Phoenix BII Analysis

Image credits: The Guardian

About

This project analyzes changes in the Biodiversity Intactness Index (BII) in Phoenix, Arizona (Maricopa County) between 2017 and 2020. The analysis aims to understand the impact of urban expansion on local biodiversity, as Phoenix has experienced significant urban development in recent decades.

Repository Structure

urban-bii-analysis/
├── data_clean/
│   ├── phoenix-boundary-file
│   └── ...
├── .gitignore
├── README.md
└── biodiveristy.ipynb

Data Access

1. Biodiversity Intactness Index (BII) Time Series Access the io-biodiveristy collection from the Microsoft Planetary Computer STAC catalog Use the 2017 and 2020 raster covering the Phoenix subdivision. A bounding box with cooridinates [-112.826843, 32.974108, -111.184387, 33.863574] is used for data acquisition. Data can be retrieved by searching for io_biodiversity collection with specified parameters in the MPC catalog.

2. Phoenix Subdivision Shapefile The Phoenix subdivision shapefile was downloaded from the 2020 TIGER/Line® Shapefiles: County Subdivisions for Arizona, as provided by the US Census Bureau. Data can be accessed by selecting Arizona on the webiste and clicking download.

Acknowledgments

This repository contains materials created by Carmen Galaz-Garcia for the course EDS 220 - Working with Environmental Datasets. This course is part of the UCSB Masters in Environmental Data Science.

Biodiversity Intactness Index data De Ornellas, P., Callaghan, C.T., Lahoz-Monfort, J.J., & Simmonds, J.S. (2023). io-biodiversity: Global Time Series Maps of Biodiversity Intactness Index. Microsoft Planetary Computer. https://doi.org/10.34911/rdnt.ev7x2p

Administrative Boundaries U.S. Census Bureau (2020). TIGER/Line Shapefiles: County Subdivisions [Arizona]. Retrieved from https://www.census.gov/cgi-bin/geo/shapefiles/index.php?year=2020&layergroup=County+Subdivisions