Canopy Change Assessment and Water Resources Utilization in the Civano Community, Arizona

Abstract

The Civano community of Tucson, Arizona, is built for sustainability. Trees and plants are precious resources in the community and balancing human needs and natural resources. The design of rainwater harvesting systems and the usage of reclaimed water inside the community effectively irrigate plants and save drinking water. This project estimates canopy changes over time and explores the effect of water resources on plant growth for developed areas and natural areas, respectively. This project generates land cover classifications for 2007, 2010, and 2015 using supervised classification method and measures canopy cover change over time. Based on City of Tucson Water “harvesting rainwater guide to water-efficient landscaping”, this project discusses if water supply meets plant water demand in the developed areas of the community. Additionally, the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) data for developed area and natural area over ten years are compared and provide a correlation analysis with water sources. The results show that canopy cover across the entire community decreased from 2007 to 2010, then increased from 2010 to 2015. Water supply in the developed areas is sufficient for plant water demand. In natural areas plant growth changes dramatically as a result of precipitation fluctuation. In addition, it’s proved that 2011 National Land Cover Database (NLCD) tree canopy underestimates canopy cover in the Civano community. The final products not only provide the fundamental canopy cover data for other studies, also serve as a reference of water efficient landscaping within a community.