Lisa Bowman
An Application for Regional Coastal Erosion Processes in Urban Areas: A Case Study of the Golden Horseshoe © 2013
The Golden Horseshoe is Canada's fastest growing region extending from the Niagara Peninsula to east of Durham. The purpose of this study is to measure the effects urban growth has on the eroding coastline. With the use of Landsat satellite imagery, detections will be made to the changing coastlines along Lake Ontario in the Greater Golden Horseshoe Area from a study period of 1990-2011. Locations of urban expansion will be highlighted and a climate change model will be overlaid in order to predict future trends of coastal erosion. The methodology of this project is presented in three stages. The first phase is to derive coastal changes along Lake Ontario in an open software program ILWIS. The second phase is to derive land cover changes along the coast in ArcMap, to highlight urban growth. The last phase works with a climate model (SimCLIM) in order to predict areas of high vulnerability to coastal erosion.