Book cover image for second edition of the book GIS for Disaster Management Technical Exercises Home

This is the companion website for techical exercises from the book Geographic Information Systems (GIS) for Disaster Management (second edition). This page contains an overview of the books' exercises, links to exercise video walkthroughs, and other additional materials.

Overview: A major difference between the first and second book editions are the technical exercises. A particular point was made in writing the exercises to cover mainstream commercial GIS technology as well as well-established open-source technology for the widest possible coverage. Because these exercises were being written into a printed book, they were made to be as flexible as possible and able to stand the test of time. However, technology always changes, so ideally the concepts they present will be transferable to new technology platforms.

Additionally, there are always multiple ways to achieve tasks when using particular software titles. Thus, the exercises do not claim to be the only way to achieve the stated outcomes. You can think of the exercises as starting points that, if you are so motivated, you can modify to your teaching and/or learning style.

Software Notes: The software used for the book exercises was:

Suggested Pre-Requisite GIS Software Skills:

The book does not focus on software operation training. Rather, the exercises provide the minimal set of software operation instructions so the student can stay focused on achieving the lesson objectives. With that said, the following is a list of pre-requisite GIS software skills that would be useful to have in order to complete the exercises:

  • Working with shapefiles
  • Adding data to maps
  • Stylizing maps
  • Creating layouts
  • General use of ArcGIS Pro and QGIS project files

Technical Exercise Overviews

For detailed exercise instructions, purchase the book from Routledge Press »

Exercise 1-1: Compile and Critically Examine Disaster Management Maps

Skill level: beginner.

Purpose: the purpose of this exercise will be for you gain experience and knowledge with finding and critically examining maps related to disaster management in terms of how those maps provide geographic context.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • how to find maps related to disaster management;
  • how to critically examine disaster management maps in terms of the “who, what, where, why, and how” aspects of a disaster situation and geographic context.

GIS software used: N/A.

Video tutorial provided: No.


Exercise 2-1: Fundamentals of Geographic Information

Skill level: beginner.

Purpose: the purpose of this exercise will be for you to gain knowledge on the mechanics of how geographic maps work as communication devices and to understand basic principles of geographic information as represented in paper maps as per topics presented in this chapter.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • the various components that make up a map and how they function;
  • how to intelligently read maps and use the information contained in maps to derive basic geographic facts.

GIS software used: N/A.

Video tutorial provided: No.


Exercise 2-2: Basic Thematic Map-Making with GIS Software

Skill level: beginner.

Purpose: the purpose of this exercise will be for you to gain knowledge and experience in cartographic design by constructing a basic thematic map related to disaster management using either ArcGIS Pro or QGIS. Specifically, you will build a basic thematic map to investigate the relationship between earthquakes, population levels, and roads categories in California, USA.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • how to apply cartographic design concepts for thematic information;
  • how to establish figure–ground relationships in a map you create.

GIS software used: ArcGIS Pro or QGIS.

Video tutorial provided: Yes, see: Exercise 2-2: Basic Thematic Map-Making with GIS Software Video Walkthrough


Exercise 3-1: Basic Table Join

Skill level: beginner.

Purpose: the purpose of this exercise will be for you to gain knowledge on how to perform a basic table join using desktop GIS software.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • how to work with data in a comma separate values (.csv) format;
  • how to perform a table join between a shapefile and a .csv file.

GIS software used: ArcGIS Pro or QGIS.

Video tutorial provided: Yes, see: Exercise 3-1: Basic Table Join Video Walkthrough


Exercise 3-2: Basic Python Scripting with ArcGIS Pro and ArcPy

Skill level: beginner/intermediate.

Purpose: the purpose of this exercise will be for you to gain experience and knowledge with basic GIS programming concepts and algorithm development.

Learning objectives:

  • how to write basic Python statements that use variables, import statements, for loop, and the ArcPy library;
  • how to run Python code written outside of ArcGIS Pro in the ArcGIS Pro Python window.

GIS software used: ArcGIS Pro, Notepad++.

Video tutorial provided: No.


Exercise 3-3: Basic Python Scripting in QGIS with PyQGIS

Skill level: beginner/intermediate.

Purpose: the purpose of this exercise will be for you to gain experience and knowledge with basic GIS programming concepts and algorithm development within the QGIS 3.x environment.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • how to write basic Python statements that use variables, for loop, and PyQGIS libraries;
  • how to run Python code written outside of QGIS in the QGIS Python window.

GIS software used: QGIS, Notepad++.

Video tutorial provided: No.


Exercise 4-1: Obtaining Free Remote-Sensing Imagery (Landsat) from USGS Earth Explorer

Skill level: beginner.

Purpose: the purpose of this exercise will be for you to gain knowledge on how to obtain free remote sensing imagery that can be used in disaster management applications.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • how to obtain Landsat images from USGS Earth Explorer.

GIS software used: ArcGIS Pro 2.x or QGIS 3.x if you wish to view the images.

Video tutorial provided: No.


Exercise 5-1: Accessing Humanitarian Datasets from Multiple Organizations

Skill level: beginner.

Purpose: the purpose of this exercise will be for you to gain knowledge on how to compile free geographic datasets and other related information from multiple international organizations discussed in this and other chapters of this book involved in humanitarian emergencies.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • how to obtain free geographic datasets and other related information from multiple international organizations involved in humanitarian emergencies;
  • how to critically examine datasets downloaded, identify possible issues with datasets downloaded, and identify gaps and limitations with the datasets.

GIS software used:ArcGIS Pro or QGIS.

Video tutorial provided: No.


Exercise 6-1: Hot Spot Analysis and Visualization of Conflict Events

Skill level: intermediate.

Purpose: the purpose of this lab will be for you to gain experience and knowledge on conducting a hot spot analysis using Getis-Ord Gi*.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • how to test a hypothesis using a spatial statistic;
  • how to combine various spatial analysis tools (Integrate, Collect Events, Incremental Spatial Autocorrelation [ISA]) to conduct a hot spot analysis via Getis-Ord Gi*;
  • how to visualize the results of your hot spot analysis using the Inverse Distance Weighted (IDW) technique.

GIS software used: ArcGIS Pro (only).

Video tutorial provided: Yes, see: Exercise 6-1: Hot Spot Analysis and Visualization of Conflict Events Video Walkthrough


Exercise 7-1: 311 Harvey Call Data Heat Mapping with Kernel Density

Skill level: intermediate.

Purpose: the purpose of this lab will be for you to gain experience and knowledge with developing heat maps related to a disaster-response event.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • how to use a Kernel Density tool;
  • how to visually represent and map point data as a heat map based on outputs from a Kernel Density mapping tool.

GIS software used: ArcGIS Pro or QGIS.

Video tutorial provided: Yes, see: Exercise 7-1: 311 Harvey Call Data Heat Mapping with Kernel Density Video Walkthrough


Exercise 8-1: Sustainable Debris Removal with Networking Analysis

Skill level: intermediate.

Purpose: the purpose of this lab will be for you to gain experience and knowledge with generating service areas and routes related to a disaster-recovery event using networking analysis tools.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • how to filter datasets using SQL to conduct focused analysis;
  • how to generate service areas using network analysis tools;
  • how to generate routes using network analysis tools.

GIS software used: ArcGIS Pro or QGIS.

Video tutorial provided: Yes, see: Exercise 8-1: Sustainable Debris Removal with Networking Analysis Video Walkthrough


Exercise 9-1: Creating a Displacement Natural Disaster Resilience Index

Skill level: intermediate to advanced.

Purpose: the purpose of this lab will be for you to gain experience and knowledge with developing a spatial index using refugee natural disaster resilience in Rwanda as a case study.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • how to develop a spatial index framework;
  • how to convert vector datasets to raster datasets;
  • how to use the Euclidean Distance (ArcGIS Pro) or Proximity Analysis (QGIS) tools;
  • how to derive slope values from a Digital Elevation model;
  • how to reclassify datasets to a common measurement scale;
  • how to combine and weight datasets to develop a final spatial index score.

GIS software used: ArcGIS Pro or QGIS.

Video tutorial provided: Yes, see: Exercise 9-1: Creating a Displacement Natural Disaster Resilience Index Video Walkthrough


Exercise 10-1: Classifying Hurricane Damage Imagery with Machine Learning

Skill level: intermediate to advanced.

Purpose: the purpose of this lab will be for you to gain experience and knowledge with how to use and evaluate a machine-learning algorithm (Support Vector Machine [SVM]) to classify imagery in a disaster-response context.

Learning objectives: after completing this exercise, you will know:

  • how to create training samples to classify imagery with the Support Vector Machine algorithm;
  • how to assess the results of a machine-learning algorithm by creating and modifying accuracy assessment points to “ground truth” and compare the results of a machine-learning algorithm against human judgement;
  • how to assess the results of a machine-learning algorithm by creating and interpreting a confusion matrix that quantifies the results of comparing a machine-learning algorithm classification with a human classification.

GIS software used: ArcGIS Pro (only).

Video tutorial provided: Yes, see: Exercise 10-1: Classifying Hurricane Damage Imagery with Machine Learning Video Walkthrough

For detailed exercise instructions, purchase the book from Routledge Press »

Technical Exercises Video Inventory: A complete list of all the book's video. Includes the video's name, URL, and length. (.pdf, 92 kb)

Technical Exercises Youtube Video Playlist

Additional Resources

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