Exposure to human influence – a geographical field approximating intensity of human influence on landscape structure

A new spatial variable for the land use and land cover change modelling is introduced, approximating the intensity of human influence on the landscape. The ‘exposure’ simulates the dilution of human activity from settlements (source points with information about population size or other human activity quantification) to landscape, based on the accessibility. Exposure to a settlement is directly proportional to its population size and inversely proportional to the cost distance from the settlement. Cost distance uses the sine of the slope angle as a cost raster to simulate a barrier effect of the terrain. Overall exposure to human influence summates exposure to all individual settlements in a region. The resultant raster field created for Slovakia achieves observable resemblance to the actual intensity of land use derived from Corine Land Cover map. The ArcGIS tool developed for the exposure calculation is supplemented.