Subfield of Geography / Research Question / Ron Method Notes (explained in class)
Biogeography and Remote Sensing / Does the population geography that surrounds a mountain preserve influence the perennial plants? Do more wealthier populations degrade the plants more than lower-income populations? / Use aerial photographs of Maricopa County
Use FAM
Climate / How does “deserts scaping” influence diurnal temperatures, as compared to more traditional lawn and tree landscaping? / Sling
IRT surface
Climate / As Tempe grows vertically, are surface winds changing? If so, how? / Mixture of archival and field measurements
Climate / Precipitation encounters the surface at different angles. Sometimes, the rain falls vertically. At other times, it falls at an angle. For example, you might expect a summer thunderstorm to fall more vertically than rain associated with a classic cold front to be more angled. For winter time precipitation, is there a bias on rain gauge data? / Design a rose series of rain gauges. Put them out when/where it rains & pray it rains (have a back-up plan)
Climate and Recreation / What mountain preserve has the best air quality for exercising, and when does this occur? / Climate data
Week 7: Cultural/Urban / “The Tempe Experience” has changed substantially in just the last twenty years, let alone the last century. How has the “Tempe Experience” changed over time?
Target location: Downtown Tempe /

Rephotography

Cultural/Urban / News stories abound on neighborhoods filled with foreclosed homes that are occupied by the seedier elements of society. How does a heavy concentration of foreclosed homes influence the nature of place in a neighborhood?
Week 3: Environmental Geography / How does the population geography surrounding an environmental preserve affect disturbance in the preserve?
Idea: distance decay measurement
Design an “index of preserve disturbance”.
Learn about stratified random sampling / Design an index
Feminist Geography / Different spaces and places in Downtown Tempe have different concentrations of women and men. What is the “geography of gender” in Downtown Tempe? / Qualitative and Quantitative observations
Week 5: Geomorphology / What are the hazards (e.g. debris flow, landsliding, flooding) associated with living next to South Mountain Park?
Target Location: 17th Avenue and the Preserve (south side) / Field mapping on aerial photographs
Geomorphology / How fast does weathering fracture boulders in deserts? / Using fissuresols & debris flow levees that have been dated
Geomorphology / How does the stability of rock art differ with different rock types? / Use RASI
GIS / Census data are displayed easily with just about any geographic information system. Yet, the connection between the computer screen and the nature of that place can be quite complex. Does a GIS display of Census data “jive” with the reality of the nature of place in that Census track? /

Target location: stratified random sampling selection of Census track.

In advance, come up with factors that will be observed
GIS / What is the cell-phone geography of the ASU Tempe Campus? of Tempe? Of the East Valley? /

Group writes an article for the New Times that maps out cell service among different companies

GIS/GPS / Geocaching and GPS drawing are expressions of the general public’s interest in geotoys such as GPS and Google Earth. What geographic factors can influence (positively or negatively) the ability to create GPS art? /
Week 5: Recreation / How do backyard amenities vary spatially among upper middle class households?
Target Location: 17th Avenue and the Preserve (south side) /

Amenity survey. Passive observations

Remote Sensing / If you have taken remote sensing, you could ask the question:
What is the accuracy of my classification, based on ground truthing? / Ground truthing, stratified random sampling
Retail / How has the opening of light rail influenced businesses located near light-rail stops? / Qualitative & Quantitative passive observations. Interviews of business owners (with IRB approval)
Transportation / How does the location of a light rail stops influence the nature of light-rail customers? / Qualitative & Quantitative passive observation
Transportation / Light rail is a new traffic issue for the ASU commuters. How is light rail affecting traffic? / Field observation
Urban / Leap-frogging development slaps down suburbia on what was once the metropolitan fringe where such activities as trash dumping, ORV/motorcycle driving and target practice have been replaced by horse riding and hiking. How do these very different land uses manifest themselves in today’s urban/desert interface?
Target Location: Anthem, Queen Creek / Use aerial photographs of Maricopa County
Stratified Random Sampling
Urban / What is the best Tempe neighborhood for an ASU student? / Design an index
Urban / Mapping the rental landscape: does the appearance of a house inform on whether it is a rental?
Target Location: surrounding ASU / Design a model based on one neighborhood and test that model on another neighborhood
Urban / The economic meltdown of 2008 has increased foreclosure rates in a host of valley cities. But what is going on at the urban fringe, where the halt to construction has created ghost developments? / Queen Creek. Map it? Baseline for future monitoring
Urban / Tempe is an inner suburb. Being one of the most dense population centers in metroPhoenix, Tempe should be a hotbed of “new urbanism”behavior. Is this happening? / Qualitative & Quantitative passive observations
Urban/Biogeography / Trails are expanding across the Scottsdale Mountain preserve as suburbia continues to expand into the Sonoran Desert. How have these new trails impacted the surrounding landscape?
Target Location: Windgate Pass, McDowell Mountains / Use Aerial photographs
FAM – case