We investigate relationships between environmental governance and water quality in two adjacent growing metropolitan areas in the western US. While the Portland, Oregon and Vancouver, Washington metro areas share many common biophysical characteristics, they have different land development histories and water governance structures, providing a unique opportunity for examining how differences in...

1. Land Evaluation 1.1. Soil Interpretations 1.2. Land Capability and Land Suitability 1.2.1. Development of the Land Capability Classification in USA 1.2.2. The Canada Land Inventory (CLI) A Modified Land Capability Classification 1.2.3. Land Capability Systems in Europe 1.3. Physical and Integral Land Evaluation 1.4. The International Framework for Land Evaluation 1.5. Quantitative Land Evalu...

A land classification method was designed for the Community of Madrid (CM), which has lands suitable for either agriculture use or natural spaces. The process started from an extensive previous CM study that contains sets of land attributes with data for 122 types and a minimum-requirements method providing a land quality classification (SQ) for each land. Borrowing some tools from Operations R...

Pollution loads from land sources and their impact on the receiving waters can be predicted by using land-use and surface water quality models, respectively. In this paper details are given of the development of an integrated modelling system for managing water quality in coastal basins. The system includes a model linking the pollution input loads to land-use and a model for simulating surface...

Land use-land cover (LULC) change is one of the major environmental changes occurring around the globe. Water quality is one of such factors affected by LULC change, since it is a key component of a healthy watershed where it integrates important geomorphic, hydrologic, and some of the biological processes of a watershed (Hem, 1985). Alteration of any one of these processes will affect one or m...

With current trends of converting grasslands to row crop agriculture in vulnerable areas, there is a critical need to evaluate the effects of land use on groundwater quality in large river floodplain systems. In this study, groundwater hydrology and nutrient dynamics associated with three land cover types (grassland, floodplain forest and cropland) were assessed at the Cedar River floodplain in...

INTRODUCTION Grand Traverse Bay and the Grand Traverse Bay Watershed (GTBW) are important natural and economic resources for Michigan and the Great Lakes Region, due to their great scenic beauty, quality of waters, and the recreational opportunities these afford. However, the watershed is currently undergoing some of the most rapid population growth and land-use change of any region in the Grea...

urban expansion and agriculture intensification are relevant drivers in land degradation (ld)processes in europe due to net loss of land, soil sealing, landscape fragmentation and other negative effects on the environment. this paper explores changes (or “trajectories” of change) in land use and cover (lulc) and their relationship with the consumption of soils in emilia-romagna (northern italy)...