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Impact from Tourism on Vegetation Greenness in Yellowstone National Park

Runfors, Fenja LU (2023) In Student thesis series INES NGEK01 20231
Dept of Physical Geography and Ecosystem Science
Abstract (Swedish)
Tourism has increased drastically during the last decades in Yellowstone National Park, from nearly 20 000 visitors in 1910 to almost five million visitors in 2021. Yellowstone is an important ecosystem with unique wildlife, and geological and cultural history. It has a high variety of plants and serves as the home for many different animal species. Previously, tourism has been found to have an impact on vegetation. Trampling reduces vegetation and tourists scare away animals and pollute the waters. The aim of this thesis is to study the effects of tourism on vegetation greenness with the use of remote sensing and the normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI; a proxy for vegetation greenness) in Yellowstone National Park, USA. To study... (More)
Tourism has increased drastically during the last decades in Yellowstone National Park, from nearly 20 000 visitors in 1910 to almost five million visitors in 2021. Yellowstone is an important ecosystem with unique wildlife, and geological and cultural history. It has a high variety of plants and serves as the home for many different animal species. Previously, tourism has been found to have an impact on vegetation. Trampling reduces vegetation and tourists scare away animals and pollute the waters. The aim of this thesis is to study the effects of tourism on vegetation greenness with the use of remote sensing and the normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI; a proxy for vegetation greenness) in Yellowstone National Park, USA. To study the impact of tourism, the area in the park was divided into different zones depending on their distance to roads and trails being the source of influence from tourism. The NDVI values are being compared between years from 1991-2013, with a lower tourist rate, and the years 2015-2022 with a higher tourist rate. Vegetation close to roads seem to be more impacted by the increased amount of tourism than areas close to trails. However, the results cannot prove that there is any statistically significant impact from tourism on any areas. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
Runfors, Fenja LU
supervisor
organization
course
NGEK01 20231
year
type
M2 - Bachelor Degree
subject
keywords
Yellowstone National Park, NDVI, Remote Sensing, Tourism
publication/series
Student thesis series INES
report number
601
language
English
id
9130400
date added to LUP
2023-06-27 11:01:48
date last changed
2023-06-27 11:01:48
@misc{9130400,
  abstract     = {{Tourism has increased drastically during the last decades in Yellowstone National Park, from nearly 20 000 visitors in 1910 to almost five million visitors in 2021. Yellowstone is an important ecosystem with unique wildlife, and geological and cultural history. It has a high variety of plants and serves as the home for many different animal species. Previously, tourism has been found to have an impact on vegetation. Trampling reduces vegetation and tourists scare away animals and pollute the waters. The aim of this thesis is to study the effects of tourism on vegetation greenness with the use of remote sensing and the normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI; a proxy for vegetation greenness) in Yellowstone National Park, USA. To study the impact of tourism, the area in the park was divided into different zones depending on their distance to roads and trails being the source of influence from tourism. The NDVI values are being compared between years from 1991-2013, with a lower tourist rate, and the years 2015-2022 with a higher tourist rate. Vegetation close to roads seem to be more impacted by the increased amount of tourism than areas close to trails. However, the results cannot prove that there is any statistically significant impact from tourism on any areas.}},
  author       = {{Runfors, Fenja}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Student Paper}},
  series       = {{Student thesis series INES}},
  title        = {{Impact from Tourism on Vegetation Greenness in Yellowstone National Park}},
  year         = {{2023}},
}