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Project

Spatial inequality of urban vegetation distribution

Today more than half of the world's population lives in urban areas and it is estimated that around 90 percent of the population of Latin America will be urban by 2050. Vegetation in cities plays a very important role in life quality and people's well-being, urban planning, sustainable development, and environmental protection. In recent years, awareness of the importance of urban ecosystems as a source of ecosystem services has been increasing. However, the extension and distribution of vegetation varies between cities and even within them, generally depending on the size of the city, population growth, political, socio-economic, and biophysical factors. This leads to the benefits of vegetation being perceived unevenly among certain sectors of society, such as low-income households. Remote sensors have been used extensively for vegetation mapping in different scenarios, having the potential to discriminate land cover on a large scale in urban areas. The use of unmanned aerial platforms for remote sensing has drawn increasing attention from researchers, industries, and governments in recent years. The benefits of using these new technologies with respect to satellite images and aerial platforms are related to the low risk of operation, low cost of image acquisition, high efficiency, and the possibility of acquiring images with high spatial and temporal resolution. The aims of my research will be first to analyze the state of the art on the use of very high-resolution images for the study of urban vegetation through a systematic review. Then I will identify size thresholds in cities to understand the existing variations in the distribution of urban vegetation through free-use images and finally, I will analyze the vegetation of the urban area of a medium-sized city, its spatial distribution, quality, and accessibility depending on the income level of its population. To achieve the last objective, we will use multispectral images obtained from an unmanned aerial vehicle with which the vegetation of the urban area of the city will be mapped. The vegetation will be classified into two classes according to its size in height and will be differentiated according to its public-private nature. In this way, we will make a contribution to future decision-making in relation to urban planning and greening.

Date:24 Sep 2020 →  23 Nov 2021
Keywords:Environmental justice, UAV, very high resolution, multispectral imaging, equity
Disciplines:Remote sensing
Project type:PhD project