Oldham UDP

Maps showing the development plans for Oldham are readily available for viewing. You can customise them for yourself by selecting appropriate layers. This is a simple but effective use of GIS for your controlled assessment. Just follow this link to interactive maps. The map above shows the outer suburbs of Oldham and the green belt is clearly visible.

Census 2011 Deprivation Maps

Another very useful site for human geogrpahers. Explore your home town and discover the levels of deprivation. These are calculated using a basket of indicators all combined into one figure. The data is based on the latest census information. However, please be very careful about making value judgements based on this evidence. Follow this link to the Guardian web site.

Controlled Assessment 2012

Keep up to date with the Hulme geogblog for the latest tips and bonus help. It may help boost your marks or at the very least give you some ideas on how to expand your project. It may just save you a little time and make the whole process just that bit smoother. For instance the image below from OMBC is now no longer readily available. It does give a useful insight into the planners ideas about land use zoning in the CBD

7 Billion and counting

Although it is not an exact science it is estimated that the worlds population hit 7 billion today.
Watch this clip to see who claims the 7 billionth person.
You can also see where you fit in by clicking this link.
Or you can go the UN's Population Bureau to see their reaction

East Africa Famine

The United Nations has declared a famine in two areas of southern Somalia as it suffers the worst drought in more than half a century.

You can read more at the BBC.

Or go to the Disaster Emergency Committee website where there are specific case studies and a place to donate.

For those of us that remember the famines of 1984/1985 that led to Band Aid and the Live Aid concerts this seems a great deal worse.

Year 10 - Population homework

Using the Population Reference Bureau you need to find the Infant Mortality Rate, Fertility Rate, Birth Rate, Death Rate and Natural Increase for:

Two North American Countries

Four South American Countries

Three European Countries (including the UK)

Five African Countries

Five Asian/Middle East Countries and

Two Oceania Countries.

To start you off click this link.

Skipton Controlled Assessment

These maps may be useful for use in your controlled assessment. However, you must feel free to use any that you may have created or modified for yourself.

Controlled Assessment

This may help you with your introduction!

Click this link.

Unemployment Map

A simple but effective GIS to show current trends in unemployment can be found here at the BBC. Look closely and you can see how the details change over time. You can even zoom in to see our home region.

Can you process this data further, maybe to produce a table of employment changes by local areas over the past 5 years? This could even be transformed into a graph.

Recession Accentuates Impacts of Decentralizing of Retailing

The number of vacant shops in Rochdale is more than 10 times higher than it was a year ago.
In June 2008, 1.63 per cent of shops stood empty, compared to 17.43 per cent this June.
The figures were compiled by market analysis firm the Local Data Company, which studied shop vacancies in 675 town centres across England and Wales.
Of all the town centres studies, Rochdale had the 15th highest number of empty shops.
Since last June, the town centre has suffered a number of retail losses, with both high profile national chains and small independent businesses shutting up shop forever.
Several estate agents and the Toni and Guy hair salon in Yorkshire Street have also either relocated outside of Rochdale or folded.
Many of the closures are the result of national chains collapsing under the pressure of the recession, such as Principles, which had been trading in the Exchange Centre for more than 20 years before the firm slid into administration earlier this year.
In January, 53 people lost their jobs and a flagship Yorkshire Street store closed its doors forever with the national demise of Woolworths.

Coal for the future?

Aswell as the new generation of Nuclear Power Stations the government has given the go-ahead for a new generation of coal-fired power plants - but only if they can prove they can reduce their emissions.
Up to four new plants will be built if they are fitted with technology to trap and store CO2 emissions underground.

For more information, including how they aim to bury the Cardon click this link.

New generation of Nuclear Power

The government has released a list of 11 sites in England and Wales where new nuclear power stations could be built.

For information, including a map of the proposed sites click this link.

For information about Nuclear Power click this link.

This month's Wide World Magazine

For those of you studying GCSE

This month's contents include:
Improve your grade Aiming for an A*
Clean coal?
Wideworldweb Rising sea levels
Holding the coastline
Aerial view The Ganges-Brahmaputra delta
Focus on… Tropical rainforest
Global ecosystems Tropical rainforest

Copies are in the school library or available from Phillip Allan Publishers.

Drax uses biofuel

Drax Power Station the largest coal fired power station in the UK is beginning to use a mix of coal and biofuel to produce electricity. Drax contributes 7% of the National Grid's electricity.

It is mixing straw, a waste product from the nearby grain farms which is turned into pellets, with the coal. As well as these pellets Drax also mixes its coal with sawdust.


The need for this mix is not only because Drax produces 22 million tonnes of Carbon Dioxide but also because of the rapid rise of the cost of coal. Coal prices have doubled this year and now cost the power station £209 per tonne.

Cycling City

Bristol has become England's first "cycling city" in a £100m government scheme aimed at encouraging cycling.
The city intends to double the number of cyclists over the next three years with a series of innovations.
Sharing the funding will be York, Stoke, Blackpool, Cambridge, Chester, Colchester, Leighton Buzzard, Southend, Shrewsbury, Southport and Woking.
Among the features in Bristol will be the UK's first major bicycle rental network, modelled on a scheme in Paris.
The government is giving Bristol £11.4m to transform cycling by creating dedicated cycle lanes, better facilities and more training for children.

Protesters storm a coal train

A train carrying coal to one of Britain's largest power stations was stopped by protestors and boarded this morning.

Thirty members of the group "Leave it in the Ground" stopped the train with a red flag and boarded it at Rawcliffe on the boundary between north and east Yorkshire. The train was carrying coal to Drax Power Station.

Leave it in the Ground is an organisation which protests against open cast mining.

Drax Power Station the largest coal fired station in the Uk claims to be the cleanest and most efficient power station in the UK.

Look at the two site and see what you think?

Congestion Charge for Manchester

Today the government approved a Congestion Charge scheme for Manchester.

The scheme, due to begin in 2013, will have two charging rings as shown on the map. The outer ring will be the M60 and the inner ring will be made up of the current inner ring road system that surrounds the CBD. Charges will be be triggered by a series of electronic beacons and costs will range from £1 to £5.

The government have also stated that they will provide £2.8bn to upgrade the public transport system of Manchester. This funding will support the extension of the Metrolink to Oldham, Rochdale and Ashton-under-Lyne. It will also be used to create priority lanes for buses and improve the city rail links.

So how do you feel about getting charged for driving in Manchester?

Second Homes - here there and everywhere

Not only was it a major item in the news but the debate on Second Homes also featured in todays AQA Syllabus B GCSE Paper 1.

A Second Home is a home bought, usually in resort areas for the use by the owners at weekends and during holidays.

The debate over Second Homes is one of great interest for Geographers. As many rural areas, especially National Parks have a high percentage of Second Homes; in some parts of the Lake District 60% of the dwellings are Second Homes. The debate has both advantages and disadvantages to the rural communities.

In todays news a report suggested that parts of the Welsh countryside could "lose its next generation of young people" because, despite their being over 18000 vacant properties in rural Wales the house prices were up to five times above the average wage: such prices were being forced up by the demand from city slickers wanting a quite rural retreat. For more information check out the news story on the BBC and also take a look at the Jeremy Vine Website on Radio two for different opinions on the debate.