Journal of Spatial Analysis

Environmental hazards include all kinds of hazards in the environment such as natural and technological or natural and man-made. The natural phenomena such as rains or floods are the normal behaviors of the nature which only when they cause damage to the human life, are considered as hazard. The technological events such as road accidents, air pollution and chemical pesticides are always dangerous to human life. Both kinds of two hazards are produced in the context of human- nature relation. For example if human beings avoid flood prone areas there will be no harm or damage. And if human beings control their waste in the urban areas they will never pollute the city. Thus, this is the human who causes risk and damage to his life. The relation between human and the nature is governed by the thoughts and beliefs of human or in general terms his world perspective and philosophy. It is the human perspective and belief which controls his action at any circumstances. A person who believes in the nature as his mother and supporter of life differs from the one who thinks of nature as a sole source to use and enjoy. The first one gets only his basic needs from the environment, but the second person tries his best to exploit the nature for his benefits. Therefore to understand the intensity and frequency of environmental hazards, we should investigate the mental beliefs of people living in different places. A brief discussion of the historical development of hazards will help us to have a better understanding of the philosophical basis of the environmental hazards. From the ancient times up to around nineteenth century life was very simple and man had been using nature only for his basic needs, there was no consideration of environmental hazards. Hazards were considered only as diseases threatening the human life. But later, especially after the industrial revolution, due to the increase of human population and demands, the use of natural resources was exponentially increased far above the production and recovery of the nature. This process triggered the occurrence and expansion of environmental hazards.  The human- nature relation is studied by different scientific fields such ecology, anthropology, and geography from different aspects. The ecologists mostly emphasize on the relationship of individuals with his environment, as the characteristics of environment controls his life. While geography studies the spatial relations between human population and environmental assets. As a result, the philosophical stances of these fields differ substantially. Ecologists want to see whether this relation is dominated by the needs and intentions of man or by the capacity and potentials of the nature. From this point of view three kinds of philosophies were developed including anthropocentrism, biocentrism and ecocentrism. On the other side, geography emphasizes on the spatial distribution of human population on the basis of environmental resources. This spatial relation between human and natural resources is believed to be controlled by the nature or human conducing to the development of two philosophies of environmental determinism and possiblism. Ecological philosophy of anthropocentrism was dominated in the earlier centuries, focusing on the will of human to use and enjoy the nature. In this view, the nature has the instrumental value for human. The result of this philosophy was depletion and destruction of the environment in favor of the human development. But during the twentieth century some philosophers stated that the human does not have the right to harm and damage all living creatures including animals and plants. This view ended with the biocentrism approach.  During the second half of the 20^th century due to the over exploitation of nature by human, the philosophers and ecologists realized that the human kind in order to possess a sustainable living should not harm any members of the environmental system including even rocks, rivers, soil and etc. This approach developed the ecocentrism philosophy. The main controlling force in these philosophies is the ethical stance of humans. On the other hand, the older geographers believed that it is the nature that controls the human distribution and living conditions. The humans cannot change the natural arrangement of the environment and should limit their activities to the natural allowances. The development of the technology after the Second World War changed this view. Some geographers believed that human can change the environment by his techniques and developed the possiblism. The adoption of this philosophy and the growth of industrial development ended with the deployment and damage of the natural resources. It is clear from the aforementioned discussion that in all cases, the main reason for the depletion and destroy of the environment was lack of ethical considerations in human behavior toward the nature. If the ecologists have come with the ecocentrism, geographers developed the geocentrism philosophy. That is, to save the nature and prevent environmental hazards we, as human beings, should preserve the natural arrangement of resources. We should not disrupt the spatial order of any resources, because it will cause harmful results in the environment. For example eroding the soil will deteriorate the vegetation and cause floods and other hazards. The alteration of spatial order of surface temperature has caused the thermal imbalance and hence global disorder and warming. There is no doubt that the relation of each human should be controlled and put in the moral contexts, but to prevent the environmental hazards an overall effort is needed over the environment which is possible only through the preservation of spatial order of natural resources. Spatial management of land resources is the outstanding example of this philosophy and ethic.

Nowadays air pollution in large cities such as Tehran have dramatic effects on public health, hence study of the way air pollutions varies with meteorological parameters appears to be important. One important aspect of sustainability of large cities such as Tehran, is controlling the emissions of pollutants as the meteorological (climatic) conditions are becoming more acute in terms of air pollution and temperature rise. In this paper some recent records of near surface meteorological parameters as well as some pollutants records are examine to observe how they change daily, monthly and annually and how they are correlated. Considering the variations of winds and temperature (extracted from a 2D sonic anemometer at 10 m at the Institute of Geophysics, Tehran University in the northern part of central Tehran, with one minute intervals) and hurly data of CO and PM10 concentrations for the same station for 2007, their relations were investigated. Also using upper air meteorological data (at 00.00 and 12.00 UTC) from Mehrabad Airport station, the stability of the atmosphere during this period was analysed. Here the buoyancy frequencies that are measure of stability of air column were calculated. For averaging of winds two methods based on the real wind vectors and wind unit vectors were used. By correlations between the pollutants concentrations and meteorological parameters, their relationships were considered. Based on the probability distributions of winds for 2007, it was found that most of the time wind speeds were in the range of 0.5 and 2 m/s. Hence most of the time due to this weak wind there was a condition of air pollution accumulations over the city and only local winds could move the polluted air over the area. Annual cycle of variations of mean surface winds had small amplitude that appears to be due to high mountain ranges that surround the city from north and east. The annual cycle of CO variations showed a peak in autumn and winter while PM10 amounts showed a trough in winter and spring. The higher values of CO in winter seems to be due to the surface temperature inversions and improper burnings of the fuel of vehicles as well as the domestic heating systems. This was indicated in the correlations between temperature and CO concentration.  In annual cycle the correlation between CO and PM10 concentrations was about 0.4 which increased to 0.7 for spring time. This may indicate that in this season the sources of these two are similar and one of them may be used to estimate the others is the sources are not changed. There are two maxima in the daily variations of CO which coincides with minima of wind in morning and evening transition times. In this study it was found that due to calm meteorological conditions (often od local origin, called mountain breezes) over the city air pollution problem is a serious problem requiring more emission control. Also trend factors as the pollutant sources (traffic) and the depth of the atmospheric surface layer are important. It is particularly noticeable that during the midday as the depth of the mixed layer increases, the air pollution concentration is reduced substantially. At night surface drainage flow from north of the city and surface radiation cooling creates near surface inversions that can limit mixing and ventilation of the polluted air from the area leading to higher values of gaseous pollutant over the city.  Also lager stability in the air over the city at higher levels in autumn and winter is due to subsidence inversions as a result of the prevailing meteorological conditions of high pressure systems over this area in these months. Such conditions seem to have increased the creation of more acute conditions for air pollution over the city. For a more resilient city in terms of air pollution, some mitigation need to be undertaken in the face of climate change effects that are deteriorating the atmosphere of the city.  

Although environmental hazards occur because of natural factors, however, political economy, controlling the sociospatial relations and conditions, also affect centrally the increase or decrease of physical and social vulnerability caused by hazards. In this regard, present paper has put the spotlight on “explaining the role of spatial distribution of social stratification in vulnerability to environmental hazards in the city of Tehran”. This is based on Political Ecology Approach which emphasizes the domination of prosperous social strata on the urban natural-ecological endowments and utilities and marginalizes low-income and inferior social strata. So, the recognition of social strata inhabitation across the city is significant for the analysis of social inequalities and their effects on the vulnerability of environmental and human hazards. The concentration of middle to high class and working and inferior classes has also caused the range of social inequality to increase in the metropolitan of Tehran and this trend per se has transformed Tehran to the spatial reflection of the contrast between poverty and wealth to the greatest extent in the country. Hence, regarding the fundamental role of social stratification and class structure and its evolution in explaining the dynamics of socio-economical relations in the dominant society and the process of urban space production and reproduction, explaining the role of spatial distribution of social stratification in vulnerability to environmental hazards in the city of Tehran is significant and necessary. Vulnerability to environmental hazards has been studied from the physical, biological perspectives, social construction perspective and contingency perspective. The present paper emphasizes the effects of social construction on the production of vulnerability. Scientists think radical and critical geography of space is a kind of social production. They believe that not only urban space, but also the entire space has a social structure and nobody can analyze it thoroughly regardless to the society’s work on the space. Thus in a world under the Capitalist System, urban space represents a reflection of the control and domination of superior social strata (owners of power, wealth and high status, or the owners of political, economic and socio-cultural assets) in its functional zones.  This has been appeared in the recent decades, within the literature of hazards and catastrophes and based on “an approach of vulnerability” which has been rested on Political Ecology. The mentioned approach has been concentrated on a series of socio-spatial conditions and political economy which shapes the hazards and catastrophes. Some of the effective social conditions in shaping the hazards and catastrophes and their amounts of vulnerability depend on the racial, ethnic and class characteristics. Racial, class, ethnic and political economy analyses, which dominate their social ties, are considered as part of understanding knowledge system of hazards and catastrophes. Since this causes detecting the role of political economy of inequalities and racial, class and ethical processes and the marginalization caused by it, in the emergence of hazards and exacerbation of catastrophes and crises impacts. To use job structure means to emphasize concrete class structures, according to which an image of social inequality can be offered. Thus in present study, for structure determination and main composition of social stratification in Iran and Tehran “Structure Determination and Composition of Social Strata Model” was used. According to this model and with the use of data from matrix tables, major occupational groups and occupational situation have been classified in 5 classes superior strata, traditional middle strata, new middle strata, working and inferior strata and farmers. The data were prepared and analyzed by ArcGIS and Ms Excel softwaares.   During the last century, uneven development process of the country was in favor of the Tehran and superior strata and powerful institutions located in this city. Regarding the processes and relations emerged from political economy of space and political ecology of Tehran, social strata inhabitation of Tehran has been in compliance with environmental capacities raised from topographic and microclimatic distinctions and ecological endowments. The findings of present paper also indicate physical and social vulnerability changes caused by probable hazards related to the general pattern of social strata inhabitation in north-south geographical direction. Spatial distribution of populated blocks in 1996, for which more than 30% of their inhabitants were “senior managers and experts” and “manufacturing jobs employees and laborers”, indicates the above mentioned issue and clearly show the poverty (old poor neighborhoods) and wealth (expensive and rich neighborhoods) spatial centers. In addition, according to the supporting studies on Tehran Comprehensive Plan, most of old urban tissues are in central and southern regions. Also according to the International Seismological Research Agency (JICA), the mentioned regions would be the most vulnerable in the Tehran probable earthquakes. Therefore, it can be said that findings and results of the present study indicate the determining place of political economy of space and urban political ecology and also the fundamental role of social stratification and class structure for recognition, analysis, explanation and understanding of the urban development challenges and problems. Hence, this is impossible to reduce social and physical vulnerabilities caused by natural and human hazards, particularly in the poor neighborhoods, regardless of political economy of space mechanisms and reduction of the gap and even urban development. 

In the Tsunami of Dec. 26, 2004, although there was a large distance between the earthquake center of Indian Ocean and coastal cities of Iran, the Tsunami waves brought some damages in Chabahar coast. This means that if the earthquake center was closer to Iran, Iran’s coastal regions would have confronted serious danger... In the present study, we used ComMIT software (Community Model Interface for Tsunami) as a research tool, Inundation modeling was done for the Jask coastal area in order to assess the potential and find out the impact of tsunami from any future Makran Subduction Zone earthquake.

    Computer modellings programs help analyze sea-level data to generate forecasts of tsunami wave height and the expected inundation for specific coastal areas. In this research we use ComMIT software. For modeling the wave, the assumption for 10*100 Km blocks is applied. In this formulation, the approximate for wave behavior is represented for coastal regions. In this modeling, three steps of gridding with different preciseness are used. By assuming an earthquake by magnitude of 8.6 Richter and movement of 6 blocks mentioned in the subduction area close to Jask, each block rises about 16 m. the first impact by coast by a wave of 2 m height knocks up the coast at 26 minutes.

     According to the performed modeling, the first change after Tsunami is reduction in sea level and this procedure continues till 11 minutes after that. In this time, the maximum amount of water regress from coastal line for 2 m is observed. After this time, the first wave attacks Jask. The first wave impacts Jask headland and then affects the whole eastern coast of Jask. The wave height in this region in 26 minutes after Tsunami reaches to 2 m and starts approaching in the coast. This process occurs in the western coast of Jask by a 10-minute delay. The first tall wave impacts western coast at 36 minutes after Tsunami and regresses for about 2.5 Meter. The second wave is ready to attack the western coast and 40 minutes after Tsunami the second wave attacks eastern coast. The height of this wave in its maximum is about 2.5 Meter.

    According to investigation of existing models concerning influence of Jask city by Tsunami is divided to three sections: A) eastern coast of Jask, B) Jask headland, C: western coast. The eastern coast us the first region that is confronting attack of the greatest waves and the maximum rate of wave march in the coast (about 1 Km) is in this region. In this area the slope is about 1% and concerning topography, it provides an appropriate condition for wave on the coast. In eastern coast of Jask, there is an intense concentration of governmental offices and military centers including Jask airport and Admiral Force’s quay. In the first waves caused by Tsunami, these installations would be damaged severely and in second and third waves this process continues.

_{Settlement's Systems are evolving as any other systemic phenomenon. Multitudinous and different factors are involved in settlements evolution and shaping. One of the effective factors on settlement system evolution is society public power intervention and planning based on approaches which had been approved as predominant paradigm on its time.}    

_{Creation and reinforcement of growth poles was considered as national economic growth instrument in developing country, till 1970. It was supposed that growth pole effect will cause surrounding area's prosperity. The theory of Perroux growth pole was one of these theories in regional planning.}

_{During recent years, some rural settlements of country have experienced physical-spatial changes and have transformed to Towns. These processes have been rising based on theoretical approaches related to spatial development or according to political consideration and election requirements. This trend imposed inconsistency landscape to settlements, and has been the source of crises and economic, social, management and environmental disasters.}

     _{The main question in this research is "what has been the environmental subsequent of Maklevan evolution based on rural planning and also political consideration, and alteration it into town from 2013? Study area of research is Maklevan in Fuman county, Guilan province, Iran. Required data are collected from documents, Satellite images, and field study and questionnaire fulfillment. Collected data has analyzed based on variable frequencies distribution and locational-spatial approaches. Documents show that Maklevan development trend was done without passing any gradual organic process and only inspired from growth pole theory. Assignment the role of service center (services including health, education, agricultural, post, bank, administrative, business services, and Saturdays week local market), creation of main big avenue and concentration of investment (although limited) with the purpose of hinterland development and population centralization, are some of these evidences. That outcome of current development trend in Maklevan is creation a situation which has reinforces incidence and prevalence of environmental hazards including:}

• _{Destruction and loss of agricultural soil, the soil of Maklevan was very rich for rice cultivation, because it is provided from alluvial of Masuleh Rudkhan River. Deficiency of arable soil is considerable, therefore arable soil elimination could result to food insecurity, unemployment, extension of unofficial jobs in the region and urban fringes. Research depicted that the area of paddy lands were reduced from 1.27 square kilometers to 0.8 square kilometers during 5 years (2010-2015), which means that 46 percent of rich paddy lands has been reduced. Agricultural lands and forest has been destructed by establishment of unnecessary roads and villas. Due to above mentioned changes the area of Maklenan (constructed area) was increased from 6.12 square kilometers to 12.11square kilometers during last five years (2010-2015).}
• _{Destruction of forest and flood extension risk, regarding to climate situation of area, topography and kind of soil, the probability of flood risk and landfall has been increased. The evidence of land destruction, housing and bridge by the flood obviously can be seen in the point of bridge between Maklevan and Kondesar.}
• _{As the experience of Masuleh shows, concentration of population in a location such as Maklevan will intensify the pollution of water resources especially Masuleh Rudhan River, because of the drainage of all wastewater are into this River.}
• _{Undermining the foundations of traditional production and its subsidiary production, elimination of handicraft production and vernacular architecture resulted into the attenuation of area tourism foundation. Extension of Tourism activities was one of the main goals of Maklevan development.}
• _{Due to Physical disturbance, functionally Maklevan has become a space that is urban space nor rural. Livelihood system shows the coexistence of agricultural, animal husbandry, service and business activities. Modern buildings are seen besides the cottages.}

     _{As a conclusion it can be said that growth pole theory is not suitable approach for settlements development in the country, or at least in the studied area. Since land use control and management should be in accordance with existing local reality. Land use planning process should be responsible of three fundamental questions: where are we? Where are we going? How can we arrive there? Rational decision making, different situation flexible approaches, emphasis on conservation of sustainability, harmony with nature, can prevent from adverse consequences of interference in nature. Therefore, abrupt town creation without gradual processes and using indigenous knowledge and people participation doesn't lead to creation of sustainable cities, but its outcome will irreparable harm to people and natural resources.}

Abstract

Coastal areas are dynamic and complex multi-function systems. A wide number of often conflicting human socio-economic activities occur in these areas. These include urbanization, tourism and recreational activities, industrial production, energy production and delivering, port activities, shipping, and agriculture. Coastal systems are also characterized by important ecological and natural values; their high habitat and biological diversity is fundamental to sustain coastal processes and provide ecosystem services which are essential also for human well-being. Human activities often conflict with the need to preserve natural coastal systems and their ecological processes.

   One of the most important applied problems in coastal geology today is determining the physical response of the coastline to sea-level rise. Predicting shoreline retreat and land loss rates is critical to planning future coastal zone management strategies and assessing biological impacts due to habitat changes or destruction. Presently, long-term (>50 years) coastal planning and decision-making has been done piecemeal, if at all, for the nation's shoreline. Consequently, facilities are being located and entire communities are being developed without adequate consideration of the potential costs of protecting or relocating them from sea-level rise-related erosion, flooding and storm damage.

   Research on major natural disasters and related technologies has become an important subject in geography and its application. The complexity analysis of the issue is possible in a system approach to theoretical and applied geography also in the integrity of physical and human geography.

Due to the Caspian Sea water-level fluctuation in coastal zone of Babolsar which happens very quickly in decade scale, the observance of safety element will be possible in light of the integrated coastal zone management with determine of sea frontage. In this context, geography and especially geomorphology is a main basic in this kind of coastal management.

   Detection of sea level fluctuations causing morphological changes in the earth surface and damage to facilities, clarifies the necessary of the present research to study the role of geomorphological indices in Babolsar coast zone constructions. The Coastal Vulnerability Index (CVI) is one of the most commonly used and simple methods to assess coastal vulnerability to sea level rise, in particular due to erosion and/or inundation. The CVI provides a simple numerical basis for ranking sections of coastline in terms of their potential for change that can be used by managers to identify regions where risks may be relatively high. The CVI results can be displayed on maps to highlight regions where the factors that contribute to shoreline changes may have the greatest potential to contribute to changes to shoreline retreat.

In this study, coastal vulnerability index (CVI) is used as effective geomorphic index on Babolsar coast zone constructions. In first, primary and secondary vertical frontages were detect using topographic data (digital elevation model with cell size 10-meter) and Caspian Sea water-level fluctuations.

   The primary vertical frontage includes areas which have the lower height of -24.7 meters and secondary vertical frontage consists of areas which are placed between -24.7 and -23.5 meters. Following this issue, within the primary and secondary vertical frontage, coastal vulnerability index was performed based on five parameters, elevation, slope, landform, land use and distance from main road. According to the coastal vulnerability based on natural (NCVI), human (HCVI) and total vulnerability index (TCVI), large parts of the Babolsar coastal zone (especially in Fereidoonkenar and Babolsar city areas) placed in classes of high and very high vulnerability.

   With respect to detection of the primary (level -24.7 m) and secondary (from level -24.7 to -23.5 m) frontages in Babolsar township area, 345 and 7177 hectares of the township lands are located in the primary and secondary vertical frontages, respectively. The most area of the township land uses in primary frontage belongs to natural structures that have 153 hectares of area. Survey of lands distribution in the height of -24.7 to -23.5 m (secondary vertical frontage) shows that agriculture land use has the most extent in this area; the area of this land use is 5293 hectares that equivalent to 74 percent of all lands which are located in the secondary frontage. Urban and industrial structures have 45 and 522 hectares of area in the primary and secondary frontages of Caspian Sea in Babolsar Township, respectively.

Air pollution has become one of the main problems of cities. Among the sources of air pollution, vehicular traffic plays an important role. Planning for efficient management and control of the air pollution caused by vehicular traffic requires accurate information on spatio-temporal dispersion of the pollutions. This research studies 3D spatio-temporal dispersion of NOx pollution caused by vehicular traffic at Valieasr-Fatemi intersection resides in Tehran, Iran. It is selected for being crowded and having the required meteorological and pollution data sensed by the Air Quality Control Corp. of Tehran Municipality.

This study uses GRAL that is a local micro-scale air dispersion model defined based on Euleran-Lagrangian dispersion models. It investigates the level of spatio-temporal autocorrelation generated by GRAL simulations at both 2D and 3D modes and discusses how it adapts with the reality.

Adopting the GRAL air pollution dispersion model, streets are defined as the linear source of pollution of NOx caused by vehicular traffic. The traffic rate is estimated based on street areas and directions, the designed average traffic velocity, traffic volume and car passage counting at the intersection. The 3D geometry of the buildings is also added to the model. All the required data that were available for winter of 2007 are gathered and introduced into the model.

The model is executed at 9 heights vary from 1.7 m to 52.5 m. These heights are defined covering a range from an average human level height to average building height and above. These levels are considered both separately in 2D mode and integrated into a 3D mode. The formation of NOx clusters is investigated analyzing their autocorrelation using Moran Index at global and local scale.

The calculated Moran-I at global scale at each 9 levels of heights, varies from 0.7 to 0.9 that depicts the validity of the GRAL model adopted to simulate the expected autocorrelation of pollution density affected by spatial issues. The Moran-I increases at higher levels as less air turbulence happens. However the result show that the turbulence increases temporarily at about 10m to 15m which are the average building heights. At local scale, the Moran-I/Anselin shows that HH clusters dominate at lower levels, around streets central areas that are farther from the buildings, and around the intersections. At higher levels, esp. higher than buildings average height, the LL clusters dominate. However the HH clusters formed around intersections, while are shrank, are still visible at high levels. The turbulence caused by building fronts and their down wash effect is also shown in the result as no definite cluster is formed near the buildings front and back.

The autocorrelation analysis is also carried for an integrated 3D model consists of all the 9 levels of heights. Considering the weight matrix for a 20m 2D neighborhood and 1m/s dispersion of the pollution vertically, the global calculated Moran-I equals 0.229 which shows existence of a spatio-temporal autocorrelation of the results generated by GRAL. At local scale the results show that the HH clusters have higher temporal dispersion rate than LL clusters.

Precipitation is one of the important aspects of the Earth’s climate that has both spatial and temporal variations. Understanding the behavior of this element and analyzing its spatial and temporal variation is importantwhich can lead to a comprehensive and detailed planning for water resource management and agriculture. Geostatistical techniques and spatial autocorrelation analysis are the most widely used techniques in the field of the spatial continuity. Spatial autocorrelation analysis is applied to help researchers understand the spatial patterns in the area.

      The purpose of this study is to identify the heavy precipitation spatial patterns in Guilan Province. For this purpose, the 6- hourly sea level pressure of the network from  0 to 120 Easter longitude and 0 to 80 Northern latitude with 2.5×2.5 degrees spatial resolution were obtained from the National Center for Environmental Prediction/National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCEP/NCAR) for the period 1979-2010. The daily precipitation data of 21 stations were obtained from the Islamic Republic of Iran Meteorological Organization and Ministry of Energy.

      Guilan province is one of the most humid regions in the country. The heavy rain days were selected as days when more than 30 percent of the all stations had daily rain amount more the 95^th percentile. As a result, 321 days were selected as heavy and widespread rainy days. By using principal component analysis these 321 days were reduced to 9 factors. These factors then were subject to cluster analysis with Ward method and resulted in three surface pressure patterns of heavy rainy days. Within the resulted pressure patterns by using local geostatistical techniques we identified the heavy rain spots and their spatial orientation. These spatial methods include Kriging,  Geostatistical Analysis, and Anselin local Moran index.

According to the results of this research, the first pattern was characterized with a high pressure over northern part of the Black Sea causing the highest Variance of heavy rainfalls. The second pattern is identified as a low pressure on the Black Sea. But the third pattern showed a precipitation distribution with low variation caused by the Siberian high-pressure. The results of Spatial Statistics techniques indicated that heavy rains were clustered in all there patterns. The clusters of heavy rains were localized mostly over the coastal areas and some over the central regions. The clusters of the western high-pressure patterns penetrated somewhat inside the province, while clusters of the Siberian high pressures was located on the shoreline of the province. The precipitation of western migratory high-pressures was heavier than of the Siberian high-pressure. The results of the standard deviation ellipse showed that heavy rain clusters were oriented in the east-west direction and were nonhomogeneous. While the ones oriented in the south east direction were more homogeneous and clustered. Because of this arrangement, the entry of moisture from the Caspian Sea is relatively concentrated on the East or North East. Because of the concentration of heavy rains in the central areas of the coast, the risks of floods and soil erosion is very high in these areas. This study showed that contrary to the popular belief, the heavy rains of Guilan were produced by western systems and the role of the Siberian high pressure is less important and is limited only to the coastline.

The temperature as an indicator of heat intensity is one of the basic elements of knowing weather. The frost is a condition when the air temperature is less than 0 c Due to the geographical possition of Iran, spring is a season that plants resume a new life after leaving a pause in a periode of the growth. At the beginning of such a periode emerge of sudden cold cause loss bloom (in the case of openinig) or delay in a beginning of plant growth periode (Azizi,2002). Recentley with occuring climate chaos, one of the important climatic disasters which treats human and particularly different  areas of the country are cold waves and sever frosts that in some years covers large area of the country.

    Surface data including minimum daily temperature of the days of 29 to 30 and 25 to 26 of march of 2003 and 2005 in 9 meteorological synoptic stations in the area of north west of Iran in  table (1) was collected  from meteorology organization then the days of cold waves in the above mentioned time periode, were analyzed. In ordet to analyse the synoptic patterns, using ncep/ncar data, maps of sea level pressure ,combined of  geopotential height and vorticity and temperature advection  using Grads were drawn and analysed in the levels of 1000 to 500 hpa.

    As it mentioned, during the time period, 29 to 30 and 25 to 26 of the march in 2003 and 2005, 2 clod system  were located on the area of north west. In oeder to explain and analyze of  synoptic patterns of  mentioned period time, the absolute minimum temperature below 0 degrees celsius of stations in western Azarbayejan province were selected and maps of sea level pressure, combined of  geopotential height and vorticity and temperature advection  using Grads were drawed and analysed in the levels of 1000 to 500 HPA. 

     The results showed that in the time of occuring hazardous cold waves of  29 to 30 of march 2003 and 25 to 26 of march 2005 and analyzing the sea level map in the first day of cold wave with spreading the cold core high pressure  from the eastern Europe and its location on north and east north of the black sea and its pentration from north west corner of the country covered most of the areas of the country. 

    Analyzing the combined maps of geopotential height and vorticity in the levels of 1000 and 850 HPA in the first day of occurrence of  cold, generaly faced with huge anticyclonic development . But in the levels of 700 and 500 HPA , the under studied area was in the south trough of the obtained cold core of the low height locating in the cetral Asia. But on the day of cold peak, high pressure core was exactly located on the under the studied area . Also in the upper levels of atmosphere with locating the back of the trough cumulated  of cold air of upper width on the sea level high pressure centre while strengthening the lower levels anticyclonic flows, led to intensifying cold and frost in the west Azarbayejan province. 

Positive and negative vorticity maximum cells, also conformed the intensity cold circulation flows on the north half of the country in anticyclone and cyclone centers in order. Also analysing the temperature advection in the levels of 1000 to 500 HPA, direction and temperature intensity exactly followed geopotential height maps patterns. 

     Such that in the levels of 1000 hpA of the both cold wave analysed, the anticyclonic cold temperature adcection and northward is located on the north west of the Iran. In temperature advection maps of 29 and 30 march 2003 in 850 HPA in Azarbayejan province, the anticyclonic circulation is matches with sea level high pressure. But in the 2nd cold wave that’s occured on 25 and 26 march 2005, the north west area is between 2 antycyclonic circulation on Mediterranean and cyclon located on south of  Russia that the directions of temperature cold flows is completely north ward in this level. 

    In the temperature advection maps of 700 and 500 HPA, the Azarbayejan province is in the western edge of central Asia trough or south of Russia. 

    The results showed that with studying  atmospheric motions and synoptic systems which create cold flows, we can prevent of spring late  emergence cold wave destructive impact on agricultural products, energy consumption, and road accidentd by  forcasting of these atmospheric conditions.

Vulnerability to natural hazards is one of the most important issues of villages in Iran. Iran is listed in the first ten accident-prone countries in the world. It annually imposes many damages on villages through natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods, etc. To tackle the problem, an important attempt was applied during the recent decades is the policy of resettlement. The mentioned policy has been followed in forms of movement, integration and aggregation of villages. As spatial foundation and location of settlements are mostly based on natural environmental factors, then before any attempt, or before any dislocation of the villages, ecological potential of the new place needs to be evaluated. However, as dislocations resulted from unpredicted events such as flood are associated with emergency conditions and would be done very quickly; there is not enough time for evaluation before the action. In result, conducting such plans, unlike their positive impacts on service-delivery, cannot be quite welcomed due to ignoring the ecological and environmental factors which need to be considered before any actions. Therefore, such plans can create some negative consequences and be considered as non-successful plans.

       One of the projects that have been implemented in connection with this issue in Golestan province is dislocating and integrating flooded villages on Kalaleh County during 2001 to 2006. Based on the mentioned plan, twelve villages which were located at higher section of Gorgan Roud and were aggregated and located at a new site named “PishKamar”. These villages were flood-damaged. Such a site was urgently constructed based on a top-down approach, urban-based patterns and without considering the needs and ideas of stakeholders. So, such a plan needs to be evaluated and assessed against some normal and standard criteria. As such mistakes can be repeated elsewhere, recognizing the pros and cons of such plans would be a good guide and experience for the next projects. The present paper aims to evaluate the ecological potential, physical design of the site as well as measuring the levels of PishKamar site resident’s satisfaction.

      This study is a kind of the ex-post facto evaluation and its methodology is descriptive – analytical. To do that, we have considered a four-steps ecological potential of the site using Makhdom’s model. We also have used the 1:50000 topography maps, 1:250000 geological maps, 1:100000 land-use maps and 1:100000 soil fertility and capacity. All layers were transferred into ArcGIS environment, for more analysis. Data collection was based on surveying, interview and questionnaire. The statistical sample include 1350 households heads resided at the studied site, of them 200 persons were randomly selected for data collection purposes(According to Cochran   in the formula, standard deviation was 36%, test statistical was 1.96 and α was equal to 0.05). The results of the first stage of our study indicated that based on 330 primary integrated cells and overlaying the maps, there would exist 13 homogenous ecological units. In addition, a significant proportion of the Makhdom indicators used to assess indices was confirmed by chi-square test. Accordingly, 67% of cells in class I with good ecological potential and 8/28% of the cells in the appropriate ecological class II and only 2.4 percent were in class 3 to be inappropriate ecologically. Thus, of total 13 units, 11 units with an area equivalent to 127 hectares were classified as class I and II, and environmental units with an area of three hectares in third class were inappropriate. Therefore, the studied site was evaluated as a good site in terms of ecological conditions.

     In addition, evaluation of residents' satisfaction mapping site in terms of compliance with the ecological conditions and the physical texture design which was based on systemic approach of sustainable development indicators was revealed that the maximum satisfaction of residents was related to house orientation and strength of buildings, road network design and architecture patterns.But the dimensions of environmental issues including soil resistance as a result of landslides, climate harmony with the architecture and the wind direction has not completely been considered. Totally, of 11 evaluated criteria, people were satisfied with 6 of them and disappointed with another 5 criteria. It was confirmed by T-test.

We can identify the flood not only considering circulation pattern in occurring day but also by studying circulation pattern a few days before fresh event. This subject has mutual approach. In one hand, it indicates  that circulation patterns which were before flood event have important role in determining the conditions and moisture content of studied area and playing the fundamental role in few coefficient of region because it determines the previous moisture. On the other hand, it indicates that we should tracking the rain-genesis synoptic systems from source to end place of their activity for studying floods and their meteorology factors which have created them. By this way, we can acquire more comprehensive recognition about the relationship between circulation pattern and floods. In the other words, the identification of synoptic patterns that have created the flood reveals not only the mechanism of their emergence but also is useful for prognosis and encountering with them. The extensive researches have been accomplished about Inundation in the world and Iran, but Iran haven’t much antiquity about synoptic researches. For foreign researches, we can name researchers such as Hireschboeck (1987), Kutiel et al(1996), Komusce and et al (1998), Krichak  and et al (2000), Rohli and et al (2001), Kahana (2002), Teruyuki Kato(2004), Ziv and et al (2005), Carlalima and et al (2009). The numerous researchers have studied the Inundation climatology in internal of country such as Bagheri (1373), Ghayour (1373), Kaviani and Hojatizadeh (1380), Moradi (1380), moradi (1383), Mofidy (1383), Masoodian (1384), Masoodian (1384), Hejazizadeh et al(1386), Parandeh Khozani and Lashkari (1389). In this research, we considered the heavy precipitation of Azar 1391 in southwestern of Iran that resulted in flood phenomenon in the cause and effect manner so that can do necessary prevention actions before occurring the flood for preventing the probable damages and optimal use of precipitations by forecasting the patterns that have created the flood.

In this synoptic study, we need to two database: one group is variables and atmospheric data consisting of geopotential height of 500 hpa level (in meter geopotential), zonal wind and meridional wind (in m/s) and special humidity (in gr/kg) during this times 00:00, 06:00, 12:00 and 18:00 Greenwich in 0-80° northern and 0-120° eastern with local resolution of 2.5*2.5 Arc that have been borrowed from database of (NCEP/NCAR) dependent to National Atmosphere and Oceanography Institute of USA, and other group is daily precipitation data of region rain gauge stations during 4-8^th Azar of 1391 (24^th November – 28^th November 2012). In continuation. By applying the environment- circulation approach, we took action to drawing circulation pattern maps of 500 hpa level, thickness of atmosphere patterns of 500-1000 hpa and moisture flux convergence function from 4-8^th Azar of 1391 (that for calendar, conform with 48 hours before beginning the showery precipitation until ending the storm activity) by using data which obtained from database of NCEP/NCAR and the synoptic conditions of above flood have been studied and interpreted in the region.

Flood is one of the most destructive natural hazards that have imposed and impose many damages to people during the history. Hence, the final aim of this research is to explain the key interactions between atmosphere and surface environment and in other words exploration of the relationship between circulation patterns leading to the flood generating precipitation in the southwestern of Iran for forecasting the time and intensity of showers occurrence that lead to flood. For this purpose, by applying environmental-circulation approach, the circulation patterns identified and studied which resulted in flood generating precipitation. The result of this research indicated that torrential precipitations in the region have formed the deep trough in days 4-8 of Azar on the east of Mediterranean and the studied region placed in the east half of this trough that is the location of atmosphere instability. At same time, thickness patterns, indicate the flux of cold air from northern Europe to lower latitudes and spreading the warm air of north of Africa to latitude 50° northern. As a result we expected the frontal discontinuity in the encountering place of these two air mass. Analysis of the moisture flux convergence patterns also indicated that torrential precipitations were the result of moisture flux from Mediterranean and Persian Gulf; and Red Sea and Arab Sea taken into account as reinforced sources.

The City-region of Tehran is encountered with various environmental problems, including traffic, air pollution, lack of drinking water and green space, physical texture conflict, flood and earthquake. Capital accumulation has considerable role in shaping spaces which can create and intensify environmental disaster in special socio-economic situation. The second cycle is the conversion of capital to fixed and long-term assets with the aim of further benefits, which in fact produces two types of artificially environment during this process namely the built environment for production, and the built environment for consumption.

The third cycle is aiming to connect science to production and increase production capacity by investment in science and technology. When production of surplus value reduced in the first cycle, surplus value of second cycle increases through speculation and real estate transaction (real estate capital). Therefore, the owners of the lands and buildings are encouraged in production, trade and supply of these type assets.

In the courtiers that are legally and administratively encounter with tax receipt problems,  urban lands ownership is deposited to market system without any control, hosing transaction continues without any limitation, situation is moving forward to personal vested interests, asset value rises rather than production value, the price of land and construction increase severely. In the above mentioned condition, beneficiaries attempt convert the natural resources including park, mountain, river privacy and road privacy to marketable commodity and legally or quasi legally seize them. Therefore, unreasonable construction and population density increases and city-region will encounter with environmental disasters.  

The main objective of this research is to understand the underlying factors of capital accumulation through construction and its impacts on createion and intensification of environmental disasters in the Tehran city-region.

  Five different regions of Tehran were selected for data collection. "Q-methodology" was used for gathering and analyzing data. The society of communication or people whom the study sought to identify their mentality towards the research topic, were 25 experts selected through purposive sampling. To set the concourse of communication, a combination of primary (experts commented in an interview) and secondary (sources of credit) sources have been used and   34 statements have been developed. After sorting the data for analysis, SPSS software data matrix is ​​formed. Factor analysis, as main method of analyzing Q data matrix has been used based on Q logical methodology.

The results of Q analysis depicted four viewpoints with variance of 95.911 percent on the underlying cause of capital accumulation through construction and its contribution on increasing risk of natural hazards in Tehran city-region.

The first viewpoint has devoted 52.800 percent of total variances and can be titled as" Function of real estate transaction and Non-productive economic domination".

The second viewpoint which has received 18.914 percent of total variances is accordance with "commodification of land and housing". The third viewpoint is" management and monitoring of the city-region space" with 15.163 percent of total variances.  The fourth viewpoints under the title of" monitoring and control of natural resources" has assigned 9.034 percent of total variances.

As result of these processes, land and housing business have weakened society's productive capacity by extensive land use change in the urban peripheral area's due to its huge and quick profit. The above process accompany with selling excess density policy created a powerful political and economic stratum which harmed city sustainable development. The mountainous area of north, north east and west of Tehran, have annexed to metropolis as a result of above mentioned regulation and  may gardens have converted to construction by different gropes and institutions.

Q method analysis depicted that the Tehran City-Region has converted from use value to exchange value. It means that values of the city including work, security, education, leisure and welfare have been lost in favor of exchange value. In other words, the city has been converted to a commodity for exchange and selling in pursuit of profit, rising cost of urban land, building and housing. Consequently, the city-region construction site is extended to the river beds, steep slops and surrounding natural environment. This in turn is leading to rapid land use change and violation of environmental and spatial rules and regulations and intensification of environmental hazards.

Frost is one of the sources of risk in agriculture which threatens the orchardists' performance and their security of products. The protection of cold-sensitive species of fruits against frost damage is an annual challenge in many growing regions of the world. Frost protection managerial behavior is the the first way to avoid or reduce the effects of frost damage to walnut trees. Application of active and passive methods of frost protection is effective under conditions of strong thermal inversions. However, most of studies on the adoption of managerial behaviors to environmental hazards usually ignore underlying psychological constructs that affect farmers’ decisions and behavior. Sepidan county is one the well-known regions of Fars province which is subjected to frost damage for its climatic nature. The amount of frost damage to walnut orchards of Komehr township, which is located in Northwest of Sepidan county is significantly substantial in recent years. The region is well-known for its walnuts and this product is the most important source of velliagers’ income. This research aims at investigating frost management behavior of walnut orchardists of Sepidan county, Fars province, Iran. The managerial behavior is composed of active and passive methods of protecting walnut trees to frost damage.

This applied study was based on descriptive correlational method. Data collection tools were structured questionnaires. The sample of this survey study was consisted of 90 orchardists of Komehr township. The sample orchardists were selected based on their vulnerability against frost. Structured questionnaires were used to collect information from a random sample of walnut orchardists that were interviewed. Face validity was confirmed by a panel of experts. And the reliability was confirmed by conducting a pilot study in Bardzard region. The calculated Cronbach’s alpha for the measures of the instrument were 0.53-0.82. Statistical package for social science (SPSS) in WINDOWS context was used for analyzing data. Coefficient of variation and cluster analysis was the most important analysis methods applied in this research.

Results revealed that active methods of frost protection includes burning fuel, tires etc., were the most common methods of controlling frost in walnut gardens. While using energy intensive practices (heaters, sprinklers) were shown the lowest rate of interest. However, orchardists' "perceived effectiveness", "perceived ease of use" and "perceived usefulness" of their active and passie controlling behavior was investigated. As it was shown by the results, orchardists' perception of effectiveness of the method of controlling frosts was in a low position. On the other words, they were not belived in the effectiveness of the methods. This was whilst, orchardists belived in ease of using the active and passive measures of controlling frost. They were noted that these methods had the potential of controlling damage to their gardens. Performing frost controlling methods was not easily applicable and garden's context was known as the most important barrier to performing the frost controlling behavior. To better understand orchardists' profile regarding to their frost protection behavior, cluter analysis was used. By means of this method, orchardists were categorized to two clusters: orchardists with convergent behavior with respect of frost protection protocol and divergent ones. Convergent group of orchardists (n=23, 25.5 %) were those who invested more on their gardens, used crop insurance supports, and more importantly they used lower levels of chemical products (poisons, fertilizers, etc.) on their gardens. On the other hand, divergent system of gardening regarding to frost protection pointed to the system of negative orientation towards rational thinking and behavior of gardening protection. These group of orchardist (n=67, 74.5%) were those who were performed eclologically dangerous methods of gardening regarding to use of pesticides, fertilizers and other chemical inputs. Low level of orientation towards crop insurance organizations and investment for the gardens were the most differtation factors for this group. However, results shed light on the difference of these two groups of orchardists regarding to their percievd effectiveness, ease of use and usefulness of frost protection methods. As it was shown by the results, frost protection- conevergent group of crchardists was significantly different from their divergent counterparts regarding their frost protection behavior and perception of ease of use and usefulness of frost protection methods. The aforementioned group of orchardists perceived frost protection methods easy to perform. From their viewpoints, these methods were useful in increasing crop yield, promoting its quality and controlling damge.      

Dust particles consist of important aerosols and resulting in blowing strong winds on the surface of desert areas. These particles enter the atmosphere under the influence of different factors including: weather condition (wind, precipitation and temperature), land surface (topography, humidity level, roughness and vegetation), soil features (texture, density, composition and land use (agriculture).

Today powerful dust storm destroys people lives and causes severe damages to their life and also causes financial problems in most regions of the world especially in west and southwest of Asia. Dust storm is one of the most important natural phenomena and also a kind of severe natural disaster that influence Iran and its west and southwest part. The location of Iran on the desert belt is accompanied by frequent increasing of sand and dust storm. Integral prediction of dust storm phenomena can be useful in decreasing damages caused by these storms. So synoptic-dynamic analysis of dust storms and their simulation play an important role in achieving to this goal.

In this research, we investigate severe dust storm in August 2005 that affected a large area of our country. Select of dusty days were based on minimum visibility and maximum durability of that dust storm. At first, we show the minimum of daily visibility table. These data has been provided by Meteorological Organization in 5 western cities. The synoptic maps were related to these phenomena derived from NOAA website and synoptic and dynamic interpretation has been done. We have got the data with resolution of 2.5 degree from NOAA website.

Then 700 hpa relative vorticity maps were drawn. We investigate MODIS images instrument on Aqua satellite and evaluate the amount of mass concentration of dust particles. Then the Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory Model has been used to determine the backward trajectory of dust particles. We run HYSPLIT model by GDAS data with a resolution of 0.5 degrees. At last we investigate the output of the WRE-CHEM model. This model was run to simulate dust storms in 7-10 August and FNL data with a resolution 1 degree use for initial and boundary conditions. WRF-CHEM is used to simulate dust condition and transmission. As a part of WRF model, its main application is the study of atmosphere chemistry.

At 500 hpa a very strong ridge entered Iran from the southwest. It covered all areas of our country which prevents the transference of dust to high levels of atmosphere. In 700 hpa relative vorticity maps show one day before dust storm reach to Iran a Positive voriticity is located in Iraq and Syria. So dust comes up to higher levels of the atmosphere and in dusty days in our country. There is a negative voriticity located in our country and because of downside movement of the air, dust storm happen in Iran.

Dust loading and friction velocity of outputs of the model has been drawn in dusty days. The time series of dust concentration of output models for Tabriz are compared with the concentration data of Environmental Organization of visibility data. Result show that a low pressure system is located over the Oman sea that its blaze has been extended to the northwest of Iran. On the other hand a high pressure center is located in the Europe that extended to the east of Mediterranean. So strong pressure gradient were in Iraq and Syria and they caused the creation of strong winds in their deserts which caused dust emission.

Friction velocity related to the model outputs show that the velocity of wind is high in dusty days in Iraq and Syria. So conditions are suitable for dust raining. Satellite images showed that WRF/CHEM model is simulated very well in emission, source, diffusion and the extent of the areas covered with dust. Comparing MP10 concentration of the model output with and Environment Organization data of Tabriz city show that WRF/CHEM model forecast daily changes well. But model underestimate significantly in quantity of concentration. This error may be due to a model considering only dust quantity but other pollutants affected on visibility. In general it can be said that in this event, dust concentration has been underestimated by WRF/CHEM model especially in maximum amount of PM10 concentration.

Drought is the most important natural disaster, due to its widespread and comprehensive short and long term consequences. Several meteorological drought indices have been offered to determine the features. These indices are generally calculated based on one or more climatic elements. Due to ease of calculation and use of available precipitation data, SPI index usually was calculated for any desired time scale and it’s known as one of the most appropriate indices for drought analysis, especially analysis of location. In connection time changes, most studies were largely based on an analysis of trends and changes in environment but today special attention is to the variability and spatial autocorrelation. In this study we tried to analyze drought zones in the North West of Iran, using the approach spatial analysis functions of spatial statistics and detecting spatial autocorrelation relationship, due to repeated droughts in North West of Iran and the involvement of this area in the natural disaster.

In this study, the study area is North West of Iran which includes the provinces of Ardebil, West Azerbaijan and East Azerbaijan. In this study, the 20-year average total monthly precipitation data (1995-2014) was used for 23 stations in the North West of Iran. In this study, to study SPI drought index, the annual precipitation data of considered stations were used. According to the statistical gaps in some studied meteorological stations, first considered statistics were completed. The correlation between the stations and linear regression model were used to reconstruct the statistical errors. Stations annual precipitation data for each month, were entered into Excel file for the under consideration separately and then these files were entered into Minitab software environment and the correlation between them was obtained to rebuild the statistical gaps. Using SPI values drought and wet period’s region were identified and zoning drought was done using ordinary kriging interpolation method with a variogram Gaussian model with the lowest RMS error. Using appropriate variogram, cells with dimensions of 5_×5km were extended to perform spatial analysis on the study area. With the establishment of spatial data in ARC GIS10.3 environment, Geostatistic Analyze redundant was used to Interpolation analysis Space and Global Moran's autocorrelation in GIS software and GeoDa was used to reveal the spatial relationships of variables.

The results showed that most studied stations are relatively well wet and this shows the accuracy of the results of the SPI index. Validation results of the various models revealed that Ordinary Kriging interpolation method with a variogram Gaussian model best explains the spatial distribution of drought in North West of Iran. So, using the above method the stations data interpolation related to SPI index in North West of Iran was done. The results showed that Moran index values for the analysis of results of standardized precipitation index (SPI) in all studied years, is more than 0.95. Since Moran’s obtained values are positive close to 1, it can be concluded that drought, in the North West of Iran during the statistical period has high spatial autocorrelation cluster pattern of 90, 95 and 99 percent. Results also showed that in all the years of study, Moran's global index is more than 0.95 percent. This type of distributed data suggests that spatial distribution patterns of drought in North West of Iran changes in multiple scales and distances from one distance to another and from scale to another and this result shows special space differences in different distances and scales in this region of the country. Results also showed that drought in North West of Iran in 2008 is composed of two parts: Moderate drought in parts of West and North West region (stations of Maku, Khoy, Salmas, Urmia, naghadeh, Mahabad and Piranshahr) and severe drought in the southeastern part of the study area (stations: Sarab, Khalkhal, Takab, Tabriz and Mianeh). So the pattern of cluster drought in the North West of Iran in 2008 is on the first and fourth quarter. The results of this index showed that drought and rain periods are similar in the studied stations. The results of the application of Moran's index about identifying spatial distribution of drought patterns showed that The values of the different years during the period,  have a positive a positive coefficient close to 1 (Moran's I> 0.959344) and this shows that the spatial distribution of drought is clustered. The results of the standard score Z values and the P-Value proved the clustering of spatial distribution of drought.

The results of the analysis of G public value, In order to ensure the existence of areas with clusters of high and low values showed that The stations of Maku, Khoy, Salmas, Urmia, naghadeh, Mahabad, Piranshahr and Parsabad follow the moderate drought pattern in the region and are significant at the 0.99 level. Jolfa station also has a mild drought of 0.95 percent confidence level and for Sardasht station is significant in 0.90 percent. High drought pattern in Sarab, Khalkhal, Takab, Tabriz and Mianeh stations was significant in 0.99 percent level and also for Ardabil, Sahand and Maragheh stations very high drought pattern was significant in 0.95 percent level and for Meshkinshahr and Ahar high drought pattern is significant in 0.90 percent. By detection of clusters of drought and rain in the North West of Iran using Moran’s spatial analysis technique and G general statistics a full recognition of the drought affected areas in this region can be obtained and take the necessary measures in its management 

Erosion is one of the most destructive and continuous phenomena that cannot be prevented and only could be controlled by studying the chemical and physical properties of soil. Marls are one of the most important sedimentary units in Iran which have high rate in sediment production and erodibility because of their Physico-chemical characteristics. These properties caused large environmental and civil damages and so, the study of erosion and erodibility of the marl units is essential. One of the most important points about marls is grain size nature and elements in them and their effects on amount of erosion. The physical and chemical proprieties of soil are very important in the development of badlands. This study deals with Physico-chemical properties of Marl and its impact on various land forms of erosion in Lotshur-Pakdasht region. Badlands are a typical landform of greatly dissected fine-grained materials in arid or semi-arid environments like Lotshour, although they are also found in different climatic conditions. Climate and geology are several factors determining the tendency to badland formation. Runoff, rain splash, marl and loose formations together with massive wasting processes such as creep, sliding and flow, become the dominant factors determining landform genesis, resulting in the formation of badlands in Clayey-silt slopes.

In this research, in addition to sampling the soil and sediments, rain simulated (using rain simulators) in two marl, two conglomerates and two alluvium  units, in area with different forms of erosion and runoff and produced sediment amounts in each point were measured in laboratory. Also, at the same time, soil samples were taken from adjacent plot and the amount of runoff and sediment produced in the laboratory, separated and measured in the lab for all points. parameters such as Ph, electrical conductivity, content of sodium, potassium, calcium, magnesium, gypsum, chlore, carbonate, solfate, nitrate, organic carbon, CEC was measured. In analyzing the data, analysis of correlations and Pearson and Spearman comparison of means method were used in SPSS software. Also, grain size and Aterberg limits for all samples were determined in lab.

Mineralogical, geochemical and grain-size composition of soil and pore-water chemistry parameters was characterized on both eroded (south-facing) and non-eroded (north-facing). Only a few grain-size parameters and mineralogy discriminate eroded from non-eroded slope substrates. Erosion occurs where the fine fraction is abundant. This may be due to reduced permeability in the eroded soil, whereas the non-eroded one is more stable with respect to weathering, as it is more permeable. The abundance of clay minerals is affected by pedogenetic processes in the non-eroded slope, which increases in mixed layers and indirectly reduces the amounts of other minerals, making clay mineralogy a discriminating parameter in the two different types. Chemical data enable discrimination between eroded and non-eroded slopes. pH, SAR (sodium adsorption ratio), TDS (total dissolved salts), mineralogy and PS (percentage of sodium) are distinctive parameters for both eroded and non-eroded slopes. TDS increases in depth in the non-eroded slope, whereas the maximum TDS is just below the crust in the eroded one. On average, eroded substrates are higher in pH, SAR and PS than non-eroded ones. The ESP (exchangeable sodium percentage) of the eroded slope has a higher value than the non-eroded one. Crusts are less dispersive than eroded substrates, and non-eroded substrates behave as crusts. This suggests that the portion of the slope most severely exposed to weathering tends to stabilize, due to strong decreases in SAR, PS and ESP. Several diagrams reported in the literature show similarly anomalous crust samples on eroded slopes, compared with other samples coming from greater depths on eroded slopes. In the present case study, the exchangeable form of Na characterizes crusts more than the soluble form. The meaning of maximum SAR and TDS (and covariant parameters) is interpreted as the effect of decreased permeability, as suggested by a local increase in the fine-grained fraction, which coincides with maximum TDS. Variations in SAR values are of primary importance for soil erosion, because many authors have used solution chemistry (i.e., SAR, PS, TDS, EC) as a descriptor of dispersity.

            Based on results of analysis of variance in various forms of erosion are significantly different in the sodium ion, sodium absorption ratio and the percentage of clay. The average amount of sodium ion and sodium absorption ratio in marl samples of region, increase from sheet to gully erosion forms while average clay percentage decreases in this trend. Finally, three variables of sodium ions, sodium absorption ratio and clay percentage of marl samples can be significant factors in erosion and related forms in this region. This study describes the erosional mechanism, which involves morphological and geographic exposure and climatic elements, as well as grain size, mineralogy, chemistry and exchangeable processes of soils.

In analyzing the data, correlation analysis and comparison of averages by the SPSS software has been used. As well as a brief comparison between north and south facing slopes that are different in terms of erosion, was also performed. Based on statistical analysis of in various land forms of erosion are significantly different in the sodium ion, sodium absorption ratio and the percentage of silt and clay. The average of sodium ion value and sodium absorption ratio increase from surface to gully erosion form and average silt percent reduced from surface to Gully erosion in marls outcrops in this area. Also, three variables of sodium ions, sodium absorption ratio and clay percent factors can be seen in the erosion of marl and create various land forms of erosion in the region.

Urmia Lake is one of the largest hyper saline lakes in the world and largest inland lake in Iran which located in the north west of Iran, between the provinces of East Azerbaijan and West Azerbaijan. The lake basin is one of the most influential and valuable aquatic ecosystems in the country and registered as UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. In addition, it is very important in terms of water resources, environmental and economic. Unfortunately, lake water level has dramatically decreased in recent years, due to various reasons. This issue has created some problems for Local people, especially people living in rural area in east of the Lake. The results of this research are of great importance for regional authorities and decision-makers in strategic planning for people of inhabits in east coast village.

The present paper is an attempt to integrate a semi-automated Object-Based Image Analysis (OBIA) classification framework and a CA-Markov model to show impacts of Urmia Lake Retrogression On eastern coastal villages. OBIA present novel methods for image processing by means of integration remote sensing and GIS. Process and outcome of this methodology can be divided in three step including: Segmentation, Classification and Accuracy assessment.in the process of segmentation aims to create of homogeneous objects by considering shape, texture and spectral information. A necessary prerequisite for object oriented image processing is successful image segmentation. In our research the segmentation step was performed by applying multi-resolution segmentation and considering 0.2 for shape and 0.4 for the compactness. The scale of segmentation is also an important option which leads to determine the relative size of each object. Having great values for scale leads to create large objects while smaller value would result small objects respectively. In this study the scale parameter of 100 has been selected based on the size of objects in Scale of study area as well as spatial resolution of the satellite images were used for segmentation. In doing so, we employed spectral and visual parameters contains: texture, shape, color tone and etc. for developing object based rule-sets.  To determine the characteristics of the spectral data and geometric features classes the fuzzy based classification was performed by employing fuzzy operators including: or (max) operator with the maximum value of the return of the fuzzy, the arithmetic mean value of fuzzy and the geometric mean value of fuzzy, and (min). After this step, the validation process was performed by using overall accuracy and Kappa coefficient. Then, using the CA-Markov Model The trend of changes was predicted in the future (For 2020). Another way to predict changes in land use and cover, used the CA-Markov model. Markov chain analysis is a useful tool for modeling land use changes. Markov chain model consists of three step: First step Calculating the probability conversion using Markov chain analysis, second step, Calculating the Cover and land use maps competently on the basis of multi-criteria evaluation, third step, assign locations cover and land use simulation based on the CA position operator.

Results of Satellite image processing indicate that the area of garden, Farmland, Zones of muddy-salty (Saline soils), moist salt and newly formed salt have increased while area of Urmia lake has rapidly dropped between 1984 and 2015. The area of Urmia lake declined from 4904.51 square kilometers in 1984 to 676.79 square kilometers in 2015. The farmland area increased from 177.72 square kilometers in 1984 to 542.37 square kilometers in 2015. The garden area increased from 83.71 square kilometers in 1984 to 227.28 square kilometers in 2015. The moist salt area increased from 111.89 square kilometers in 1984 to 945 square kilometers in 2015. Zones of muddy-salty (Saline soils) area increased from 859.01 square kilometers in 1984 to 2986.5 square kilometers in 2015. The newly formed salt increased from 171.27 square kilometers in 1984 to 921.99 square kilometers in 2015. Markov chain model results indicate in 2020 the garden area will be 638 square kilometers, the moist salt area will be 717 square kilometers, Zones of muddy-salty (Saline soils) area will be 4127 square kilometers, the farmland area will be 644 square kilometers, the newly formed salt area will be 363 square kilometers and the Urmia lake area will be 118 square kilometers.

Today slum refers to those areas of the city which are not necessarily situated at the corners of the city, but to those which are in margins from economic, social, cultural, and other urban life aspects, that has formed a settlement in which the least living-supplies of healthy water, electricity and gas, transportation system and a clean environment suffice their lives. This type of settlement is due to the asymmetry and commonality of features and conditions of living in the main parts of the city. And generally indicate the low level of living conditions in comparison with the average standards in the main city specifically, and also in living conditions in cities as a whole. On the other hand, informal settlement refers to the discordance of settlement with the approved regulations of governmental organizations and particularly of municipalities. Those areas which are situated outside the servicing scope of the general and governmental organizations such as electricity, gas, and telecommunications offices, along with municipalities accompany various phenomena such as urban poverty, poor housing, immigration from countryside to cities, environment pollution, unhealthy environments and etc.

            In Iran, slum began in the 30s (solar calendar) with the immigration of village dwellers to the cities, and after a decade, it was prospered due to land reforms and economic-social policies of the day, a growing increase which has never stopped since. Slum or informal settlement in the outer parts of the cities is not just a physical notion but is an outcome of the macro structural factors in economic, social, cultural, and political aspects in a national or regional scope. The reasons for this phenomena vary which can differ from one place to another. Nevertheless immigration is one of the main reasons for slum settlements. It can simultaneously play two roles; it can be a solution to demographic crises. It leads the surplus population out of the region and accordingly the human power is directed where is needed most. It balances the structural asymmetries of population and by reducing the development imbalances in different regions result in the betterment of the status quo. And on the other hand, it might be possible that by immigration of the human power, the economic equilibrium between the source and destination community would be disturbed, and by having a community without any human power, it generates complex social and cultural situations; which all in all leads to a congested crowd overpopulating specific big cities and regions.  In this way, it brings about problems in servicing and efficient regulation of issues and thus be regarded as a disturbing element of development and mutual understanding. The investigated region has been exposed to the crises of immigration and slum settlements recently, so much so that based on the population and housing census of 2006, population growth rate of Shahriar rose by a far distance from other cities to 8.7 percent. Thus, this research was conducted to investigate the elements of immigration and slum dwelling in Shahriar city. And it aims to answer these questions:

1. How social, economic, and demographic factors influence the slum settlements of those who have migrated to this city?
2. How is the local dispersion in Shahriar?

On this basis, with the researches and investigations conducted at the outset of the study, district 2 was selected as a fit choice out of the three districts of 1, 2, and 3 which settled slums. Since all the locals were not slums in this specific districts, with proper investigation the slum areas were identified which had a high rate of immigration; with whom interviews were ran and questionnaires distributed. To this end, by following Cochran formula, 200 people were selected as samples through cluster random sampling out of the statistical community. To analyze data, descriptive statistical methods such as central index, dispersion and inferential statistics like Chi-square, Wilcoxon and Friedman tests were utilized.

The results of the  study indicates that the slum in Shahriar are situated in the old and cheap sections of the three districts of 1, 2, and 3. Also, after a detailed examination it was proved that Shamloo local in district 2 is more suitable than the other ones. On the other hand, by investigating the economic factors (such as job opportunities and income) it was indicated that immigration is very important from the aspect of providing job opportunities. Secondly, social factors are more important in slum settlements issues. For instance, one can refer to urban and welfare facilities, educational facilities, health and recreation facilities are all social factors. On the other hand, those people who have migrated due to pursuing education, higher level of welfare, better facilities etc. are all below 30 years old. Based on the findings of this research, families were not significantly changed after immigration in comparison with the period before it, but it is a vital element in three membered families in times of immigration. All has been done to meet the financial needs of the family. Therefore, one can claim that most immigrations to slum areas have been due to economic and social deficiencies of the source society.

Nowadays, the severity of the drought hazard has reached a point that has affected all the rural and urban areas surrounding it. Increasing the resilience of villages via livelihood solutions, is one of the best strategies for reducing the vulnerability of villages against natural hazards such as drought. The eastern side of the Lake Urmia consists of the six cities of Osku, Azarshahr, Bonab, Shabestar, Ajabshir and Malekan. Totally, there are 199 villages in this region, which are affected by the drought of the Lake, directly and indirectly and according to the statistics, the quantitative and qualitative reduction in agricultural and livestock productions and soil quality, the incidence of respiratory diseases and … have risen sharply compared to the past and a number of villages have been evacuated. Also because of the lack of a coherent strategy, which should be taken by the planners and authorities, the important measures to revitalize the Lake has not been taken yet and the dimensions of the threat are increasing day by day.

Current study investigate the factors affecting the resilience of rural settlements of the eastern side of the Lake Urmia against Drought. This is an applied and analytic-explanatory research. The data is collected by questionnaire from the villagers living in rural areas of the six cities, which are the statistical population of the research and the total number of the villages estimated 199 with 232295 persons.

The standardized Perception Index (SPI) is used to estimate the varying degrees of the villages in the eastern side of the Lake Urmia. In the next step, the possession index for each of the villages was calculated and the studied villages were classified based on it. On this basis and by considering the four status of drought and the three levels of possession, after sorting the villages on the basis of these two indexes, 43 villages were chosen from different regions of the eastern side of the Lake as the first level of analysis, using systematic random selection. Also, to classify the villages in the regard of possessing of the development facilities, the composite indicators called Morris pattern and 47 existing items are used, which are calculated in 9 different indexes. Finally, the obtained information were analyzed using SPSS and GIS software.

Regarding to the research findings at the eastern side of the Lake and on the basis of Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), about 78% of this area has been experiencing drought. Also, the status of the overall indicators of household's livelihood capital on the basis of the Normal Scale from 0 to 10 is 3.34, which shows the unfavorable status of this index. The results of the study in the field of the level of civil and institutional development showed that on the basis of the Normal scale from 0 to 10, civil development is 4.86 and institutional development is 3.69. Lastly, the research findings for the three levels of the sustainable development of the livelihood shows that the livelihood diversification is 3.61, in depth agriculture 3.24 and migration strategy is 3.02. The analysis of the results of the sustainable livelihood shows that the decrease of drought of the villages increases the diversity of the livelihood of the villagers. According to the results obtained, the mean of the resilience index of the investigated households on the basis of 0 to 10 equals to 4.86, which is close to the average level. The classified distribution of the resilience level and the focus of the more than of 56% of the households with average level of resilience confirms this situation. 30.26% of the households has low resilience and 15.64% has high resilience in the face of existing conditions. Upon this basis, the highest amount of the resilience equals to 5.38, which exists in the villages with severe drought conditions and by decrease of the drought, the resilience of household’s decreases. Finally it can be said that the villages with a long history of vulnerability from drought and also having more intense droughts, has a higher resilience level in dealing with the situation.

According to the results, the highest amount of vulnerability exists in the villages with low experience in dealing with the long-term conditions of drought, which their economic and social structures are not prepared to deal with the conditions. While the average amount of the livelihood capitals and the resilience of the studied statistical population do not show an appropriate conditions, but totally, the results and relationships of the studied variables conforms the role of possessing all dimensions of livelihood capital on taking appropriate approach to dealing with the conditions of drought in the Lake Urmia. In the field of taking the approaches of diversifying the livelihood resources of the villagers, there are several scientific and examined solutions, such as considering the education and awareness as a definite reality, also the knowledge and skills of the villagers in the fields of modifying the crop patterns, water saving strategies, the use of efficient products and making use of the other high-income jobs must be increased.

In the field of educational solutions, besides providing modern knowledge and international successful experiences, it must be possible to make use of the indigenous knowledge and experiences of the villagers.

Climate change is one of the crucial factors, which threaten many sector such as agriculture, water resource for decades, and the sector is more sensitive to climatic conditions.  Communities are the most vulnerable to the adverse impacts of climate change and variability because of their low adaptive capacity. One of the challenges of climate change and human spatial dimensions of climate change in international borders where climate change, and creates special challenges. Populated places in the East where rapid urbanization, industrialization and agricultural intensification result in vulnerability to climate change, water shortages as the main concern arises.

 Adaptation to climate change is the adjustment of a natural or human system to moderate the impacts of climate change, to take advantage of new opportunities or to cope with the consequences. Trying to identify the attitudes of people and their mental models of climate change can provide application to manage the post-change. Culture and engineering modeling approaches minds of scientists for climate risk management and climate change consequences have adopted. The review focused on farmers’ perceptions on changes in temperature, precipitation (rainfall), adaptation measures taken by farmers, barriers inhibiting these adaptation measures and the socioeconomic determinants of adaptations to climate change in Sistan plain.

The aim of this study is to provide mental system model, and understanding of climate change is to adapt these areas. To carry out this study to develop a theoretical framework for the model to adapt to climate change was discussed in Helmand. The field study was to assess the views of people on climate change action. The review found out that most farmers in this region are aware that the continent is getting warmer, and precipitation or rainfall patterns have changed. People with new changes and features adaptive approach to the challenges ahead were investigated. This data is based on knowledge (awareness) of water and climate change adaptation and mitigation strategies and be ready. So how compliance action is preventive in nature and to reduce the repercussions of climate change and the potential benefits of a region in the face of these side effects are formed. Most respondents aged over twenty years are at least a decade to climate change are felt to be most frequent subjects 30 to 40 years old. The data collected were processed using statistical techniques and modeling for ranking and evaluation of adaptation strategies were created and ASI index. The results for the insights, policy makers and service providers for local development is important, and can be targeted measures used and the promotion and adoption of coping mechanisms with the potential to build resilience and adapt to climate change and the resulting effects environmental prepare.

The results showed that most people in the region following the election of climate change is adaptive behavior. In total, there are 15 strategies in the region. The ASI index rating of strategies to change the pattern of cultivation, selection of resistant strains, reducing the amount of land-cultivated variety is the pattern of adaptation to environmental changes. Ensuring awareness of and adaptation to climate variability call was conducted with the cooperation of the people. Therefore, variability of climate and natural features of the area was measured by various options. The results show that already sampled respondents in the community are aware of climate change. 60% of respondents strongly observed signs of climate change and the dry season and low rainfall and warmer temperatures to believe. The main adjustment options adopted by farmers to temperature in the region include change of product types and number of ships that 61.6 percent of the farmers that their efforts. Another priority is that 39 percent of them tend to change sowing dates and planting varieties resistant to drought. The main recommendations for adapting to new circumstances in this region to stimulate the economy and livelihood of local people can be to diversify crop production (food for example, and cash crops, annual and permanent crops greenhouse) and the use of foreign income from farm sources (ecotourism, rural tourism) can be cited.