Jon Bryan Burley

Visual and Ecological Environmental Quality Model for Transportation Planning and Design

Landscape aesthetics and environmental quality have both become central investigatory areas in transportation planning and design. Environmental designers are interested in applying research-based models to study the effects of specific transportation design treatments on the built and natural landscape. The development of a perception-based visual quality predictive equation is investigated for application in both naturalistic and designed landscapes for transportation planning and design projects. The prediction model contained total area of noospheric features and total area of motorized vehicles; presence of humans, wildlife, utility structures, and foreground flowers; total area of distant nonvegetation landscape features such as mountains and buttes; perimeter of intermediate nonvegetation; total area of foreground vegetation; and openness, mystery, and environmental quality indexes (p < 0.0001 for the overall regression, p < 0.05 for each regressor using Type II sums of squares, and multiple R-squa...

Assessing user preferences on post-industrial redevelopment:

There is a growing interest in post-industrial landscape redevelopment and public participation in urban planning process. This study examined the public preference on post-industrial land transformation projects. A semi-qualitative methodology was used throughout the application of a questionnaire and interviews. Data on public perception of post-industrial landscape that incorporates significant environmental, cultural and historic assets were collected from 450 residents. Results illustrate that community attitudes to brownfield regeneration projects are positive. Urban growth should consider the redevelopment of derelict and/or abandoned areas instead of consuming new green areas. The results illustrated that, according to public perception, the most important aspect in the redevelopment of the study area is the creation of multifunctional areas, and that this aspect is statistically related with touristic activities, mobility and accessibility, use of renewable energies, environmental education, economic redevelopment, and safety/security. The researchers suggest that coupling the information gathered throughout the public preference process with the intrinsic characteristics of each landscape is helpful in understanding community expectations in order to inform urban regeneration projects that consider the economic, environmental and cultural functions of sites.

Constructing Interpretable Environments from Multidimensional Data: GIS Suitability Overlays and Principal Component Analysis

In landscape planning applications, practitioners and governmental agencies are often faced with a broad array of clientele and constituents having particular land use requirements and needs, ranging from biological conservation to urban development, generating complex multidimensional regional planning goals and objectives. Under this often complex situation, investigators are searching for methods to intelligently simplify complicated spatial environments and render them into interpretable and practical settings. While numerous investigators have studied the generation of a single suitability map, we were interested in addressing the problem of coping with a set of many suitability maps. We applied a data reduction method, principal component analysis, across 15 suitability overlays representing diverse landscape requirements to search for simplified explanations indicating the latent structure of the landscape. The study area was located in a moraine landscape of southern Michigan. We discovered that t...

International greenways: a Red River Valley case study

Building and preserving a network of greenways can be an intricate activity requiring interdisciplinary collaboration. Greenway segments often require local input and participation. In addition, greenways are not necessarily generic open spaces, but can be managed structurally to fulfill specific spatial and temporal requirements. This paper describes local activities in the Fargo (North Dakota)-Moorhead (Minnesota) metropolitan area related to preserving and embellishing the greenway focused around the Red River Valley of the North. This greenway is part of a larger Western Hemisphere greenway, composed of riparian corridors operating as wildlife habitat migration flyways and as resident wildlife habitat. Local activities include demonstration gardens, comprehensive corridor planning, habitat analysis, and revegetation studies. From 1985 to 1990, four spatial treatment investigations were completed, one spatial planning study was prepared, and five demonstration gardens were built. The spatial treatment investigations revealed that the wildlife occupying the greenway could be divided into four habitat-use dimensions, suggesting four important habitat associations for the greenway. The study also revealed three distinct vegetation zones for re-establishing herbaceous vegetation in non-wooded planting conditions. In addition, one experiment indicated that replanting the disturbed woodland corridor was not influenced by seedling size and that Fraxinus pennsylvanica seedlings were highly successful at surviving in a gap opening within the forest corridor. In the last experiment, a seeding application rate study indicated that seeding rates three times higher than recommended rates resulted in improved vegetation cover of non-wooded herbaceous vegetation planting sites. The spatial planning study illustrated landscape patterns for the greenway composed of a continuous tree canopy corridor, augmented by herbaceous vegetation patches, food plots, and snags. To build and manage the greenway, this investigation reaffirms the importance of multi-disciplinary collaboration, local participation, and the potential individualistic structure of a greenway. The study suggests that both broad landscape planning visions and detailed site endeavors are necessary to understand and manage the greenway successfully.

Quantitative Methods in Environmental and Visual Quality Mapping and Assessment: A Muskegon, Michigan Watershed Case Study with Urban Planning Implications

For generations, people have been in pursuit of at least two conflicting goals. On one hand, people seek to make life physically easier. Especially during the past few centuries, the results include the development of new products, ease of transportation, and ease of communications. On the other hand, people have growing concerns about the condition of the natural environment, including water, air, soil, plants, and animals. These concerns even include perceptual values about the quality of the environment such as aesthetics/visual quality. As the human population grows, these competing concerns require thoughtful planning, design, and management to efficiently and effectively facilitate the use and protection of the environment. However, it has been at times, difficult for professionals, governmental agencies, and citizens to develop thoughtful measures and means concerning peoples perception and reaction associated with the environment.

Habitat suitability models: a tool for designing landscape for wildlife

Abstract This article describes the theory and application of habitat suitability models as a tool for design. The article illustrates the potential of Geographical Information Systems (GIS) to be incorporated into the modelling process by using the Northern Colorado Nature Center and Blacked‐capped Chickadee (Parus atricapillas) in a case study.

Citation Analysis of Transportation Research Literature: A Multi-Dimensional Map of the Roadside Universe

Abstract Landscape scholars and information scientists are often interested in the structure of knowledge and the relationships of subject areas to each other. This study examines the latent structure of the transportation citation universe as evidence concerning how connected or disjointed areas of knowledge are to each other. Multivariate statistical analysis techniques were performed on citation data from 16 years of transportation articles in Landscape Journal, Landscape Research, Landscape and Urban Planning. The study produced 101 source articles and 1351 citation articles, arranged in 31 Library of Congress subject areas. Principal component analysis revealed thirteen significant dimensions. The results suggest that the universe is complex, yet disjointed and reinforce the notion that investigations in transportation related to landscape are fragmented and disconnected.

Productivity equation for reclaiming surface mines

This article addresses the development of an agricultural productivity equation for predicting new soil (neo-sol) plant growth potential in Clay County, Minnesota, USA. Soil factors examined in the study include percent organic matter, percent slope, percent rock fragments, hydraulic conductivity, electrical conductivity, pH, topographic position, available water-holding capacity, bulk density, and percent clay. Squared terms and two-factor interaction terms were also examined as possible regressors. A best equation was selected that had a multiple coefficient of determination of 0.7399 and has five significant regressors and intercept withP.0001. The regressors are hydraulic conductivity, percent slope squared, bulk density times percent rock fragments, electrical conductivity times percent rock fragments, and electrical conductivity times percent organic matter. The regressors predict soil suitability for a general crop model. The crops included in the model are wheat, oats, barley, soybeans, sugar beets, sunflowers, and grasses/legumes.

Replicating species based fractal patterns for reclaiming northern Michigan waste rock piles

Landscape planners and designers are interested in replicating natural landscape patterns to reclaim degraded landscapes to blend with existing conditions. One approach that shows promise is the use of fractal geometry to create natural landscape patterns. While the measurement of the actual fractal dimension of an object is difficult, the box-counting method (developed at Agrocampus Ouest, Angers, France) approximates the fractal dimension of an object. This process is illustrated by measuring and replicating a stand of trees in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and applying the method for a planting plan on a Northern Michigan surface mine. The estimated fractal dimensions for the tree species are calculated: 0.329 for Tsuga canadensis Carriere, 0.674 for Thuja occidentalis L., 0.607 for Acer rubrum L, 0.345 for Acer saccharum Marshall, 0.442 for Pinus strobus L., and 0.359 for Picea glauca (Moench) Voss. and were applied in the design of a revegetation plan.

A risk assessment of landscape hazards for building sites in the Front Range mountains of Colorado

Abstract Predictive spatial modelling is becoming an integral part of landscape planning. One emerging modelling approach is risk assessment. This paper illustrates the application of risk assessment techniques within a regional context for landscape planning and design, as urban development expands into mountainous building environments. The investigation examines the susceptibility of building sites in a portion of the Front Range mountains of Colorado/Wyoming to catastrophic disturbance by four landscape hazards: flooding, rockfall, fire and avalanche. A hazard rating model is applied to a portion of the Front Range, the Pingree Park vicinity, by employing geographic information system technology. We discovered that, below the tree‐line, approximately 75% of the landscape contained a high risk rating and the remaining portion a moderate risk rating. This study implies that there is no long‐term, safe building site in the study area. Assuming that the Pingree Park vicinity is a representative sample of ...