Special Issue "Interaction between (Mega-)Urban Land Use and Water Management"

Guest Editor
Dr. Klaus Baier
Department of Engineering Geology and Hydrogeology, RWTH Aachen University, Lochnerstraße 4-20, 52064 Aachen, Germany
Website: http://webserver.lih.rwth-aachen.de/lih/content/e58/e514/index_ger.html
E-Mail:
Interests: mega-urbanization; megacities; land use and land use change; integrated water resource management; urbanization and water; socio-cognitive aspects of water usage

Dear Colleagues,

Humanity has crossed the line from being a rural to urban species since 2007. For the first time in history, more people live in cities and urban areas than in the countryside. Starting in the developed nations, where the urbanization process has been significantly decelerated in the meantime, urbanization has especially increased in Asia and South America as well as in Africa to a substantial extent in the second half of the last century. Especially in developing and emerging countries, the hydrological and hydrogeological setting of each region has deteriorated through growing urbanization processes. Urban areas show, in contrast to the rural areas, a rapid interaction between surface water and groundwater as well as between drinking water and sewage system. Urbanization and the attended changes in the settlement and land use structure will eventually lead to negative consequences for the environment as well as for the water resources. In this context, one of the key tasks of sustainable and long-term land and natural resources management is to optimize water resource utilization referring to the spatial distribution of people and their activities.

Klaus Baier, Ph.D.
Guest Editor

Submission

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• Urban land use
• Land use change
• Analyse methods of land use change
• Modelling of land use change
• Urbanization
• Urban planning
• Megacities
• Water resource management
• Urban recharge
• Water quality/quantity in urban areas
• Modelling of urbanization effect on water resources
• Water basin management
• Health effects
• Vulnerability
• Water treatment / decentralized systems
• Water Landscape
• Environmental awareness
• Socio-cognitive aspects in water management

Title: The Potential for Abandoned Paddy Fields to Reduce Pollution Loads from Households in Suburban Tokyo
Authors: Jiro Kogi, Mariko Miyamoto, Jay Bolthouse and Makoto Yokohari
Affiliation: Graduate School of Frontier Sciences, The University of Tokyo, 5-1-5 Kashiwanoha, Kasiwa, Chiba, 277-8563, Japan;
E-Mail:kogijiro@nenv.k.u-tokyo.ac.jp
Abstract: Similar to other Asian nations, suburban areas in Japan are characterized by dense intermixtures of residential areas and farmlands. These hybrid rural/urban areas are evaluated negatively in modern planning frameworks. However, mixed rural/urban landscapes may prove advantageous when attempting to reconstruct sustainable wastewater treatment systems. This research examines the potential for abandoned paddy fields to reduce nitrogen and phosphorous loads, an increasingly problematic source of eutrophication in many closed water areas, from households in suburban areas. Our results indicate that abandoned paddy fields remaining in mixed urban/rural areas have significant potential to reduce both nitrogen and phosphorous loads. Accordingly, we suggest that abandoned paddy fields can play an important role in reducing pollution loads in mixed urban/rural areas.
Keywords: domestic wastewater pollution, abandoned paddy field, wetland wastewater treatment, mixed urban-rural landuse

Title: From Agricultural Land Use to Urban Landscape – Analyses of Interactions between Urbanization and Urban Water Cycle, by Means of Restructuring of a Rural Village in the Context of Mega Urbanization. The example of Shibi in Guangzhou, China
Authors: Katharina Wiethoff, Klaus Baier, Ramona Strohschön and Rafig Azzam
Affiliation: RWTH Aachen, Lehrstuhl für Ingenieurgeologie und Hydrogeologie, Lochnerstraße 4-20, D-52064 Aachen, Germany; E-Mail: baier@lih.rwth-aachen.de
Abstract: Since 1978, Chinese megacities have been subject to far-reaching changes due to economic reforms and the accompanying economic opening. Within the net of megacities and special economic zones, the Pearl River Delta with the industrial megacity Guangzhou and the special economic zone Shenzhen plays a decisive role. The region became one of the most densest-populated areas on the earth and some of the industrial cities emerged from the rural structures in just ten years- a noticeable dynamic which causes tremendous effects on the land use principles as well as on the social and environmental structure.
The urban waterhousehold represents one of the most vulnerable sectors in the course of rapid urbanization: With rising population the adequate water supply risks to become an insolvable problem due to the serious decrease of ground and surface water quality together with a drastically decreasing infiltration rate by reason of rising structural densification. Being aware of the essential role of water for the “urban vulnerability” of the total urban system and the urban society, it will thus be one aim of this article to describe and explain the multi layered driving forces of changing urban landscapes (urbanization) and to link these findings to the direct and indirect effects on the mega urban waterhousehold.
The present paper will refer to the continuous transformation of the mega urban landscape of Guangzhou in order to explain underlying mega urban growth principles as well as the resulting changing determinants for the mega urban landscape and the mega urban waterhousehold. The theoretical basis is an interdisciplinary research approach of natural, engineering and social issues, mainly referring to findings on micro level. In order to cope with the complexity of a mega urban system, it works initially with the concept of 'urban units', structural entities forming the complex urban landscape of Guangzhou.
Shibi, actually a village at its origin of mega urban development, will represent the case study area for micro level analysis. Within the current development dynamics of Guangzhou, it can be seen as symbolic for the multilayered transformation processes due to massive land use and land structure change: it will develop in the next few years to a highly urbanized area by reason of the construction of the biggest railway station in southern China. With the help of the micro analysis, the whole range of urbanization- related influences on the waterhousehold can be shown. Based on the research results and with regard to further development, it will be discussed at the end in which way the interdisciplinary research approach can be transferred to other urban units or to other urban contexts.

Title: Urbanization Effects on Watershed Hydrology and In-Stream Processes in the Southern U.S.
Authors: Michael O’Driscoll ¹, Sandra Clinton ², Anne Jefferson ³, Alex Manda ¹ and Sara McMillan ⁴
Affiliations: ¹ Department of Geological Sciences, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC, USA; E-Mails: odriscollm@ecu.edu (M.O.D); sclinto1@uncc.edu (S.C.); mandaa@ecu.edu (A.M.)
² Department of Biology, University of North Carolina-Charlotte, Charlotte, NC, USA; E-Mail: sclinto1@uncc.edu
³ Department of Geography and Earth Sciences, University of North Carolina-Charlotte, Charlotte, NC, USA; E-Mail: ajeffe10@uncc.edu
⁴ Department of Engineering Technology, University of North Carolina-Charlotte/ Charlotte, NC, USA; E-Mail: smcmillan@uncc.edu
Abstract: The southern United States is characterized by a humid, subtropical climate and consists of 16 states (Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Delaware, and Maryland) and Washington DC. Currently this region is experiencing the largest net population growth in the U.S. Over the last century, the expansion of large urban centers and impervious area in the region has altered the hydrologic cycle. This review synthesizes regional research that shows how watershed hydrology, groundwater recharge, stream geomorphology, climate, biogeochemistry, and stream ecology have been affected by urbanization and the expansion of watershed impervious area.
Keywords: urbanization; TIA; surface water; groundwater; stormwater runoff