Scientific Sessions

5 parallel scientifc sessions are organized covering the following themes:

A) Economic, Transport and Tourism Geography (Convenors: M. Aalbers, F. Dobruszkes and D. Bassens)

This conference theme hopes to attract research within the broadly defined fields of economic, transport, and tourism geography. More specifically, we intend to receive, but do not limit ourselves, to papers on the following topics: (global) urban systems and networks, urban political economy, service industries, financialization, real estate and finance, transport geography, mobility studies, regional development and policy, tourism geographies, etc. As there may be some overlap with the urban and cultural geography track, this theme is intended for papers that have a more economic inclination, even when dealing with urban issues. Given the conference focus on cartography, contributors are encouraged to make the visualization of their results a substantive element of their presentation, as well as to consider how their research allows us to reflect on the (future) role of critical geographers in economy and society.

B) Urban and Cultural Geography (Convenors: D. Vanneste, M. Van Criekingen and B. van Heur)

Cities are at the forefront and key engines of globalization, playing a key role in transforming bounded national state territories into an uneven and hierarchically patterned mix of networked urban spaces. These urban spaces, and the people living and working in these spaces, are deeply shaped by the very political, economic, social and cultural relations to other urban spaces across the world. The topic ‘urban and cultural geography’ invites presentations that tackle and investigate this relational challenge through sustained empirical, methodological or theoretical research. This includes (but is not limited to) presentations on the mobility of urban politics and policy, translocal connections developed by social movements, positions of cities within wider urban hierarchies or the effects of global cultural networks on the lived diversities within cities.

C) GIS and Environmental Modelling (Convenors: S. Vanwambeke, N. Van de Weghe and F. Canters)

The past decade has witnessed a remarkable progress in the development of GIS based technologies, not only affecting the way spatial data are managed, yet also how these data are used. A wide range of satellite and airborne sensors are nowadays available enabling us to map and monitor the environment at different spatial scales in a nearly continuous fashion. At the same time the use of mobile sensor platforms has facilitated real-time data gathering and also provides new ways for interaction with stakeholders in projects involving the use of spatial data or geolocation. The ever increasing amount of spatially-enabled data that is nowadays available also poses new challenges though in terms of how this data can be managed, analysed and used most effectively.
With 2015-2016 being proclaimed as International Map Year, the role of geographic information and GIS based technologies in research and in society will be worldwide on the agenda. This theme will therefore focus on how geo-enabled technologies and geospatial modelling may help us in better understanding and dealing with the environmental issues we are facing today, how the outcome of spatial environmental research is best communicated to its stakeholders, and how these stakeholders may be involved in the research process itself. We welcome contributions on new approaches for spatial data handling, as well as studies highlighting the potential of geospatial analysis for policy oriented research.

D) Geomorphology, Natural Resources and Hazards (Convenors: N. Broothaerts, A. Frankl and M. Kervyn)

Terrestrial landscapes are shaped by natural processes involving complex interactions between the lithosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere and biosphere. These control the spatial distribution and local variations of natural resources and potentially hazardous processes. The increasing human imprint on landscapes and exploitation of natural resources greatly impact on geomorphological systems leading to the environmental degradation and increasing impacts of hazards. This theme invites presentations that investigate the spatial character of geomorphological and environmental processes and the influence of – and impact on – human activities on from local to global scales. This includes, but is not restricted to, research on soil processes, erosion, geological and hydrological hazards, ecosystem services and landscape evolution. We encourage contributors to give a special attention to discuss the way to best represent spatially-explicit research results using cartographic products adapted to targeted end-users.

E) Climate, Meteorology and Ice (Convenors: F. Pattyn, X. Fettweis and P. Huybrechts)

Climate has a profound influence on life on Earth on all possible time scales. The physical climate system involves complex interactions between the atmosphere, the hydrosphere, the cryosphere, the land surface, and the biosphere, forced or influenced by various external forcing mechanisms. Prominent are the direct effect of human activities on the climate system since the Anthropocene, in particular from the emission of greenhouse gases and land-use change, with far-reaching impacts on almost any aspect of the natural environment and human society. This session invites contributions from observational, theoretical, or modeling studies on any component of the climate system on any spatial and temporal scale. This includes, but is not limited to, research on climate change, atmospheric processes, weather forecasting, global and regional climate modeling, glaciers and ice sheets, sea level, and paleoclimatology.