MA, University of Cincinnati, 2009, Arts and Sciences : Geography

Land use and land cover change is a complex process involving both physical and socioeconomic factors. Land use changes greatly impact ecosystems and the biophysical environment, such as global climate, water quality, and soil conditions. Consequently, research on land use change is essential. This research focused on the East Fork Little Miami River (EFLMR) watershed, which is located in southwest Ohio. In recent years, urban expansion in the EFLMR watershed has led to encroachment on agricultural lands, thereby changing the land use patterns of the area. This study used the CA_Markov land use change model of the IDRISI software package to simulate and predict land use change in EFLMR watershed, particularly regarding urban expansion. The Multi-criteria Evaluation (MCE) method was also applied to incorporate the population dynamics into urban growth modeling. The projected land use pattern of the EFLMR for the year 2050 was examined. This projection showed significant urban expansion, especially on the downstream portion of EFLMR, which is adjacent to the city of Cincinnati.

Committee: Susanna Tong PhD (Committee Chair); Nicholas Dunning PhD (Committee Member); Kevin Raleigh PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Geography

MA, Kent State University, 2008, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of Geography

Cuyahoga Valley National Park (CVNP) is located between Cleveland and Akron in Northeast Ohio and is the only national park in Ohio. Even though it is within a short distance of the metropolitan areas, the wilderness inside of the park has been preserved through Cleveland Metroparks, Metroparks Serving Summit County, Cuyahoga Valley National Park, non-profit organizations, and community efforts. However, outside the park boundaries, urban extent and population have increased progressively outside the park potentially providing stresses to the park environment. CVNP receives over 3,000,000 visitors every year, and is a primary recreation area in the region. In this thesis, human impacts on CVNP are analyzed using geographic information systems (GIS) and remote sensing to determine how the impacts have influenced the park environment. The main goal is to detect urban expansion patterns around CVNP from 1987 to 2006. In order to do this, the object-oriented classification (OOC) and pixel-based classification (PBC) were compared to determine which method provided a higher accuracy. The results showed that the OOC maps showed higher accuracies in their results than the PBC maps, and, using the OOC maps, more urban expansions were recognized in the direction to CVNP in the last 20 years.

Committee: Mandy Munro-Stasiuk (Advisor); Jay Lee (Committee Chair); Chuanrong Zhang (Committee Member) Subjects: Geography