Using Geospatial Tools to Assess Urban Tree Canopy

landcover viriginaClassified tree canopy layer in the Virginia Urban Tree Canopy Mapper – http://www.utcmapper.frec.vt.edu

Urban forests can be defined as the sum of all woody and associated vegetation in and around dense human settlements (Miller 1997). The people living in and around urban forests receive many direct and indirect benefits, such as the cooling effect of strategically placed trees around a house or the reduced costs of storm-water management (Konijnendijk et al. 2005). In order to estimate the social and ecosystem …

What are some uses for GIS?

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) can be used to display spatial data and to solve problems that involve spatial factors. GIS is particularly useful for relating, integrating, and analyzing information from these different themes (or layers) of spatial information. Therefore, anything that can be placed on a map is a candidate for GIS, and so the variety of uses are quite extensive.
Common uses of GIS include inventory and management of resources, crime mapping, establishing and monitoring routes, managing networks, monitoring …