Location Location Location

January 20, 2010

Lecture Notes – Urban Environmental Geography

LOCATION – LOCATION – LOCATION

 

 

Five parts to the lecture – and lab.

 

(1) Logistics and announcements… how did the Google Earth prologue go?

Sign up for leadership of a lab session if you haven’t already…

ASSIGNMENT for next week … due in a week… 1/27 rather than 1/25

Why? Because it is more difficult than I anticipated

LINK to assignment HW04 – Location Location Location

 

(2) “Essentials of Geography” -  PowerPoint and embellishment … based on Christopherson: Elemental Geosystems

 

(3) Contours – what they are; how to read them; First… create your own contour map. You’ll contour data showing today’s temperatures across the United States.

 

(4) Demonstration of “elevation above sea level” … topographic information

 

(5) Coaching for your homework assignment. (1) how to get started on the Google Earth portion for your workbook and (b) and how to find contour maps for the USA… and some other places.

 

 

(1) LOGISTICS and ANNOUNCEMENTS

 

(2) ESSENTIALS OF GEOGRAPHY

Location… position relative to something

Relative location

Absolute location

 

Earth… pretty much spherical… but not quite… oblate spheroid because Earth spins and therefore flattens at the poles and bulges at the equator… but not even just an oblate spheroid, a bit like a pear. So exciting to have satellites. What a revolution in geodesy.

 

Geographic grids

How do we know Earth is round? LINK http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35UQVcY0_qws

 

Latitude … “flatitude” …easy to figure out from stars … Latitudinal geographic zones. Very important to Urban Environmental Geographers… more on that next session (reminder, what are the five subsystems of Earth systems… which are most affected by latitudinal geography/)

Longitude… so difficult to figure out because it is arbitrary. – Time zones

 

Map scales – your workbook presents it well... as do many sources on the web "map scale"

Think ratios... something is to something. A:B meaning, a model is a smaller version than reality. X units on a map = Y units on the ground. X:Y

Map scales indicate the ratio of what’s on the “map” to what’s on the ground and are ususally written as 1:xxx or 1:xxxxxxxx etc. Which is larger? 1:2 (1/2) or 1:20 (1/20) or 1:20,000 (1/20,000)? That is why a "large scale map" fits on a large peice of paper, it is more detailed that a "small scale map." It's so confusing to non-geographers that I say "detailed scale" and "coarse scale.".

1:24,000 means an inch on the map is 24,000 inches on the ground.

 

(3) CONTOURS … this is NOT in your workbook (Encounter Geosystems) or in your backup text (Christopherson, Elemental Geosystems). There are websites that teach this material. Search "contour maps" or "topographic maps."

FIRST - Think spatially --- what's so special about geography, it's spatial.

 

(a) Spatial concept… Definitions. Continuous data versus discrete data. It's a big concept. Location has attributes... some characteristic about that location. This room (ML 1110) has computers. Continuous data means everywhere has a value for that attribute. Everywhere on Earth has temperature. Everywhere has elevation with respect to sea level. Not every where has students or poverty.

Contours depict variation of CONTINUOUS data.

 

(b) Humans are really good at interpolation and extrapolation…  meaning, figuring out what a value is even when the data points don’t quite say The Answer. Interpolation means estimating a value between two known values. Extrapolation means estimating a value beyond the data set.

LINK to schematic of data. What is the value in the center of the figure?

(c) a CONTOUR is a hypothetical line with the same value all the way along it.

LINK to schematic and draw, mentally, hypothetical lines of value “5” and value “2.5”

Note: every place along the line, the contour, has the same exact value. Such a line can be called an isoline, meaning "same" value and "line."

 

(d) Make a contour map of today’s temperatures. For many of you, this will be your First Contour Map... of many you may construct mentally and physically the rest of your life. .

HANDOUT. – Step ONE will take you about 15 minutes. The exercise should take about 40 minutes. Follow the instructions… step by step. You need colored pencils and the handout.

NOTE: There are several ways to teach and learn about contours… honor me and learn it “my” way… Please... do NOT show your neighbor a "better way" to do the exercise. You can think it through and learn and teach it other ways in the future.

LINK to instructions

LINK to a map showing today’s temperatures

LINK to your worksheet showing map of today's temperatures and the key.

 

LINK not active until after the lecture to the computer generated contour map

LINK to some guidelines and coaching about contours…

REMEMBER… office hours are for you, come seem me if you get stuck. This is not about intelligence, etc, it’s about seeing a model of the world. Once you “see” it, you’ll “get” it… and see contours everywhere.

Congratulations... you have the makings of a contour map, a map showing CONTOUR LINES ... with the same value all along them, and CONTOUR INTERVALS showing lots and lots of values bracketed between bounding values. Don't confuse contour LINES (contours) and contour INTERVALS.

 

 

(4) Demonstration… the concept of elevation above sea level. Roasting pan, rocks and water.

Worksheet: simple topographic map and profile. Schematics.

LINK Simple schematic, in your packet.

LINK

LINK

 

(5) Application to Urban Environmental Geography

Topographic map of the University of Utah Campus… this is a demonstration of your homework assignment…. For the University of Utah.

The purpose of your homework assignment is (a) to make sure you have the data you'll need during the rest of the semester and (b) that you recognize contours.

See me Tuesday if you have troubles.

LINK UofU Campus

LINK Contoured data

 

For urban settings in the USA... no worries to find topographic data. Go to http://nationalatlas.gov/natlas/Natlasstart.asp

 

However... other countries may or may not have topographic maps for the urban setting you want to study. By next Tuesday... assess how difficult it will be for you to have accurate topographic informatin. Here are a couple places to check... and you may find others. Wikipedia … “google”  “topographic contour maps” “wikitopomaps”

And this appears to be an impressive sourse of topographic data... I've never used it... and there is a fee for downloaded maps... ,  http://mapstor.com  for example, examine Athens, Greece.

 

Let me know on Tuesday if you are concerned about having data you need... or email. Note: this homework assignment is due next Thursday, not Tuesday as originally listed.

 

CONGRATULATIONS… this is a significant skill to master. As you drive or walk, imagine contours.

MAJOR CONCEPTS of this LECTURE
For some of you… contours will be familiar. For others, they may be almost familiar. For others, they are something you’ve always sort of wanted to understand …
The ability to read contour maps includes understand their content and recognizing some of the assumptions that are in them. There are LOTS of contour maps in our daily lives and as urban environmental geographers you’ll read contours for the geosphere (e.g., topography), the atmosphere (e.g. temperature, pressure); hydrosphere (e.g., depth to the water table); biosphere (e.g., density of vegetation); and anthrosphere (e.g., heat islands associated with cities.
Based on student response, I devote an entire class session to contour literacy… as a refresher to some folks, and as a basic skills lab for urban environmental geographers in training.
PLEASE… for those of you who know this subject matter, DON’T “teach it your way” but try to learn it my way. Then you’ll know it two ways and will be even better at it! There are several ways to teach anything and I have had success. Have faith!

 

{Students of Geog/Envst3330 -- for powerpoints of lectures, go to your UofU WebCT / Blackboard course files }

{Problems viewing this site? Please contact genevieve.atwood@geog.utah.edu}

{This page modified on January 2010- Modifications will continue through Spring semester 2010}