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Historic Sanborn fire insurance maps of cities in the United States are utilized extensively for comprehending past built environments and evaluating potential environmental risks. While previous research in the spatial humanities has explored diverse contemporary applications for these maps, there has been limited attention devoted to the evolution of Sanborn fire insurance maps over their nearly century-long production history. This study delves into the components of fire insurance maps produced by the Sanborn Map Company, shedding light on their varying formats, scales, and annotations, discussing how they have changed over time. The paper also examines the map correction process and identifies potential alternative sources for accessing fire insurance maps. Additionally, the diverse nature of these maps as source materials is contemplated, emphasizing the valuable insights that can be gained by critically analyzing the construction of Sanborn fire insurance maps. Given the significant reliance of numerous spatial humanities projects on these historic maps, particularly those focused on urban areas, this paper provides important contextualization of this source of geospatial information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A longstanding line of research in urban studies explores how cities can be understood through their appearance. However, what remains unclear is to what extent urban dwellers' everyday life can be explained by the visual clues of the urban environment. In this paper, we address this question by applying a computer vision model to 27 million street view images across 80 counties in the United States. Then, we use the spatial distribution of notable urban features identified through the street view images, such as street furniture, sidewalks, building façades, and vegetation, to predict the socioeconomic profiles of their immediate neighborhood. Our results show that these urban features alone can account for up to 83% of the variance in people's travel behavior, 62% in poverty status, 64% in crime, and 68% in health behaviors. The results outperform models based on points of interest (POI), population, and other demographic data alone. Moreover, incorporating urban features captured from street view images can improve the explanatory power of these other methods by 5% to 25%. We propose "urban visual intelligence" as a process to uncover hidden city profiles, infer, and synthesize urban information with computer vision and street view images. This study serves as a foundation for future urban research interested in this process and understanding the role of visual aspects of the city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the focus on embodied carbon within the built environment has grown in the U.S., local jurisdictional codes have increasingly proposed and implemented code language that requires the use of concrete mixtures that have reduced environmental impacts. This paper provides details about the various ways that localized sustainable concrete provisions have been proposed and implemented in the U.S., including limits on cement content and Global Warming Potential (GWP). These laws and code revisions vary in their measurement of low-carbon concrete and their exemptions and incentives. While the current version of the ACI Building Code, ACI 318-19, does allow for the consideration of sustainability in concrete design, specifics about how the relative sustainability of concrete mixtures and systems are to be measured and compared are not included. This paper addresses how the changing landscape of local jurisdictional codes is driving the development of future ACI 318 provisions to play a part in providing more consistency in the application of sustainable design practices in the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To describe the quality of food and physical activity (PA) environments by World Bank Income level in jurisdictions from the Children's Healthy Living Program. Baseline cross-sectional community data were analyzed from 11 jurisdictions categorized by World Bank Income levels to describe exposure to different food and PA outlets. The Children's Healthy Living Program was a multilevel, multijurisdictional prevalence study and community intervention trial that reduced child obesity in the US-Affiliated Pacific region. US-Affiliated Pacific region. Food (n = 426) and PA (n = 552) Outlets. Physical activity and food scores that reflect the quality of the outlets that support being physically active and healthy eating options, respectively. Descriptive statistics are presented as means ± SD or percentages. High-income-income level jurisdictions had higher food and PA scores than middle-income level jurisdictions. The US-Affiliated Pacific region has limited quality food and PA outlets in underserved communities at risk for obesity. The findings in this paper can be used to develop tools and design interventions to improve the food and PA environment to increase a healthier, active lifestyle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to analyze how the associations of built environment and usage of urban space changed due to the social restrictions during COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. A total of 57,185 census block groups (CBGs) in 459 cities were analyzed. Built environment elements including road network, green space, and land use associated with usage of urban space (measured by over two billion mobile phone data) before/during COVID-19 were evaluated at both CBG and city level. Our results showed drastic decreases of urban space usage, ranging from 0.25 % to 76.35 %, among cities during COVID-19 social restriction. Specifically, CBG-level road length-node ratio, road intersection index and land use densities contributed less to usage of urban space during COVID-19. Meanwhile, the heterogeneity of city-level road network, commercial, public places, as well as hospitals and health cares exhibited stronger relationship with usage of urban space. The heterogeneity of green space at both CBG and city level showed less associations with usage of urban space during COVID-19. The discrepancies of the built environment effects on usage of urban space between CBG and city level suggest the importance of varying-scale analysis. Future interventions should consider space usages and health inequality from a space-varying perspective for post-pandemic period. • The changing associations of built environment with usage of urban space during COVID-19 were investigated • The changing associations were evaluated based on the census-block-group (CBG) level and city level in 459 U.S. cities • CBG-level road complexity and urban facility density contributed less on the usage of urban space during social restriction • City-level built environment exhibited stronger relationship with usage of urban space during social restriction [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Direct demand modeling is a useful tool to estimate the demand of urban rail transit stations and to determine factors that significantly influence such demand. The construction of a direct demand model involves determination of the catchment area. Although there have been many methods to determine the catchment area, the choice of those methods is very arbitrary. Different methods will lead to different results and their effects on the results are still not clear. This paper intends to investigate this issue by focusing on three aspects related to the catchment area: size of the catchment area, processing methods of the overlapping areas, and whether to apply the distance decay function on the catchment area. Five catchment areas are defined by drawing buffers around each station with radius distance ranging from 300 to 1500 meters with the interval of 300 meters. Three methods to process the overlapping areas are tested, which are the naïve method, Thiessen polygon, and equal division. The effect of distance decay is considered by applying lower weight to the outer catchment area. Data from five cities in the United States are analyzed. Built environment characteristics within the catchment area are extracted as explanatory variables. Annual average weekday ridership of each station is used as the response variable. To further analyze the effect of regression models on the results, three commonly used models, including the linear regression, log-linear regression, and negative binomial regression models, are applied to examine which type of catchment area yields the highest goodness-of-fit. We find that the ideal buffer sizes vary among cities, and different buffer sizes do not have a great impact on the model's goodness-of-fit and prediction accuracy. When the catchment areas are heavily overlapping, dividing the overlapping area by the number of times of overlapping can improve model results. The application of distance decay function could barely improve the model results. The goodness-of-fit of the three models is comparable, though the log-linear regression model has the highest prediction accuracy. This study could provide useful references for researchers and planners on how to select catchment areas when constructing direct demand models for urban rail transit stations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: To prevent obesity among Latino youth in the United States and Latin America, it is necessary to understand the specific context and interplay of physical activity (PA) and the built environment (BE). This paper aims to advance the research agenda of BE and PA for obesity prevention in Latin America and among Latino youth in the United States by (1) identifying environmental indicators to inform the design of interventions and policy, (2) identifying interdisciplinary methodological approaches for the study of the complex association between BE and PA, and (3) presenting case studies of PA‐promoting BE programs. A group of U.S. and Latin American scientists collaboratively worked to propose innovative indicators of the BE, methodological approaches for the study of the complex association between BE and PA, and review case studies of PA‐promoting BE programs in both regions. The results identified gaps in knowledge, proposed environmental indicators (e.g., landscape, street design, mobility patterns, and crime and safety), reviewed methodological approaches (social network analysis, citizen science methods), and case studies illustrating PA‐promoting BE programs (i.e., play streets, active school transport, and school setting interventions). The obesity prevention among Latino and Latin American youth requires advanced research on BE and PA addressing context‐specific priorities and exchanging lessons learned. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Black Lives Matter movement has become one of the most visible, controversial, and impactful campaigns to address racialized violence and discrimination in the 21st century. Activists within the movement join traditional forms of social protest and policy development with rituals and spiritual practices, drawing upon spiritual resources as a source of transformation and empowerment. The transformative aims of Black Lives Matter and other contemporary African American justice movements address critical areas for reform, like criminal justice, education, and public health, but their vision for reform is broad and extensive, envisioning the creation of a more just world. As such, the physical context for African American life-the buildings and public spaces known as the built environment-is a crucial aspect of social transformation. This essay examines the spirituality of Black Lives Matter and other contemporary African American justice movements and considers how it inspires the ongoing transformation of buildings and public spaces. By analyzing the spiritual practices and themes in the Black Lives Matter movement as described by its founders, this paper identifies three principles and relates them to similar concepts in African American religious thought, womanist ethics, and ecowomanism. Applying these three spiritual principles-liberation, inspiration, and healing-to the design of architecture and public spaces can enrich and affirm African American life. Appealing to the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture as an example, this paper articulates the possibilities of architectural projects to symbolically and practically support liberative goals in African American religious systems and political movements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we describe the assessment and planning phase of the Thrive community‐based initiative to reduce violence and address other determinants of health in a community in the Southwestern United States. Using community‐based participatory research (CBPR) and an implementation science framework, we engaged residents and other key stakeholders as equal partners in the assessment and planning process. The Thrive assessment and planning phase involved collaboration among researchers, residents, law enforcement, nonprofit agencies, public health, local government, and other cross‐sector partners. We used implementation science in order to examine the barriers and facilitators to addressing community health and safety, to assess the nature and scope of health and safety issues, to review existing solutions, to assess the acceptability and necessary adaptations of selected interventions, and to assess feasibility and sustainability of the initiative. Through interviews, focus groups, analysis of crime incident data, geomapping, and direct observations, our findings highlighted the presence of an open‐air drug market, the high‐stress nature of the community, concern for the lack of opportunities for youth, the lack of trust between residents and law enforcement, and a need to address the built environment to promote safety and well‐being. Highlights: This study highlights the utility of CBPR and implementation science for crime/violence prevention.Through cross‐sector partnerships, the nature and scope of community crime/violence were assessed.Findings highlighted an active drug market, high‐stress, concern for youth, and lack of trust in police. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the development of a Place-Based Food Insecurity and Vulnerability Index (PFIVI), which incorporates six indicators and 30 variables. It also presents an application of this Index within the context of Philadelphia, a postindustrial U.S. city. The paper argues that in order to thoroughly measure a multidimensional socioeconomic problem that is tied to the built environment (e.g., food insecurity and vulnerability), the use of participatory and mixed-methods approaches in GIS (e.g., participatory GIS or PGIS) may produce more comprehensive results compared to other commonly used methods. This paper makes an intervention in the food environment literature, which tends to analyze food access in a narrow way, by applying a methodology conceptually grounded in community food security and operationalized through a PGIS project. It also contributes to still-evolving PGIS methodologies by directly engaging stakeholders in a complicated GIS-based analytical process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transit-friendly development has recently become a popular strategy to increase transit mode share in the United States. Many policies and programs have been proposed and implemented across the country to increase residential and job densities, walkability, and mixed-use development around major transit stations in order to encourage transit ridership. Using data from all rail transit stations across the United States, this paper presents an analysis of commute mode share for people who live within walking distance to rail transit with regard to the urban form at both neighborhood and regional levels. This study provides additional evidence to better understand how transit accessibility and urban design jointly aim to encourage transit use and reduce driving in rail stations areas across the U.S. and thus cope with ever-growing traffic congestion in urban areas. It is one of the first analyses to examine the relationships between urban form measured at both local/neighborhood and metropolitan levels and the commuting mode share across major transit station areas nationwide. It utilizes a Seemingly Unrelated Regression modeling method (SUR) -which is based on generalized least squares (GLS)- and estimates three primary modes of auto, transit, and walk/bike. Findings suggest that urban form at both station area (local effect) and at the whole metropolitan area (regional effect) influences commuting patterns. Factors such as population and employment densities, walkability, and transit accessibility at both local and regional levels are significantly associated with commute mode share. Job accessibility via transit in the entire region (measured by the number of jobs located within 45 min from a transit stop) is another important factor encouraging transit ridership for every-day commuting trips. • The relationships between urban form at various scales on commuting mode share is analyzed. • Seemingly Unrelated Regression Modeling method (SURE) is utilized to estimate three primary modes of auto, transit, and walk/bike. • It examine how urban form measured at both local/neighborhood and metropolitan levels impacts the commuting mode share across major transit station areas nationwide. • Provides additional evidence on how transit-friendly design could help reduce automobile use and promote the more sustainable travel modes such as transit and walking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite similarities to the US in terms of transportation, land use, and culture, Australia kills 5.3 people per 100,000 population on the roads each year, as compared to the US rate of 12.4. Similar trends hold when accounting for distance driven and the number of registered cars. This paper seeks to understand what is behind the road safety disparities between these two countries. The results suggest that a number of inter-related factors seem to play a role in the better road safety outcomes of Australia as compared to the US. This includes Australia’s strategies related to seat belt usage and impaired driving as well as their efforts to help curb vehicle speeds and reduce exposure. Design-related differences include a much greater reliance on roundabouts and narrower street cross-sections as well as guidelines that encourage self-enforcing roads. Policy-related differences include stronger and more extensive enforcement programs, restrictive licensing programs, and higher driving costs. Combined with a more urban population and multimodal infrastructure, Australia tends to discourage driving mileage and exposure while encouraging safer modes of transportation such as transit, at least more so than in most of the US. Australia also enacted their version of Vision Zero – called the Safe System Approach – more than a decade before similar policies began cropping up in US cities. While it is difficult to attribute recent road safety successes to any specific policy, Australia continues to expand their lead on the US in terms of safety outcomes and is a road safety example worthy of consideration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes a framework for understanding the diversity of New Urbanism (NU) in practice in the United States. The framework is based on a nationally representative survey of NU developers that inventories characteristics of NU projects’ built environments across categories of urban design, land use, street configuration, and size. Using cluster analysis, the paper resolves the diversity of NU in practice into three types: Mainstream Urbanism, Dense Urbanism, and Hybrid Urbanism. The paper elaborates on each type, including geographic and temporal aspects of constituent projects. It also considers the ways in which the framework contributes to scholarly understanding of NU and advances the discussion of NU in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Indicator systems help organizations worldwide to understand their progress toward sustainability. But few systems include measures of the built environment, the primary area of agency for local planners seeking to contribute to sustainability. This paper uses the U.S. as a case study to explore the challenges of, and prospects for, filling that gap. Its main questions are: 1) Can a scan of existing built environment indicators yield a catalog of high-quality indicators that measure sustainability comprehensively? and 2) What gaps and challenges arise and how can they be overcome? The study triangulates answers through a review of sustainability literature, a scan of existing indicators, and consultation with panels of indicator experts. Results suggest that U.S. built-environment indicators do not robustly track local progress toward sustainability, confirm deficiencies in the equity dimension, and provide recommendations that allow communities in the U.S. and internationally to more successfully track their local progress toward sustainability goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Childhood obesity is disproportionately prevalent in communities of color, partially because of structural inequities in the social and built environment (e.g., poverty, food insecurity, pollution) that restrict healthy eating and active living. Community organizing is an underexamined, grassroots health promotion approach that empowers and mobilizes community residents to advocate for, and achieve, environmental and policy changes to rectify these structural inequities. This paper presents outcomes of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Communities Creating Healthy Environments initiative: the first national program to apply community organizing to combat childhood obesity-causing structural inequities in communities of color.Methods: Twenty-one community-based organizations and tribal nations (grantees) conducted 3-year community organizing-based interventions primarily designed to increase children's healthy food and safe recreational access. Grantees' policy wins (environmental and policy changes resulting from grantee interventions) were measured from 2009 to 2014 using semi-structured interviews conducted quarterly and 6 months post-grant, and independently coded and reviewed in 2015 by researchers and expert community organizers.Results: The 21 grantees achieved 72 policy wins (mean=3.43, SD=1.78) across six domains: two directly addressed childhood obesity by enhancing children's healthy food (37.50%) and recreational access (33.33%), whereas four indirectly addressed obesity by promoting access to quality health care (8.33%); clean environments (9.73%); affordable housing (8.33%); and discrimination- and crime-free neighborhoods (2.78%).Conclusions: These findings provide compelling evidence that community organizing-based interventions designed and led by community stakeholders can achieve diverse environmental and policy solutions to the structural inequities that foment childhood obesity in communities of color. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using an online stated preference survey and secondary data across four different geographic settings in the contiguous United States (U.S.), this paper elucidates the relationships between physical activity levels, built environment, and access to infrastructure (connectivity). Secondary data were collected to characterize the area surrounding respondents' reported residences. We estimated two multi-group structural equation models to measure how statistical constructs vary across settings. The models' results suggest that the built environment has a lower effect on respondents' physical activity in isolated rural and suburban areas than in urban areas and large rural towns, which are denser and promote higher physical activity levels. We conclude that the built environment and access to infrastructure have a non-monotonic relationship with physical activity when considering the levels of rurality. • Physical activity levels vary across settings with different rurality levels. • An increase in physical activity can serve as a proxy for active travel behavior. • Access to infrastructure has a non-monotonic relationship with rurality. • Urban areas consistently reported having the highest physical activity levels. • Our surroundings can encourage or inhibit physical activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Communities across the globe are focusing on the needs of young people and their families in an effort to create child- and youth-friendly cities. In an attempt to become more child and youth friendly, over 40 communities in the United States have developed youth master plans (YMPs), as of 2009; however, our understanding of these plans is limited. To broaden this understanding, this research employed a multiple-methods approach, including an online questionnaire, plan analysis and semi-structured interviews with key community informants. Findings show that YMPs often focus on collaboration among community entities and youth participation, yet include only general normative statements regarding the physical environment. Furthermore, urban planners do not typically take the lead in development of YMPs, and, in some cases, are not involved at all. To inform and improve future YMPs, this paper recommends greater focus on the physical environment, particularly in relation to safety, access to nature and sustainable transportation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The residential construction market remains vulnerable to the environment. The architecture, engineering, and construction industry now recognizes natural hazards as an increasing threat to the vitality of the built environment. Resilience has become a central concept for assessing environment adaptations; however, how to assess resilience remains elusive. In an effort to solve this problem, the present work proposes a conceptual framework of resilient built environment (RBE), which focuses on one piece of the resilience puzzle: residential construction in the built environment. This paper also provides a case study to demonstrate how to use the RBE framework to assess the state-level minimum resilience performance for the U.S. residential construction market. Findings from the study indicate that 53% of states have adopted building codes with a satisfactory capability for resilience, which raises a need for new policies on resilience management. The case study validates the RBE framework as a valuable tool for describing and assessing resilience performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It has long been known that social and physical environments can shape individual and population health, for better or worse. Master-planned communities (MPCs) in the US are custom-designed residential neighborhoods with defined boundaries planned and developed under a single, private owner or entity from their inception. Across the US, these vary greatly in scale ranging from 100 to over 50,000 homes, but broadly all provide residents with housing, infrastructure, landscaping, and purpose-built facilities to support socialization. Current research in the urban planning literature suggests that MPCs can influence the health of their residents. However, few studies have examined the use of MPCs as settings to conduct individual or population health research. In this paper, we examine the potential of MPCs as context for observational or intervention studies aimed at understanding individual and population-level health and well-being. We first summarize links between built and social environment and individual and population health research. Next, we describe the history of planned communities in the US. Then, we review specific features of MPCs related to governance, development, design, and social structure. We end by exploring how those specific features may lead to potential opportunities and challenges when using MPCs in health research. Through this discussion, we highlight MPCs as overlooked settings that may offer potential for collaborative, innovative, and socially engaged health research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The environments where people live, learn, work and play have a profound influence on health. Policies affecting physical activity, access to healthy foods, and the prevalence of tobacco products in our neighbourhoods can either promote or discourage behaviour associated with cancer and other chronic diseases. Given the regulatory landscape in the USA, where federal law controls venues with the widest possible scope (such as television and the Internet), states and cities have tremendous latitude in regulating the physical environments that residents experience every day. This paper explores innovative and meaningful ways to improve public health through policy initiatives targeted specifically at places such as homes and neighbourhoods, schools, shops, restaurants, bars and recreational areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Objective: There has been an increasing realization of the need for environmental interventions to increase physical activity levels in the population. Although promising, the impact of these strategies in reducing obesity-related disparities will be limited by the presence of inequities in the distribution of activity-related resources in the community. Advocacy efforts are critically needed to ensure that all communities benefit from environmental strategies being implemented. Method and results: This paper describes two activist community-based organizations in Southern California, The City Project and Latino Health Access, and their successful efforts to mandate equitable access to public resources critical for reducing obesity-related disparities. Conclusion: Principles for equitable development of public land are also presented as well as lessons learned that can inform future advocacy efforts. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Numerous studies have found that suburban residents drive more and walk less than residents in traditional neighbourhoods. What is less well understood is the extent to which the observed patterns of travel behaviour can be attributed to the residential built environment (BE) itself, as opposed to attitude-induced residential self-selection. To date, most studies addressing this self-selection issue fall into nine methodological categories: direct questioning, statistical control, instrumental variables, sample selection, propensity score, joint discrete choice models, structural equations models, mutually dependent discrete choice models and longitudinal designs. This paper reviews 38 empirical studies using these approaches. Virtually all of the studies reviewed found a statistically significant influence of the BE remaining after self-selection was accounted for. However, the practical importance of that influence was seldom assessed. Although time and resource limitations are recognized, we recommend usage of longitudinal structural equations modelling with control groups, a design which is strong with respect to all causality requisites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By estimating multinomial choice models, this paper examines the relationship between travel mode choice and attributes of the local physical environment such as topography, sidewalk availability, residential density, and the presence of walking and cycling paths. Data for student and staff commuters to the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill are used to illustrate the relationship between mode choice and the objectively measured environmental attributes, while accounting for typical modal characteristics such as travel time, access time, and out-of-pocket cost. Results suggest that jointly the four attributes of the local physical environment make significant marginal contributions to explaining travel mode choice. In particular, the estimates reveal that local topography and sidewalk availability are significantly associated with the attractiveness of non-motorized modes. Point elasticities are provided and recommendations given regarding the importance of incorporating non-motorized modes into local transportation planning and in the study of how the built environment influences travel behavior. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Researchers highlight the importance of urban form and sprawling development patterns as determinants of economic mobility in the United States. However, the relationship is complex because sprawl affects other variables too, which themselves may affect upward mobility. This study uses a structural equation model to estimate the direct and indirect effects of urban sprawl, and related components of the built environment, on mobility at the census tract level. The results suggest that compactness has a positive direct effect on mobility, but an overall negative indirect effect on mobility through the tested mediating factors. Hence, there are both positive and negative side-effects associated with compactness in regards to economic mobility. In light of these findings, this paper recommends policies, programs, and procedures for the planning community to aid in alleviating the negative consequences of sprawl on economic mobility, while maintaining the positive ones. • Urban sprawl directly and indirectly effects upward economic mobility at the census tract level in the United States. • The direct effect of compactness on mobility is positive, though the total indirect effect is negative. • More compact census tracts have higher rates of upward mobility than more sprawling ones. • Indirect effects through social capital, poverty, job access, housing stock, and education quality are negative. • Indirect effects through concentrations of non-white minorities and food deserts are positive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hurricanes are one of the most frequent and destructive disasters in the United States. The events are large scale and have relatively long-term impacts. Social networking platforms such as Twitter can provide real-time information for disaster managers and affected populations during large-scale disasters (e.g., hurricanes), but extracting useful information and interpreting data accurately for disaster management is still challenging. Sentiment analysis of social media data helps detect the concerns of affected people and understand individuals' responses on the ground at unprecedented scales, but the method is known to be domain-dependent. The same words or expressions can indicate opposite sentiments in different domains. This paper proposes a domain-specific sentiment analysis approach specifically for tweets posted during hurricanes (DSSA-H). DSSA-H can retrieve hurricane-relevant tweets with a trained supervised-learning classifier, Random Forest (RF), and classify the sentiment of hurricane-relevant tweets based on a domain-adversarial neural network (DANN). We built a dataset of tweets posted during six recent hurricanes and applied the DSSA-H approach for sentiment analysis. After evaluation, we found that each classifier (i.e., RF and DANN) outperforms baseline classifiers and that DSSA-H outperforms two high-performing general sentiment classification approaches when classifying sentiments of tweets posted during hurricanes. We also applied DSSA-H in examining sentiment patterns across six recent hurricanes in the U.S. This domain-specific sentiment analysis approach can be used by the first responders and affected communities to more accurately and rapidly detect crises and emergent events, allocate resources, and assess disaster's impact during hurricanes. DSSA-H contributes to an intelligent and adaptive disaster information system for the data-rich human and the built environment system. • DSSA-H retrieves meaningful tweets relevant to hurricanes precisely. • DSSA-H applies a recurrent neural network with domain adaption to classify sentiments. • DSSA-H outperforms general sentiment analysis approaches in classifying hurricane-relevant tweets. • DSSA-H is useful to detect small-scale crises that trigger negative sentiments in hurricanes. • DSSA can be trained and applied to sentiment analysis of short blogs related to other extreme events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article comments on the paper of Arthur C. Nelson on his predictions about urban development and redevelopment in the coming years in the U.S. The author argues that the information on consumer preferences presented by Nelson may not be reliable as the samples used in his study are selected rather than random. The author opposes on the idea of Nelson that financial incentives and concessions be given because development consistent with the long-term public interest may conflict with short-term financial return requirements. Application of principles of sustainable development, democracy, private property and competitive markets has been suggested by the author to make regional vision realistic for planner-leaders.

Abstract: Publication of a White Paper on “Grand Challenges of the Future for Environmental Modeling” is announced. The White Paper has been prepared for the US National Science Foundation (NSF) in the setting of its several Environmental Observatory initiatives. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Comprehensive land use plans and their corresponding regulations play a role in determining the nature of the built environment and community design, which are factors that influence population health and health disparities. To determine the level in which a plan addresses healthy living and active design, there is a need for a systematic, reliable and valid method of analyzing and scoring health-related content in plans and regulations. This paper describes the development and validation of a scoring tool designed to measure the strength and comprehensiveness of health-related content found in land use plans and the corresponding regulations. The measures are scored based on the presence of a specific item and the specificity and action-orientation of language. To establish reliability and validity, 42 land use plans and regulations from across the United States were scored January-April 2016. Results of the psychometric analysis indicate the scorecard is a reliable scoring tool for land use plans and regulations related to healthy living and active design. Intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) scores showed strong inter-rater reliability for total strength and comprehensiveness. ICC scores for total implementation scores showed acceptable consistency among scorers. Cronbach's alpha values for all focus areas were acceptable. Strong content validity was measured through a committee vetting process. The development of this tool has far-reaching implications, bringing standardization of measurement to the field of land use plan assessment, and paving the way for systematic inclusion of health-related design principles, policies, and requirements in land use plans and their corresponding regulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Objectives: This paper presents a new, comprehensive tool for communities to assess opportunities for active living and healthy eating and to mobilize all sectors of society to conquer obesity and chronic disease. Method: Relevant existing tools and input from an expert panel were considered to draft the Community Healthy Living Index (CHLI). CHLI covers five major sectors where people live, work, learn, and play: schools, afterschools, work sites, neighborhoods, and the community-at-large. CHLI and the accompanying procedures enable community teams to assess programs, the physical environment, and policies related to healthy living and to plan improvement strategies. In 2008, with local YMCAs acting as conveners, community assessment teams from six US communities pilot-tested CHLI for cognitive response testing, inter-rater reliability, and implementation feasibility. CHLI was revised to reflect the test results. Results: Pilot analyses demonstrated that the process was feasible, with most questions being interpreted as intended and showing substantial to almost perfect agreement between raters. The final CHLI is being disseminated nationally. Conclusions: Preliminary data illustrate CHLI obtains reliable results and is feasible to implement. CHLI is a promising tool for community-based prevention efforts to draw attention to opportunities for healthy living and create impetus for community changes. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]