4.5 Detailed Plan of Study Although the final selection committee will be well informed, remember that they are not likely to be specialists in your subject. You should therefore describe clearly the aim of your research; the methodology that you will use, and the potential significance of this study to your discipline. You should also justify why you want to undertake this study in the UK. (500 words maximum)
Bangladesh is a disaster-prone country. Almost every year the country experiences different kinds of disasters such as tropical cyclones, landslides, floods, and droughts causing heavy loss of life and property and jeopardizing the development activities. In the foreseeable future, Bangladesh is likely to be one of the most vulnerable countries of the world in the event of climate change. The global warming due to the increase in greenhouse gas concentrations in the earth’s atmosphere and the consequent sea-level rise are going to add fuel to the fire. Almost every sector of socioeconomic life in Bangladesh is likely to be affected by climate change. Moreover, due to extreme population densities, the effects of flooding, earthquake and fire hazards in the large cities would be devastating. Coastal cities are vulnerable to sea level rise and tropical cyclones. Some cities are affected by drought through extreme heat events. Heavy precipitation events cause flooding and landslides in many cities of Bangladesh. Large cities tend to have higher air and surface temperatures due to the urban heat-island effect. Therefore, my research will try to identify the relationships among urban land cover change, society and climate. Moreover, it will introduce appropriate mitigation and adaptation strategies to help combat impacts of climate change to promote urban sustainability. This research will use both qualitative and quantitative modelling methods incorporating modern technological approaches (Remote Sensing and GIS) to assess these changes. Moreover, extensive field work and questionnaire surveying will be conducted to collect data on real-world situation. For analyzing the impacts of landcover change, the temperature images will be produced for urban heat island effect.
Š Bayes Ahmed
Moreover earthquake vulnerability, flood hazard, landslide vulnerability, drought maps, loss of vegetation and relevant climate change induced urban disasters will be analyzed by generating the hazard maps. Then it is possible to predict the future changes using different methods (e.g. Markov Chain, Cellular Automata and Artificial Neural Network). This is how simulating the future land-cover pattern and relating it with the predictive effects of climate change will be a landmark study. It also aims to examine planning and social capacity to evaluate community resilience to disasters. Therefore findings of this research will open a new horizon in the field of urban planning. To be an apt urban planner the clear understanding of urban development is a must. In addition the vulnerability of the urban poor, under the threat of continuous environmental degradation and increasing number of disaster, received wide recognition of the need to incorporate disaster risk management in urban planning. This is why I want to focus on climate change induced disaster responsive planning in my future course of study. As an urban planner, I need higher study and research for working in the decision making level. I have gone through the courses offered in UK universities and found that there is enough scope for getting advanced knowledge in my field of interest. This is why I want to undertake this study in the UK.
Š Bayes Ahmed