Browsing by discipline "Maantiede"

The focus of this study is locations of hotels. Location has a huge meaning in hotel business. In urban tourism, researching the location is logical, because hotels are tourism elements that are only used almost entirely by tourists. The area research in the thesis is the capital region of Finland. The research is carried out by using the principles of inductive research, The method used are GIS analyses and interviews. With the help of GIS analyses, the location is studied by using a typology of hotels in a tourist city developed by researchers Ashworth & Tunbridge. In this typology, hotels are divided under six locations: hotels in traditional market/city gate, near railway station, main access roads, in nice and practical locations, in transition zones of CDB and the historic city and in urban periphery. Data is also analyzed with models of urban structure and Leisure product model. Themes are formed based on start-up year, size, level of chains and quality. Interviews will give more information about the background of the locations and the influences of planning. SeutuCD10 is used as a data. In additional data has been collected manually. As in the typology, also in the capital region of Finland the development of vechicles has had a major impact in the hotel sector. There are clusters of hotels near railway stations, and these areas have been popular locations for hotels from early days of railway. There is a cluster of hotels near the airport, and in that area there is also a postmodern entertainment center. The biggest difference compared to typology is that in the capital region, there are not any hotels in the traditional market locations nowadays. There are also hotels in the capital region that are difficult to categorize using this model for example hotels away from city center, near some elements of nature and hotels near harbors. Based on results, the hotels in the capital region of Finland are divided in nine different categories. Four of these are not mentioned in typology. These are hotels away from city center, hotels in trendy areas in the outskirts of city center, hotels in CBD and hotels near passenger harbors.

Steam power revolutionized shipping in the beginning of the 19th century. At the local level, the new technology enabled faster water transport connections operated by predetermined time schedules and routes. The aim of this Master's thesis is to provide an overview of the beginning, development and end of the local steamboat traffic in Helsinki. The industrial breakthrough, which started during the second half of the 19th century, was followed by a rapid population growth and urbanization process which shaped the city and society in many different ways. The development of the steamboat traffic is viewed as part of this urbanization process. In the actual study section of the thesis, I have examined the settlement development along the steamboat networks from the 1890s to the 1930s. The subject of the study can be classified as historical geography, transport geography and urban geography. The study is descriptive. A model designating the relationship between urban transport systems and the spatial form and organization of the city is adopted as the theoretical framework of the study. The research material consists of literature, historical maps and timetables. Maps produced based on historical spatial information illustrates the changes in the urban structure of the city. The study shows that local steamboats primarily served as a transportation mode related to different leisure activities for the urban residents. The regular water transport connections created conditions for the expansion of the summer villa settlement and later the steamboats also maintained transportation to a number of people`s parks established in the1920s and 1930s. Local steamboat transportation networks, along with other urban transportation modes contributed to the urban development and expansion of Helsinki, though their role has been marginal compared to other modes of transport. Still today, many of the villas built in the turn of the 19th and the 20th centuries are part of the maritime landscape of Helsinki. Several of the remaining villa areas are classified as nationally significant built cultural environment, which therefore also affects the land use in the future. Many of the people`s parks established in the early 20th century are still in recreational use. The transportation connections to the recreational islands is today maintained by motorized water-buses. Steamboat traffic has thus, at least indirectly, affected the landscape of the coastal areas and islands of the Helsinki archipelago.

Themes of change, complexity and globalization have established themselves firmly in modern discourse. Among other discources these produce a picture of the state of the world and society. Changes in discourse do not act out randomly. They are a part of deliberate control. Governmentality in modern societies consists of governmental rationalities, technologies and subjectification. The thesis focuses on the role of national curricula in subject production. School is a crucial part of governing the population. Focusing on how a curriculum depicts an ideal citizen reveals current trends in society. Among the ideal subject in a curriculum the thesis focuses on factors impacting what the curriculum forms to be like. The thesis studies Finnish elementary school curriculum from 2016 that sets the basis for elementary school teaching in Finland. By means of content analysis the thesis does define the most influential themes in the curriculum. Basing on these themes forms a picture of ideal subject found in the curriculum. Basing on literature the thesis also studies themes working on the background of the curriculum. The ideal subject found from the curriculum is defined to be an economic subject that manages oneself basing on economical rationality that the neoliberal rationality defines. Demand for certain ideal subject forms discursively through problematization and determining solutions for problems. The current situation and problems are defined, and basing on that definition is justified what should be done. Through problematization the structure of society is modified. Model of an ideal individual does also change in this context. Economic individual establishes oneself as a part of an ensemble where economical globalization defines the direction of societal development. The subject has to internalize global orientation, enhance her human capital and manage herself with entrepreneurial spirit. In the world that is defined by globalization, an ideal subject is part of topological power. The purpose of individuals, nations and global economy become one and the same. This happens when the purpose of nations is defined as competing with each other. An ideal citizen is defined based on nation's economic ambition.

Land use change refers to the modification of the Earth's surface by humans. Land use/land cover change (in short, land change), especially the clearing of tree cover, is a major source of increased carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions contributing to anthropogenic climate change. In this study, carbon densities and changes in aboveground tree carbon (agc) across different land cover types were mapped in the Taita Hills, Kenya, using field measurements, airborne laser scanning (ALS) data and classified satellite imagery. An existing biomass map was used for retrieving carbon densities for a part of the study area. For the lowland area, another biomass map was created with a regression model based on field measurements of 415 trees on 61 plots and metrics calculated from discrete return ALS data. Explanatory variables in the linear regression model were the standard deviation and 60 % height percentiles of return elevations. Carbon fraction was calculated as 47 % of aboveground biomass. 11 land cover classes were classified from a satellite image with an object-based approach. Overall classification accuracy was 71.1 % with most confusion between the cropland and shrubland classes and shrubland and thicket. Based on the biomass maps, carbon densities were calculated for different land cover classes. Mean carbon densities were 89.0 Mg C ha-1 for indigenous broadleaved forests, 29.0 Mg C ha-1 for plantation forests, 15.6 Mg C ha-1 for woodland, 5.5 Mg C ha-1 for thicket, 3.2 Mg C ha-1 for shrubland, 8.1 Mg C ha-1 for croplands above 1220 meters above sea level (m a.s.l.) and 2.3 Mg C ha-1 for croplands below 1220 m a.s.l.. Land cover maps from 1987, 1992, 2003 and 2011 were used for studying the impact of land change on aboveground carbon stocks. A reduction in carbon storage was observed between years 1987, 1992 and 2003. An increase in total carbon stocks from 2003 to 2011 was observed as a results of increased proportion of woodland, plantation forest and broadleaved forest. These changes should be further verified in a spatially explicit way. More detailed data should be used in order to understand the full complexity of the dynamics between land change and carbon stocks in the heterogeneous landscape of the Taita Hills.

Participation is located in a living and complex environment. Traditional means of participation are only partially able to meet the new environmental requirements. In need are forms of participation which take into account the new opportunities of the environment and residents expertise. Internet map applications are an important channel of participation which potential is in many respects as unexplored and unutilized. They are commonly in inventory the perspectives, bringing out the concerns of the area, and only little for discussing about solutions. Interpretation is usually made by designer. This study focuses on evaluation and development of Internet map applications in strategic land use planning. Subject matter is dealt from designer and the inhabitants point of view. City Planning Department of Helsinki s Esikau-punkien Renessanssi -project and the associated SoftGIS survey acts as the case study. In the beginning of the study I tried to recognize the new environment in which the Internet map applications are placed. The research question is, what kind of challenges and opportunities the e-participation confronts in information society, and what kind of requirements the environmental creates for development of an application. In chapter three I evaluate how successfully these requirements are met in Esikaupunkien Renessanssi -project. I m trying to examine how the application would look like if the environment and the characteristics of the project are met better. The approach is experimental and I try to find new ways to take advantage of Internet maps. I try not to be too limited to current projects and studies. For example, I try to examine how social media and Web 2.0 opportunities can be utilized, and how the learning and shaping nature of planning may be reached in Internet map environment. In chapter four I have developed a new concept for the Esikaupunkien Renessanssi map application, and made images to visualize its operation in practice. I collect all the data in the research and gather it into a new service. The aim is to create a better application for Esikaupunkien Renessanssi -project, which takes into account the living and complex environment of participation and responds to threats and opportunities arising from it. The presented outcome is in many respects different from the current query. In the new service the role of residents is to interact and learn. The traditional standing of the Internet maps and the position of resident as one-sided information donor are questioned. In the concept, the residents innovate and make interpretations too. Influences are taken from a number of modern applications and for example services that make use of social media. The user experience is intended to be interactive, fast and easy. The idea is that the service keeps you up to date with planning matters, not the other way around. Service guides inhabitants, striving to achieve a deeper knowledge of the project's objectives as well as the dynamics and realities that different individuals experience.

Current poor state and concern over the state of the European surface waters has led to the introduction of the EU water directive. Aim of the directive is to restore surface waters back to their natural state by 2015. Problems with conservation work arise as the natural state of lakes and waters is usually unknown. As the water monitoring programs are fairly new and only cover the time when people have already altered their environment, however, paleolimnological research methods can help to trace back the natural state of the surface waters. According to the theoretical framework of paleolimnological study, 'the presence is the key to the past'. By this theory, knowing the processing operating today, we can trace back the processes operated in the past and reconstruct different phases of a lake and find out the natural state. Study lake is situated in Somero, Southwest Finland. Lake Åvik is approximately 6 m deep and covers an area of 7 hectares. The aim of this study is to find out if there has been changes in water quality in the past by using diatoms and paleolimnological methods. Study aims to answer the questions: - How has the water quality in Åvik changed and what is the natural state of the lake? - Which changes in the drainage area has affected the changes in the water quality? Paleolimnological research has traditionally used a methods called transfer function. However, in this study the diatom data was analyzed with Omnidia database. Omnidia is normally used in river studies. It appears that this is the first time that Omnidia database is applied to paleolimnological data. 200 cm long sediment core was analyzed for diatoms. Diatom data was analyzed with Omnidia and several water quality indices (TDI, GDI, IPS, evenness, dissimilarity and ecological information) were produced. Total phosphorus and total nitrogen were also analyzed from the sample. Most significant changes in the diatom species composition were found in depth that was dated approximately to year 1300 when people permanently started occupying Somero. Population growth and introduction of agriculture into the area altered the ecosystem and caused changes in the species composition. Second phase for changes appears around 1960 when agricultural methods were intensified. Dissimilarity analysis shows that differences between species in the top and bottom layers differ statistically significantly. Main causes for the changes in the species composition are the increased nutrients in the water due to population growth and agriculture. In the surface layers, some oligotrophic species were discovered. These species could represent species from other areas or they could indicate that the actions taken to improve the water quality have worked. River Paimionjoki is one of the risk areas in terms of the poor water quality. Good ecological status of Åvik and Paimionjoki will not be reached by 2015 and extension for the conservation work has been granted until 2027. Because of the result of the study it would advisable to collect a shorter surface sample from the Åvik and analyze diatoms with higher resolution in order to find out in more detail whether the taken measures have actually started to work and water quality is improving.

It is clear for a geographer that a map is a basic tool for presenting the world or parts of it. A map promotes national identity as it creates a meaning and boundaries for a society. It is concrete and provides means to belong to a society. Maps provide material for studying and understanding the history of mankind. They are artifacts worth collecting. This is what makes maps and studying of maps interesting. This field has not been widely researched in Finland despite the awesome collections. These are the reasons behind in the selecting the topic of my master thesis. The history of cartography is a material part of cultural and human geography. Research on map collecting especially, albeit more common abroad, is decades old or scattered in various publications. The challenge of my master thesis is the management of scarcity and partially outdated as well as scattered materials. The development of the research hypothesis has emerged from my strong interest to the subject. One should focus on a specific theme when it comes to collecting old maps. This allows the historic or economic value of the collection to be significant. Collecting of antique maps can be focused on a specific region, cartographer, era or geographic specialty. The characteristics of map collectors can be divided into researchers, selective collectors or investors. The most material aspects of map markets are the places to obtain maps, pricing and investment potential. The downside of map collecting relate to their low survival rate, theft, forgery and ageing of collectors. Maps have been both luxury and commodity items. They have been collected already for centuries for their political, religious, geographical, or esthetical values. During the Renaissance, maps started to spread to a wider group of collectors, driven by innovations and expeditions. They became collection objects of the intelligentsia in the 18th century and incitement for many expeditions and national collections in the next century. The 1920s started the heydays of map collecting both in Finland and Europe. At the same time publications and research related to the history of cartography increased and the field started to gain in valuation. The economic and cultural changes in Finland in the 19th and 20th centuries enabled a wider collecting of maps. There was a need in Finland to know about the history of the nation, society and region and collect related maps. Among the Finland-born scientists and map collectors, Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld became the founding father of the history of cartography and his collection is among the most valued globally. Obtaining Nordenskiöld’s collection to Finland in 1906 gave a strong signal of the importance of the history of cartography and map collecting. Many Finnish businessmen, politicians and cultural influencers became interested in old maps. Meanwhile, the antiquarian business, which acted as a marketplace for maps, was established. The heydays of map collecting in Finland was between 1960-90s. However, the migration of the map markets to the internet meant that the era of big collectors in Finland is over. Finnish map collector Juha Nurminen (b. 1946) was chosen as the subject of this thesis as he is one of the most significant map collectors in Finland. He has reaped a meaningful collection of world maps and other maps of the Nordic and the Arctic over five decades. His collections have been relocated and new uses at their new locations through sales and donations. The research angle of my master thesis is cross scientific, and it mainly represents the history of cartography and the cultural history of collecting both in a European and Finnish context. Qualitative methods are used in the research and written sources, interviews, and pictures as material.

The significance of the forest as leisure time environment has increased in Finland. City forests are used for outdoors exercises and enjoying the nature. The citizens of Helsinki have an opportunity to refresh themselves in the city forests: 22 % of the land area of the city is covered by forests and forests' accessibility is good. However, due to the land use plans of the city and predicted increasing number of city inhabitants of the new Helsinki city plan, the number of city forests will decrease, and the erosion of the remaining forests continues. Meri-Rastila forest, which is situated in eastern Helsinki and well-liked by the residents of the area, is an example case where the construction projects of the city are steered to the city's inner remaining forest areas, and to the neighborhood forests which are important for residents. The aim of the study is to examine what Meri-Rastila forest means to the residents as an experienced space and place. The method for this study is qualitative. The theoretical frame is based on the humanistic geography in which the place is understood as lived and experienced, as an entity formed by the meanings given by the experiences of the people. Therefore the meanings of the forest are investigated by examining the knowledge, memories and experiences of the residents. The second aim of the study is to find out what kind of favorite places, routes and other meaningful objects the residents have in their neighborhood forest. The experiential knowledge of the residents will be linked to the exact locations on the geographical map. The research was carried out by doing nine walking interviews in the Meri-Rastila forest during February and March 2015. The most common routes, favorite places and other meaningful objects were photographed and localized by a GPS device during the walking interviews. In addition, six of the interviewees wrote voluntary free-form story about their relationship to the forest. The contents of the interviews and stories were analysed. The database of experiential knowledge was created from the research results. The database was linked to the favorite places, routes and objects and was visualized on the map using the GIS approach. As result for the first aim, following four outcomes were discovered. Firstly, as being an experienced space and place Meri-Rastila forest is an important source of physical and mental well-being in everyday life and city life for the residents. The forest is a place for everyday recreational activities. Outdoor recreation in the forest has become a part of interviewees' everyday life. Secondly, the forest is experienced as a familiar and cosy neighborhood forest which carries lots of important memories. Thirdly, the Meri-Rastila forest is experienced as an experiential neighborhood forest where one can have nature experiences and feelings of being far away in Lapland wilderness. Fourthly, the future of the interviewees' important neighborhood forest and their everyday use of outdoor recreation of the forest are considered uncertain and worrying. As result for the second aim of the study, following two outcomes were discovered. Firstly, most of the favorite places in the forest are rocky places situated either on the seaside or in the inner part of the forest where the peaceful and calm ambience is of value. Secondly, the sandy road of the forest is a popular walking route but also the small trails are important for the interviewees. Meri-Rastila forest is a meaningful neighborhood forest in the everyday lives of the residents of the area. By doing the walking interviews and using the GIS method it was possible to reveal and localize the residents' experiential knowledge of the forest. The experiential knowledge linked to a place is a valuable source of information which can be utilized to improve urban planning and decision making in the future.

In this master’s thesis, a guided tour that uses a dramapedagogic approach is developed in an iterative process to be used as a part of geographical education in the setting of a museum of natural history. The guided tour is designed to be as interesting as possible. In the most recent national core curriculum for basic education, use of more participatory and active learning methods, as well as more diverse learning environments, is strongly encouraged to make learning more interesting and meaningful. The guided tours designed in this study are aimed to respond to these needs. The aim of this study was to examine the experiences of the students and teachers who took part in the designed guided tours. There were two research questions in the study, first of which was aimed at the design process, and second of which was aimed at the design product, so the guided tours: Q1. How can the interest expressed towards geography be increased with the means of a dramapedagogical guided tour in a museum of natural history, according to literature? and Q2. How did the students and teachers experience the guided tours, from the viewpoint of interest? From its methodological orientation the study was qualitative. The methodology used was design research, which has been thought to be especially suitable for the purposes of educational research because of its ability to combine practice with theory. The method for data collection was semi-structured interview. Collected data was analysed through the means of qualitative content analysis. The participants were two 6th grade classes from a school in Helsinki (n=39) and their teachers (n=2). The answer to Q1 was found from earlier studies that were used to construct an understanding about the factors leading to the formation of an interest experience, and the pedagogical methods that can be used to encourage them. It was observed that different interest factors can be divided into four categories: experiences of autonomy, competence, personal meaningfulness, and social connection. These experiences can be encouraged with pedagogical methods, that were considered when designing and actualizing the guided tours. The answer to Q2 was found through analysing the empirical data. It was observed that the experiences of both students and teachers on the guided tours were positive and included many factors indicating interest in the said four categories. It seems, then, that the guided tours reached their aim of being perceived as interesting, although more research is needed to find out more specifically, for example, which were the main topics of interest, or how long the interest experience will last. The goal of design research is to produce a design product that will have practical applications also outside of the conducted research project. In this study, the teachers involved expressed interest in using parts of the design product in their own teaching practice, and the design product was utilised by the museum of natural museum of Helsinki on the autumn of 2018.

The last few decades have been the warmest since the beginning of meteorological measurements, and the mean temperatures are expected to increase at least a further 1.1 K by the end of the 21st century. Temperature is the main influencing factor of the life conditions of the alpine plants and climate warming is estimated to be higher than average in the alpine areas of the mountain ranges. Also the precipitation and snow cover occurrence and timing will change in the future. The aim of this study was to investigate the observed changes of the vegetation of the high areas of the Alps during the recent decades and the responses of the vascular plants to changing growth conditions, as well as researchers' estimates for the fate of the alpine plants in the future, as the climate change continues. This thesis was conducted as a literature review and the research data was phased out from scientific journals using various search criteria. The data consisted of 12 reports which pertained alpine vascular plants and their responses to climate change impacts, and were performed in the Central Eastern Alps or Swiss Central Alps. The method used was qualitative metasummary, where abstracted findings were formatted from the relevant discoveries and conclusions of each study. To assess the relative magnitude of the abstracted findings, as well as the similarities of the results of different reports, frequency effect sizes were calculated. In addition, abstracted findings were used to assess the intensity of each report in relation to the research questions. The most frequent abstracted findings stated that the observed changes of the vegetation have been small (75% of the reports) and the species richness has increased (67% of the reports). For example, the upward migration of the plants, the lower altitudinal index of increased species and species-specific responses of the plants to the climate change were mentioned in every other article. Two reports with the strongest intensity effect size were Pauli et al. (2007) and Cannone & Pignatti (2014), which both contributed the changes of the species richness and plant communities in relation to the climate warming. It was discovered that the future of the alpine vegetation is partly contradictory: alpine areas were found to be susceptible and the climate change threatens them greatly (25 % of the reports), but many potentially variable factors were found to have only minor effects on the alpine plants (25 % of the reports). The current alpine and nival species were estimated to disappear – or at least suffer – due to the invasion of species from lower altitudes (42 % of the reports), and especially the cold-adapted species were predicted to decrease, as a result of the loss of the suitable habitats (33% of the reports). The final fate of the species was found to be dependent on their capacity of persistence and adaptation, and their seed bank (42 % of the reports).