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Dear colleagues,
we would like to call your attention to a session about *new methods and
platforms to move road ecology towards larger scales* at the next global
conference of the International Association for Impact Assessment (IAIA;
www.iaia.org) that will be held in Montreal on April 4-7, 2017.
The session is organized by *Aurora Torres* (PhD in Ecology, Spanish
Research Council; Chair) and *Jochen Jaeger*, (Associate Professor,
Concordia University Montreal; Co-Chair). A brief description of the
session is given below.
The deadline for abstract submissions is *Monday 31st October 2016* at
conferences.iaia.org/2017/submit-abstract.php
*Session (ID 168): Road Ecology in IA: New methods and platforms to move
towards larger scales*
Predicting and assessing the impacts of human infrastructure on wildlife is
a high-priority task for the scientific, impact management and policy
communities. Rigorous science is essential to assess, avoid, minimise, and
offset those impacts. However, as infrastructure building progresses it
will be increasingly difficult to quantify these impacts, because the
potential control areas are becoming rare and isolated. Research efforts
and IA tools need to move towards larger scales in order to cope with the
rapid development of transportation infrastructure. Scientists have entered
a new age where research, policy, education and communication are driven to
higher quality by international collaboration through online communication
tools.
The rationale for this session emerges from a newly published study in PNAS
("Assessing large-scale wildlife responses to human infrastructure
development"; 2016), in which the authors made a call to create an
international coordinated network that engages scientists and practitioners
to assess the impact of human infrastructure on wildlife globally and
inspire innovative ideas and applications. What is the influence of traffic
and type of habitat/infrastructure in the response of wildlife? What are
the best study designs to address the assessment? How can we put the
network into practice and build an online community platform? This
conference provides an ideal forum to discuss these questions with
participants interested in transportation infrastructure, biodiversity and
ecology, and large-scale infrastructure development and assessments.
Our session welcomes papers from scholars and practitioners that 1)
evaluate the effects of roads and other infrastructure on wildlife from all
parts of the world, 2) propose novel methods for quantifying the magnitude
and/or spatial distribution of infrastructure-mediated effects, and 3)
present approaches to improve innovation and knowledge exchange in
international communities through open online platforms. We are
particularly interested in international experiences and lessons from South
America, Africa and Asia.
For more information please contact Aurora Torres (
[email protected]) or Jochen Jaeger ([email protected]),
and check the webpage conferences.iaia.org/2017/index.php. Please let one
of us know if you would like us to send you the PDF of the PNAS paper
mentioned above.
We look forward to seeing you at IAIA 2017 in Montreal. Please send this
email to others who might be interested.
Yours sincerely,
Aurora Torres and Jochen Jaeger
--
*Aurora Torres, PhD in Ecology*
Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales
CSIC - Spanish Research Council
José Gutiérrez Abascal, 28006 Madrid, Spain
Tel (+34) 91 411 13 28, ext 1224
[email protected]
[email protected]
twitter: @aurora_torresm
&
Dr. Jochen Jaeger, Associate Professor
Concordia University
Department of Geography, Planning and Environment
1455 de Maisonneuve Blvd. W., Suite H1255
Montréal, Quebec, H3G 1M8, Canada
Tel.: (+1) 514 – 848-2424 extension 5481
Email: [email protected]
Web: *http://gpe.concordia.ca/faculty-and-staff/jjaeger/
<http://gpe.concordia.ca/faculty-and-staff/jjaeger/>*
