence over the region. In the second map, it is clear to see that LA critical biological areas are either in the purple region of fire perimeter or close to the region. Overall, the summer months in 2009 the fire perimeters occurs in the region of Angeles National Fires. The region where naturally the fire would happen, and have little human actors involved in the region where it makes it hard to put down the fire quickly or completely eliminate the fires like we do in the populous areas in the cities. 

Reference/Bibliography:

“All Station Fire Perimeters (as of September 2, 07:02)-Complete set.” Los Angeles County Enterprise GIS: Geospatial technology for citizens of Los Angeles County.” September 2, 2009. December 7, 2011.

“Firefighters Honor 2 Comrades Killed in ‘Station Fire.’” KTLA.com INFO. September 4, 2009. December 7, 2011 .

“Station Fire.” InciWeb: Incident Information System. November 10, 2009. December 7, 2011 .

"World Street Map." ArcGIS Service: Esri, DeLorme, NAVTEQ, TomTom, USGS, Intermap, AND, ESRI Japan, METI, ESRI Hong Kong, ESRI Thailand, Procalculo Prosis. 2007. December 7, 2011. 

"RMRS Wildland Fire Potential." ArcGIS Service: Esri. USFS Forest Service Rocky Mountain Research Stations. July 8, 2010. December 7, 2011. 

"LA Critical Biological Area." ArcGIS Service: Esri. USFS Forest Service Southern California. December 29. 2005. December 7, 2011. 

"USA Fire Parameter History 1999-2009 Oct." ArcGIS Service: Esri. December 2009. December 7, 2011. 

Lab 7: Census 2000/2010

In this lab, our main objective was first to find and collect data from a secondary source. Then, we used ArcGIS software to interpret the data practicing important concepts and issues.

Here are the representation of Census collected by the US Census department regarding the ethnicity of "Asian", "Black", and "Some other race".

The above two pictures are the representation of census regarding "Asian" in the United States. Notice that the first picture tells the distribution of the exact absolute number of Asian population by counties. The second picture, tells the distribution of the percentage of Asian population by counties. Notice the differences between two pictures: In terms of the absolute number of population, most Asian populations are resided in the Southern California region, while some in reside in Washington, East Coast New York region, Texas, and Florida. On the other hand in the percentage distribution, there are lot more shaded counties where Asian reside. This proves that there are Asian people living in other countries that I have not mentioned above. The number is very low though, and it only became significant to stand out from the overall census when we calculate with percentage, that a few Asians will just "pop out" easily in a small area of county that the majority ethnicity is not Asian. 

In this graphical comparison of "Black" ethnicity, the difference between the calculation of distribution of absolute number and percentage became very obvious. If someone was asked "where do you think most African American people reside now?" They might have answered either "Los angeles or Southern United States", and both answers are right, depends on the context of reference. In the year of 2000-2010, most African American people, in terms of total number live in Southern California, Los Angeles area. However, the percentage of concentration of African American people is still high in the Southern states. Why is that? One possible reason is that counties in Southern United States might be comparably smaller in terms of area, compare to the counties else where in the United States. Thus, the ratio of the few residing African American people in Southern states over the actual area of the county will be high. Another reason might be that there is actually a very high concentration of African American population in the Southern United States compare to the region of Los Angeles in Southern California. California is known to be "a melting pot", where a mixture of various ethnicity creates the diversity of the state. So, even though there are a lot of African American people reside in the Southern California region in terms of absolute number, other ethnicities might have a high number of population reside in Southern California at the same time. We cannot exclusively conclude that Southern California, the Los Angeles region is full of African American people choose to reside. We must make a conclusion that is valid and includes the context of the data. 

The graphical representation of the "Some Other Race" data is another reinforcement of my argument, that we must make conclusions base on the context of the data. For example, in terms of absolute concentration, states such as California and Arizona is very diverse, because a lot of people of the ethnicities other than Asian and Black reside in the two states. However, their concentration is high mostly in the Southwestern United States and the coastal lines of the Eastern United States, with a few blocks in the inland region here and there. The sparse blocks of their concentration here and there, may means that their actual population is so few in some small area counties that they stand out when we calculate the data in terms of the percentage. 

Also, we must note that, besides the context of the data distribution is important, the classification of the data is important as well. In this practice, we are looking at the population distribution in terms of counties. We need to remember that the classification number must be low. Or, in another way to say it in terms of statistics, the numerical range must be high. This way, counties with similar census will be easily gathered and compared. The more the detailed comparison and classification of data, the harder we can compare and make conclusions. The more we are using the ArcGIS software now, the more I am amazed at how convenient this software can provide for us. It is extremely well built for data analyzation, I am impressed at how this software is complexly written to save us time on analyzing the data. Once again, this exercise reinforce the idea that, even though the ArcGIS is extremely convenient and easy for us to make conclusions at a shorter time, we MUST know what we are analyzing. The way we are "manipulating" the data can provide very different results, thus very different conclusions. Even though we need less time now, we must realize and understand that the connivence that ArcGIS bring to us is to let us have more time to undergo scientific research, not to produce conclusions carelessly. 

Lab 6: DEMs in ArcGIS

  




























For the location that I have chosen, here are the geographical related informations on location.
Extend:

Extent:

Top 38.0125

Left: -119.5869

Right: - 118.85

Bottom: 37.5327

Spatial Reference:

GCS_North_American_1983

Angular Unit: Degree (0.01745329)

Datum:

Datum: D_North_American_1983

I actually googled the location given from the information obtained from the ArcGIS application. On the website, it gives the selected location as in Tuolumne, California, USA. I find this very interesting and fascinating, that given the information of the geographical location, I could find out exactly where it is. More and more as I am doing labs in this class I find that Geographers actually speak a different language! A language that helps people to communicate through space. 

Lab Week 6 - Map Projections

This two projections are under the Conformal Projection. As you can see, even if two map projections are preserving the same properties - in this case the shape and the angle, there are still a lot of differences in terms of distance. Under the Gall Sterograhic projection, the distance from Washington DC to Kabul is much shorter than the distance on the Mercator Projection. 

In the two Equal Area Projections, the Bonne projection is what I would like to talk more base on my personal experience. The Bonne projection is so fun to me! It totally contradicts the general perception about map, which is classified to be boring, or tedious with accurate outlines of each countries or the regions. The Bonne projection proves that the general perception is wrong! It is fun, with its heart shape that could potentially win all the girl's affection - it is a heart shape! Who would think that the Earth, which we all know is a sphere, could be a heart?! Also, it is obvious that the Bonne projection has distortions. I am sure the airline companies would be much more happier during the current economic states that the distance from Washington DC to Kabul is really about 6730.718 miles. This will greatly reduce the cost for the airlines in terms of the oil they needed when flying planes back and forth from two cities. 

In this case of the equal distance projections, once again it proves that point that the transformation from the 3D sphere earth to the 2D plane is a hard job to do. Even though both projection preserves the distance, they are still different in terms of the visualization of representations. Although, I am quiet surprised to learn the statistics that the Cylindrical projection actually has a shorter distance from Washington DC to Kabul compare to the Conic Projection. Just by my eye view, I would definitely say that the conic projection gives the shorter distance. This also proves the point that what projection we use is critical depends on our uses of the map. The potential error of using the wrong projection could affect the conclusion of a projected, and of course the resulted effects would be greater as well. 

Mapping a three dimensional sphere onto a two dimensional surface is a challenge. This transformation from the 3D sphere to the 3D plane is never easy, due to Earth's spherical properties. When this transformation occurs, distortions are unavoidable, some country might seem larger than it actually is, like Greenland; and some will see wider than it is, like the polar areas. Different map types focus on alleviating certain distortions based on the certain uses of the map. For example, an equidistant map allows for little to no distortions in the distances on the map; however, the size of countries may be distorted. Although accuracy in map projections is not one hundred percent, map projections are essential for spatial awareness in this world.

Map projections allow for humans to be aware of their location on the world's surface. Toddlers are often amazed at the concept of maps, while they are pointing at the location of their homes, they are also looking at other areas, with weird irregular shapes and outlines, wondering what is out there on those 'strange places.' This is the perfect example of the awareness of the location. Before the world was mapped, people were uniformed of the surface on the earth and what the world consisted of beyond their scopes regime. Map projections allow for awareness of spatial positioning. Many conformal maps contain country size distortion, but they allow for humans to see the shape of the world all at one time.

Map projections also create a means of travel because of this spatial awareness. Human early in the centuries had used maps, striving for greater accuracy, voyaging the world for exploration. With the increase of technology, map projections became a necessary advancement because people began traveling larger distances. The importance of a map projection became needed with the invention of airplanes. An equidistant map projection will allow for an airplane to fly certain distances with accuracy; however, a conformal map projection would cause massive accidents. Map projections are important for spatial awareness in this world and indispensable to the success of air travel.

Equal area map projections maintain the accurate size of countries on the world's surface. These are important for power relations and seeing the land area that each country contains. Although distortions are unavoidable, mapping the earth's surface is necessary in a modern world. Humans are able to obtain spatial awareness and learn of what the world consists. Without map projections, the world would be an unknown area.

Overall, different map projections are developed for different uses. While we are appreciating the development of 3D projection such as google earth, seeing it on the aerial level; 2D map projections are still widely used for  people in this world for their own benefits.

Lab 4 - Introducing ArcGIS

 

In this lab, our main objective is to learn how to use the ArcGIS. ArcGIS is a complete system for designing and managing solutions through the application of geographic knowledge. Once we have acquired the skill to master this system, it would be very helpful for us to understand and analyze geographic information in a much more effective way, comepare to the traditional methods prior to the inventions of softwares like ArcGIS.

My experience with this lap is a little mixed feelings. Overall, I find the tutorial very helpful. It gives out detailed explainations and even screen shots for instructions. The visualization part of the tutorial saves me a lot of time, and preventing any rooms for confusion. However, since the version of the ArcGIS is actually the updated one, it does not strictly follow the tutorial. Or, in a better wording, the tutorial is a little outdated. This creates a lot of frustration for me personally, because I feel like when I am totally "enjoying" the lab and following the instructions like in a easter egg hunt, I was forced to stop due to the human error, such as a clue is missing. Luckily, the forum was really helpful, where students and TAs have all been posting answers to the questions, helping everyone to finish the project. Lastly, I love this week's lab assignment very much, because it helps me to give a real life example on how the ArcGIS has been used, how it has been used, and how effectively it helps people at work.

In this lab, we have walked through a possible city proposal of expanding an airport, using GIS. This allows us to study the possible noise pollution, the affected population density, the required land use, and the proximity to schools. This is essentially a detailed research project. However, instead of the traditional way - which is done everything in paper, GIS allows us to present the paper in the computerized method, bringing the instant visualization of effects while we are constructing the report. It allows us to provide much more extensive information, such as the needed zoom on areas, the road names, and each variables.

GIS is integrating into our daily lives so quickly that it is hard for us to recognize that we have ever lived without it. GIS has various purposes, and could be used into various fields, such as transportation, population, wildlife population, deforestation, architectural planning, and much more. This great versatility, which is one huge advantage or potential. People not only can study current phenomenons with GIS, but also can study and predict the future effects of the same phenomenons. One familar example for a lot of people in showing the potential of GIS is the reports on global warming. You often see the global map with various intensity of color, typically green in hundreds of years ago, indicating the gloabl temperature then at various continents on the globe. Then, there would be a scroll bar on the bottom of the presentation where you can visually "travel through time", showing how the global temperature has been rising over the years. Not only presentations done with GIS saves the general population from the boredom of reading or listening to the typical research reports, they attract audiences' attention, with easy and colorful graphics. Besides, researchers can convey more effectively regarding their research results with the general population, who may not have an extensive knowledge background to understand such concepts instantaneously.

Even though GIS is so critical in our daily lives now, it still has its own pitfalls. One obvious pitfall is that even though GIS allows us to explore the world and study many possible effects in various academic fields, we must rely on one assumption that the data we gathered in the process, are precisely done with accurate information. If the data provided in the study is biased, then the GIS would only go ahead and work on the false information, since it does not have the ability to detect such errors. Also, as a beginner who is just learning how to use related GIS software, the other pitfall is that the software are not as easily accessible, (exclude similar ones like Web 2.0, google map etc.), thus not easily learned on how to use. It is understandable that GIS is such an engaging field with updates everyday. If information on how to use such tools at this stage are not neatly organized, it will create tremendous difficulties for people to use it correctly, or even, lose its appealing to people. One clear example is that while we have tutorials to guide us through the exercises, the version of the tutorial was not updated on time, thus there is are difficulties for new learners to master such program.

Overall however, GIS is still helpful at our everyday lives now, as it is more easily accessible to the public, and the easing restriction of the high officials in the government. The guaranteed access of such a mass information might be alarming to those who fear about the national security, but the overall benefit to the entire population is tremendous. While technology is continuing on its advancement, I am sure GIS would be developed much more sophisticated ways, continuing on building greater potentials, and gradually eliminating pitfalls that we currently have now.



Google My Map

View Humane Societies around UCLA in a larger map

Neogeography is new to people and has totally changed the view that people have on maps. It literally means the new geography and is now being commonly used by personal and community activities. It is new because it conveys the information about a location to individuals in a new way of presentation. One of the pitfalls of neogeography could be that information provided to individuals may not be always accurate. For example, neogeography cannot 100% constantly update its information, so people still needs to reply on other tools while traveling. One unfortunate event happened a few years ago as broadcasted by the local news related to the pitfall was that one family was driving and get lost in the mountains. Back then everyone was shocking to hear that the family did actually used the GPS. However, even though they have the GPS system, the system does not tell the family that due to the heavy snow, the route has been closed down. So the alternative routes were based on old road information and it leads to the family get lost. Tragically the father went out of the car to search for routes was never found, while the rest of the family was lucky to be rescued. 


Neogeography has limitless potentials. It provides people the platform, freedom, and the flexibility to share any content they want. An example would be this assignment, each students would create a map base on their interest, such as battle fields, old historical buildings in a city, or even number of schools in one city! Also, neogeography is inclusive, anyone without professional background of geography could create maps, without intense or formal training through school as additional living expenses. 


One of the consequences of neogeography would be an explosion of information communicating various discipline of studies, more importantly, people could understand it easily without any trouble. This fastens the speed of communication and engagement, it speeds up the time that people needed earlier to absorb information. However, we have to keep in mind that, since now that everyone is a map maker, we have to validate the content of the map before using it.

Geog 7 Lab Week 2

The 7.5 Minute Map


1. What is the name of the quadrangle?
    Beverly Hills Quadrangle
2. What are the names of the adjacent quadrangles?
    Adjacent Quadrangles (AKA left and right quadrangles of Beverly Hills) are: Canoga Park, Van Nuys, Burbank, Topanga, Hollywood, Venice, Inglewood and Hollywood
3. When was the quadrangle first created?
     The quadrangle was first created in 1966
4. What datum was used to create your map?
     North American Datum of 1927, North American Datum of 1983, and National Geodetic Vertical Datum of 1929
5. What is the scale of the map?
1:24000
6. At the above scale, answer the following:
a) 5 centimeters on the map is equivalent to how many meters on the ground?
    5cm * (24000cm/1cm) * (1m/100cm) = 1200m
b) 5 inches on the map is equivalent to how many miles on the ground?
     5inches * (24000inches/1inches) * (1miles/63360inches) = 1.8939 miles
c) one mile on the ground is equivalent to how many inches on the map?
     1 miles * (63360 inches/1miles) * (1inches/24000inches) = 2.64 inches
d) three kilometers on the ground is equivalent to how many centimeters on the map?
      3 kilometers * (100000cm/1kilometers) * (1cm/24000cm) = 12.5cm
7. What is the contour interval on your map?
    20 feet
8. What are the approximate geographic coordinates in both degrees/minutes/seconds and decimal degrees of:
a) the Public Affairs Building;
    34°26'15''W  118°3'08''N ; or 34.4375N 118.4994W
b) the tip of Santa Monica pier;
    34° 00' 18" N   118° 29' 58" W; 34.005N 118.4994W
c) the Upper Franklin Canyon Reservoir;
    34° 07' 00"N 118° 24' 30" W; 34.1167 N 118.4083 W
9. What is the approximate elevation in both feet and meters of:
a) Greystone Mansion (in Greystone Park);
    560 Feet or 170.688 Meters
b) Woodlawn Cemetery;
    120 to 140 Feet and 36.576 to 42.672 meters
c) Crestwood Hills Park;
    720 Feet and 219.456 Meters
10. What is the UTM zone of the map?
       zone 11
11. What are the UTM coordinates for the lower left corner of your map?
      3,764,000m and 362,000m
12. How many square meters are contained within each cell (square) of the UTM gridlines?
      There are 1,000,000 square meters contained within each square of the UTM gridlines.
13. Obtain elevation measurements, from west to east along the UTM northing 3771000, where the eastings of the UTM grid intersect the northing. Create an elevation profile using these measurements in Excel (hint: create a line chart). Figure out how to label the elevation values to the two measurements on campus. Insert your elevation profile as a graphic in your blog.

       
14. What is the magnetic declination of the map?
      The magnetic declination of the map is 14º.
15. In which direction does water flow in the intermittent stream between the 405 freeway and Stone Canyon Reservoir?
      The direction of water flow between the 405 freeway and Stone Canyon Reservoir is from north to south.
16. Crop out (i.e., cut and paste) UCLA from the map and include it as a graphic on your blog.