| 1. |
- Furberg, Dorothy, et al.
(author)
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An indicator-based analysis of the river basin districts established under the EU water framework directive
- 2006
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In: European Water Management Online. - 1461-6971. ; , s. 1-20
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This study gives a first indicator-based assessment of the differences and similarities between the River Basin Districts (RBDs) established under the EU Water Framework Directive (WFD). The RBDs are intended to be the management units for water resources within the EU. Yet, limited harmonized or easily comparable data currently exists for this new administrative level. While there are coordinated efforts to develop a Water Information System for Europe (WISE), there is still a need for making initial and complementary assessments of the RBDs, using a set of identical indicators for all RBDs. The analysis was performed with the help of geographic information systems (GIS) and publicly available spatial databases, environmental monitoring databases and other statistics. A major goal of the study was to rank the RBDs according to the pressure on and status of their water resources. The results show a clear north-south dichotomy and that the most serious water situations occur in Western Europe, although a few regional variations appear for some indicators. The current assessment was limited in terms of the information available and more comprehensive assessments of the RBDs for comparison and policy-making purposes are needed
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| 2. |
- Furberg, Dorothy, et al.
(author)
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Monitoring of Urbanization and Analysis of Environmental Impact in Stockholm with Sentinel-2A and SPOT-5 Multispectral Data
- 2019
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In: Remote Sensing. - : MDPI. - 2072-4292. ; 11:20
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- There has been substantial urban growth in Stockholm, Sweden, the fastest-growingcapital in Europe. The intensifying urbanization poses challenges for environmental managementand sustainable development. Using Sentinel-2 and SPOT-5 imagery, this research investigatesthe evolution of land-cover change in Stockholm County between 2005 and 2015, and evaluatesurban growth impact on protected green areas, green infrastructure and urban ecosystem serviceprovision. One scene of 2015 Sentinel-2A multispectral instrument (MSI) and 10 scenes of 2005SPOT-5 high-resolution instruments (HRI) imagery over Stockholm County are classified into 10land-cover categories using object-based image analysis and a support vector machine algorithmwith spectral, textural and geometric features. Reaching accuracies of approximately 90%, theclassifications are then analyzed to determine impact of urban growth in Stockholm between 2005and 2015, including land-cover change statistics, landscape-level urban ecosystem service provisionbundle changes and evaluation of regional and local impact on legislatively protected areas as well asecologically significant green infrastructure networks. The results indicate that urban areas increasedby 15%, while non-urban land cover decreased by 4%. In terms of ecosystem services, changes inproximity of forest and low-density built-up areas were the main cause of lowered provision oftemperature regulation, air purification and noise reduction. There was a decadal ecosystem serviceloss of 4.6 million USD (2015 exchange rate). Urban areas within a 200 m buer zone around theSwedish environmental protection agency’s nature reserves increased 16%, with examples of urbanareas constructed along nature reserve boundaries. Urban expansion overlapped the deciduousecological corridor network and green wedge/core areas to a small but increasing degree, often inclose proximity to weak but important green links in the landscape. Given these findings, increasedconservation/restoration focus on the region’s green weak links is recommended.
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| 3. |
- Furberg, Dorothy, et al.
(author)
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Monitoring urban green infrastructure changes and impact on habitat connectivity using high-resolution satellite data
- 2020
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In: Remote Sensing. - : MDPI AG. - 2072-4292. ; 12:18, s. 3072-
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In recent decades, the City of Stockholm, Sweden, has grown substantially and is now the largest city in Scandinavia. Recent urban growth is placing pressure on green areas within and around the city. In order to protect biodiversity and ecosystem services, green infrastructure is part of Stockholm municipal planning. This research quantifies land-cover change in the City of Stockholm between 2003 and 2018 and examines what impact urban growth has had on its green infrastructure. Two 2018 WorldView-2 images and three 2003 QuickBird-2 images were used to produce classifications of 11 land-cover types using object-based image analysis and a support vector machine algorithm with spectral, geometric and texture features. The classification accuracies reached over 90% and the results were used in calculations and comparisons to determine the impact of urban growth in Stockholm between 2003 and 2018, including the generation of land-cover change statistics in relation to administrative boundaries and green infrastructure. For one component of the green infrastructure, i.e., habitat networks for selected sensitive species, habitat network analysis for the European crested tit (Lophophanes cristatus) and common toad (Bufo bufo) was performed. Between 2003 and 2018, urban areas increased by approximately 4% while green areas decreased by 2% in comparison with their 2003 areal amounts. The most significant urban growth occurred through expansion of the transport network, paved surfaces and construction areas which increased by 12%, mainly at the expense of grassland and coniferous forest. Examination of urban growth within the green infrastructure indicated that most land area was lost in dispersal zones (28 ha) while the highest percent change was within habitat for species of conservation concern (14%). The habitat network analysis revealed that overall connectivity decreased slightly through patch fragmentation and areal loss mainly caused by road expansion on the outskirts of the city. The habitat network analysis also revealed which habitat areas are well-connected and which are most vulnerable. These results can assist policymakers and planners in their efforts to ensure sustainable urban development including sustaining biodiversity in the City of Stockholm.
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| 4. |
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| 5. |
- Furberg, Dorothy
(author)
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Satellie Monitoring of Urban Growth and Indicator-based Assessment of Environmental Impact
- 2014
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Licentiate thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- One of the major consequences of urbanization is the transformation of land surfaces from rural/natural environments to built-up land that supports diverse forms of human activity. These transformations impact the local geology, climate, hydrology, flora and fauna and human-life supporting ecosystem services in the region. Mapping and analysis of land use/land cover change in urban regions and tracking their environmental impact is therefore of vital importance for evaluating policy options for future growth and promoting sustainable urban development.The overall objective of this research is to investigate the extent of urban growth and/or sprawl and its potential environmental impact in the regions surrounding a few selected major cities in North America, Europe and Asia using landscape metrics and other environmental indicators to assess the landscape changes. The urban regions examined are the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) in Canada, Stockholm region and County in Sweden and Shanghai in China. The analyses are based on classificatons of optical satellite imagery (Landsat TM/ETM+ or SPOT 1/5) between 1985 and 2010. Maximum likelihood classification (MLC) under urban/rural masks, objectbased image analysis (OBIA) with rule-based classification and support vector machines (SVM) classification methods were used with grey level cooccurrence matrix (GLCM) texture features as input to help obtain higher accuracies. Based on the classification results, landscape metrics, selected environmental indicators and indices, and ecosystem service valuation were calculated and used to estimate environmental impact of urban growth.The results show that urban areas in the GTA grew by nearly 40% between 1985 and 2005. Results from the landscape metrics and urban compactness indicators show that low-density built-up areas increased significantly in the GTA between 1985 and 2005, mainly at the expense of agricultural areas. The majority of environmentally significant areas were increasingly surrounded by urban areas between 1985 and 2005, furthering their isolation from other natural areas. Urban areas in the Stockholm region increased by 10% between 1986 and 2006. The landscape metrics indicated that natural areas became more isolated or shrank whereas new small urban patches came into being. The most noticeable changes in terms of environmental impact and urban expansion were in the east and north of the study area. Large forested areas in the northeast dropped the most in terms of environmental impact ranking, while the most improved analysis units were close to the central Stockholm area. The study comparing Shanghai and Stockholm County revealed that urban areas increased ten times as much in Shanghai as they did in Stockholm, at 120% and 12% respectively. The landscape metrics results show that fragmentation in both study regions occurred mainly due to the growth of high density built-up areas in previously more natural environments, while the expansion of low density built-up areas was for the most part in conjunction with pre-existing patches. The growth in urban areas resulted in ecosystem service value losses of approximately 445 million USD in Shanghai, mostly due to the decrease in natural coastal wetlands, while in Stockholm the value of ecosystem services changed very little.This study demonstrates the utility of urban and environmental indicators derived from remote sensing data via GIS techniques in assessing both the spatio-temporal dynamics of urban growth and its environmental impact in different metropolitan regions. High accuracy classifications of optical medium resolution remote sensing data are achieved thanks in part to the incorporation of texture features for both object- and pixel-based classification methods, and to the use of urban/rural masks with the latter. The landscape metrics calculated based on the classifications are useful in quantifying urban growth trends and potential environmental impact as well as facilitating their comparison. The environmental indicator results highlight the challenges in terms of sustainable urban growth unique to each landscape, both spatially and temporally. The next phase of this PhD research will involve finding valid methods of comparing and contrasting urban growth patterns and estimated environmental impact in different regions of the world and further exploration of how to link urbanizing landscapes to changes in ecosystem services via environmental indicators.
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| 6. |
- Furberg, Dorothy, et al.
(author)
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Satellite Monitoring and Impact Assessment of Urban Growth in Stockholm, Sweden between 1986 and 2006
- 2010
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In: Imagin[e,g] Europe. - : IOS Press. - 9781607504931 ; , s. 131-142
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Conference paper (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The objective of this research is to investigate the extent of land-cover change in and around Stockholm from 1986 to 2006 and the nature of the resulting landscape fragmentation with a particular focus on the possible environmental impact. Four scenes of SPOT imagery over the Stockholm area were acquired for this study: two on 13 June 1986, one on 5 August 2006 and one on 4 June 2008. Various image processing and classification algorithms were tested and compared. The best classification results were obtained using an object-based and rule-based approach with texture measures as well as spectral data as inputs. The image pairs from the two decades were classified into seven land cover categories for Stockholm Municipality, i.e., low-density built-up, high-density built-up, industrial areas, open land, forest, mixed forest and open land, and water. The overall accuracies were 93% (kappa: 0.91) for 1986 and 97% (kappa: 0.96) for 2006. Landscape fragmentation and change was evaluated using spatial metrics. The spatial metric results reveal that urban areas increased at the expense of non-built up areas by around 2% both on the municipal and regional levels. The 2006/2008 classification gives evidence of being a more fragmented landscape than that of 1986. While urban areas have become denser within Stockholm municipality, which is in line with the region's development policy, more natural land cover types have at the same time been eroded; a development not in line with the regional goal of maintaining the area's green spaces. The classification technique used on the municipality will be expanded to the region as a whole, and regional trends and consequent recommendations will be the focus of future research
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| 7. |
- Furberg, Dorothy, et al.
(author)
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Satellite Monitoring of Urban Land Cover Change in Stockholm Between 1986 and 2006 and Indicator-Based Environmental Assessment
- 2013
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In: Earth Observation of Global Changes (EOGC). - Berlin, Heidelberg : Springer Berlin/Heidelberg. - 9783642327131 ; , s. 205-222
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Book chapter (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Over the past few decades, there has been substantial urban growth in Stockholm, Sweden, now the largest city in Scandinavia. This research investigates and evaluates the evolution of land cover/use change in Stockholm between 1986 and 2006 with a particular focus on what impact urban growth has had on the environment using indicators derived from remote sensing and environmental data. Four scenes of SPOT imagery over the Stockholm County area were acquired for this study including two on 13 June 1986, one on 5 August 2006 and one on 4 June 2008. These images are classified into seven land cover categories using an object-based and rule-based approach with spectral data and texture measures as inputs. The classification is then used to generate spatial metrics and environmental indicators for evaluation of fragmentation and land cover/land use change. Based on the environmental indicators, an environmental impact index is constructed for both 1986 and 2006 and then compared. The environmental impact index is based on the proportion and condition of green areas important for ecosystem services, proximity of these areas to intense urban land use, proportion of urban areas in their immediate vicinity, and how impacted they are by noise. The analysis units are then ranked according to their indicator values and an average of the indicator rankings gives an overall index score. Results include a ranking of the landscape in terms of environmental impact in 1986 and 2006, as well as an analysis of which units have improved the least or the most and why. The highest ranked units are located most often to the north and east of the central Stockholm area, while the lowest tend to be located closer to the center itself. Yet units near the center also tended to improve the most in ranking over the two decades, which would suggest a convergence towards modest urban expansion and limited environmental impact.
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| 8. |
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| 9. |
- Furberg, Dorothy, et al.
(author)
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Satellite Monitoring of Urban Sprawl and Assessment of its Potential Environmental Impact in the Greater Toronto Area Between 1985 and 2005
- 2012
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In: Environmental Management. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0364-152X .- 1432-1009. ; 50:6, s. 1068-1088
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This research investigates urban sprawl in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) between 1985 and 2005 and the nature of the resulting landscape fragmentation, particularly with regard to the Oak Ridges Moraine (ORM), an ecologically important area for the region. Six scenes of Landsat TM imagery were acquired in summer of 1985, 1995, and 2005. These images and their texture measures were classified into eight land cover classes with very satisfactory final overall accuracies (93-95 %). Analysis of the classifications indicated that urban areas grew by 20 % between 1985 and 1995 and by 15 % between 1995 and 2005. Landscape fragmentation due to spatio-temporal land cover changes was evaluated using urban compactness indicators and landscape metrics, and results from the latter were used to draw conclusions about probable environmental impact. The indicator results showed that urban proportions increased in nearly all areas outside of the metropolitan center, including on portions of the ORM. The landscape metrics reveal that low density urban areas increased significantly in the GTA between 1985 and 2005, mainly at the expense of agricultural land. The metric results indicate increased vulnerability and exposure to adverse effects for natural and semi-natural land cover through greater contrast and lowered connectivity. The degree of urban perimeter increased around most environmentally significant areas in the region. Changes like these negatively impact species and the regional water supply in the GTA. Further investigation into specific environmental impacts of urban expansion in the region and which areas on the ORM are most at risk is recommended.
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| 10. |
- Furberg, Dorothy, et al.
(author)
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Satellite Monitoring of Urbanization and Environmental Impacts in Stockholm, Sweden, Through a Multiscale Approach
- 2021
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In: Urban Remote Sensing. - : Wiley. ; , s. 217-244
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Multiscale landscape analysis offers both advantages and challenges in monitoring urbanization and assessing its environmental impacts. In this chapter, we discuss a multifaceted approach to address some challenges associated with scale, which includes examination of the same geographic area at multiple spatial resolutions and extents based on diverse satellite imagery, the use of object-based image analysis and ecologically relevant analysis units to minimize the modifiable area unit problem, and finally separate examinations of landscape change on administrative (social) as well as green infrastructure (ecological) scales. The study site, Stockholm, Sweden, has been experiencing an unprecedented urbanizing trend, and its growing population is placing pressure on green areas that are important for maintaining ecosystem services and biodiversity in the region. We intended to investigate the extent of urbanization in Stockholm and analyze its environmental impacts by evaluating changes in relevant environmental indicators from regional to local scales. We conducted three studies based on optical satellite imagery with different spatial resolutions and varying study area extents. Multiscale analysis, performed both within and between the individual studies, reveals the broader trends of urbanization and the accompanying environmental impacts while also identifying localized environmental hotspots where mitigation measures or transboundary collaboration may be needed. This kind of information can assist urban planning by raising awareness of change trends while also indicating possible starting points for planning conservation measures.
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