Rural Subdivisions Research Articles

Health status of police personnel in a selected subdivision of Bengaluru District, Karnataka, India

Introduction: Police personnel perform untiring duties to maintain law and order. The objectives of this study were to assess the physical and mental health status of police personnel in a selected rural subdivision of Bengaluru District. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among 142 police personnel in 7 police stations of the selected rural subdivision using a universal sampling technique. A structured interview schedule was used, which included socio-demographic details, occupational details, anthropometry, blood pressure and blood sugar measurements, Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) to screen for depression and Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) to identify stress. Results: The mean age of the police personnel was 40.28±10.97 years. Most of the workforce were males (83%). About 68.3% of the studied group were obese. High random blood sugar and high blood pressure values were observed in 5.6% and 48.6% of the personnel who had no previous history of diabetes mellitus and hypertension. The prevalence of mild to severe depression was found to be 36% and that of high stress was 83.1%. Conclusion: The high prevalence of increased blood pressure, obesity, depression and perceived stress warrants the need for routine screening and application of various levels of prevention. Health promotion and improved working conditions can improve their health status.

ETAP software based power flow analysis of 225/60/11KV substation in Tinghir

Through technological advances, such as computer-based software, it is now possible to study and analyze complex electrical system problems and identify potential solutions. This analysis typically includes Load flow analysis (LFA), or power flow analysis (PFA). LFA is a crucial tool in power system engineering used for modeling and designing electrical power networks. It aims to determine the steady-state operating conditions of a power system to ensure a stable and efficient power balance between generation and load demands. LFA helps design robust power networks, maintains system stability, plans maintenance activities, and assists in the economic dispatch of power generation. This study focuses on modelling the 225/60/11 kV substation in Tinghir, a predominantly rural subdivision of the Drâa-Tafilalet region of Morocco. The model used data obtained from SPIE Maroc, specialists in industrial and tertiary electricity. AC and DC load flow analysis is performed on the Tinghir substation auxiliary services under two scenarios: one where the service equipment is powered by the auxiliary service transformer (AST) as the primary source, and another where the equipment supplied by a generator set due to a failure in the main power supply. ETAP software is selected for the simulation due to its advanced real-time power management capabilities and is widely used in power generation, transmission, and distribution systems. The Newton-Raphson method, known for its fast convergence and accuracy, is used for power flow analysis, making it ideal for complex systems. The results evaluate system performance under both normal and backup conditions, ensuring reliable operation of the auxiliary service installation at Tinghir’s substation.

Examination of Identity Negotiation, Sexual Health Behavior, and Healthcare-Seeking Behavior of Transgender Sex Workers in India

The current study, which expects to fill in the gap in research on transgender sex workers in India, examines the sexual identity negotiation, risk perception and condom compliance, sexual health screening and testing behavior, contextual barriers to healthcare seeking, and barriers to community mobilization among this population. The study was conducted in the red-light districts of Kolkata and rural subdivisions of West Bengal, and Eastern India. Transgender sex workers comprise 15% of the sex workers’ populace in India, yet they are an understudied and underserved group in the commercial sex sector. It is anticipated that the study will help to formulate future programmatic interventions that can cater more effectively to the health needs of Indian transgender commercial sex workers, contribute to the HIV/STI risk reduction among this group, and reduce barriers to attaining health.

Water insecurity in the Global North: A review of experiences in U.S. colonias communities along the Mexico border

AbstractSince the late 1970s, the term “colonias” (in English) has described low‐income, peri‐urban, and rural subdivisions north of the U.S.‐Mexico border. These communities are in arid and semi‐arid regions—now in a megadrought—and tend to have limited basic infrastructure, including community water service and sanitation. Recent scholarship has demonstrated how colonias residents experience unjust and inequitable dynamics that produce water insecurity in the Global North. In this review, we explain why U.S. colonias are an important example for theorizing water insecurity in the United States and beyond in the Global North. Tracing the history of water infrastructure development in U.S. colonias, we show how colonias are legally and socially defined by water insecurity. We draw on the published literature to discuss key factors that produce water insecurity in U.S. colonias: political exclusion, municipal underbounding, and failures in water quality monitoring. We show that water insecurity had led to negative outcomes—including poor water access, risks to physical health, and mental ill‐health—in U.S. colonias. We present four possible approaches to improving water security in U.S. colonias: (1) soft paths & social infrastructure for water delivery, (2) decentralized water treatment approaches, such as point‐of‐use, point‐of‐entry, and fit‐for‐purpose systems; (3) informality, including infrastructural, economic, and socio‐cultural innovations; and (4) political, policy, and law innovations and reforms. At the same time, we reflect seriously on how water security can be ethically achieved in partnership and aligning with the visions of U.S. colonias residents themselves.This article is categorized under: Human Water > Water Governance Engineering Water > Water, Health, and Sanitation

Lone Star Suburbs: Life on the Texas Metropolitan Frontier ed. by Paul J.P. Sandul and M. Scott Sosebee

Reviewed by: Lone Star Suburbs: Life on the Texas Metropolitan Frontier ed. by Paul J.P. Sandul and M. Scott Sosebee Yu Han Lone Star Suburbs: Life on the Texas Metropolitan Frontier. Edited by Paul J. P. Sandul and M. Scott Sosebee. (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2019. Pp. xii, 250. $24.95, ISBN 978-0-8061-6447-2.) Texas is a state I have been very interested in and have kept a close eye on for many years, simply because, for more than half a century, it has been a shining star in the Sun Belt, and even in the whole nation, in terms of solid and rapid economic and metropolitan growth. However, the metropolitan areas of Texas do not seem to be popular subjects for historians, for whom the focus has been on the "'Texas Myth,'" one "dominated by cowboys, the frontier, Texas Rangers, and above all the Alamo and the Texas Revolution" (p. 4). Obviously, Texas metropolitan areas, especially the booming suburbs, have not gotten the attention they deserve. This volume, edited by Paul J. P. Sandul and M. Scott Sosebee, is the first book featuring the comprehensive story of suburban Texas, which includes essays on planning, politics, governing, ethno-racial diversity, transportation, religion, and environmentalism. The first essay, by Sandul, serves as the introduction to this volume, and it explores the historiography of the Lone Star State, especially suburban Texas and the suburban demographic situation, in detail. The historiographical section is successful and informative, but other parts are not. Some readers might not be satisfied with the census population data as the only material used to describe the rise of Texas suburbs after World War II. Other essays are uneven in quality. The best one is the second essay, by Robert B. Fairbanks, an established urban historian, who examines suburban planning in the Dallas–Fort Worth metropolitan area in detail. He challenges, with concrete evidence, the conventional view that suburban cities are accidental or not well [End Page 760] planned. The suburbs examined are "intentional communities nurtured by their energetic civic leadership, shaped by their location within a growing metropolitan area, and formatted by professional urban planners hired by local booster governments to create what became a new urban form—suburban cities" (p. 62). The third essay, by Andrew C. Baker, presents readers with a struggle between city and suburb in Chateau Woods, a small rural subdivision north of Houston. This struggle was a response to the issues of incorporation and annexation, which have been raised by Kenneth T. Jackson in Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States (New York, 1985) but have been neglected by historians for many years. In Baker's view, "the story of Chateau Woods serves as a case study in the perils of hyper-local, amateur-led democracy," and "incorporation was not always an answer to suburban problems on the metropolitan fringe" (pp. 87, 88). Three essays discuss the suburbanization of two ethnic groups in Texas. Chapters 4 and 9 focus on the migration of African Americans to the suburbs of Dallas and San Antonio, respectively. These two essays are narratives detailing African American migration patterns but lack analysis of the effects of migration on the employment and education of African Americans in suburbs, which is often a significant part of black suburbanization; chapter 4 does mention the influence of black poverty in the city. Compared with the suburbanization of African Americans, the suburbanization of Asian Americans is a fairly new phenomenon. Chapter 10 tells the story of the formation of an "ethnoburb," a new Asian community in Texas, with an emphasis on the Vietnamese in Houston. Son Mai argues that the development of this neighborhood was for economic activity and cultural preservation, rather than protection against racial discrimination. This essay, without any firsthand resources, is quite weak in terms of originality. Chapter 5, by Tom McKinney, provides a detailed account of the development of transportation facilities in Texas, including the background, process, and effects of construction of urban freeway systems during the suburbanization of the Lone Star State. As the title of this chapter, "The Czars of Concrete: The Texas Highway Department's Engineer-Manager Program and the Development...

Impacts of a Rural Subdivision on Groundwater Quality: Results of Long-Term Monitoring.

A rural subdivision in south central Wisconsin was instrumented with monitoring wells and lysimeters before, during, and after its construction to examine the impacts of the unsewered subdivision on groundwater quality and quantity. Prior to construction, the 78-acre (32 ha) site was farmland. Sixteen homes were constructed beginning in 2003. Initial monitoring from 2002 to 2005 showed that groundwater beneath the site had been impacted by previous agricultural use, with nitrate-N values as high as 30 mg/L and some detections of the herbicide atrazine. Our 12-year study shows that the transition from agricultural to residential land use has changed groundwater quality in both negative and positive ways. Although groundwater elevations showed typical seasonal fluctuations each year, there were no measurable changes in groundwater levels or general flow directions during the 12-year study period. Chloride values increased in many wells, possibly as a result of road salting or water softener discharge. Nitrate concentrations varied spatially and temporally over the study period, with some initial concentrations substantially above the drinking water standard. In some wells, nitrate and atrazine levels have declined substantially since agriculture ceased. However, atrazine was still present at trace concentrations throughout the site in 2014. Wastewater tracers show there are small but detectable impacts from septic effluent on groundwater quality. Particle traces based on a groundwater flow model are consistent with the hypothesis that septic leachate has impacted groundwater quality.

Alternative and Virtual Rurality: Agriculture and The Countryside as Embodied in American Imagination

Affection for agrarian livelihoods and rural and small‐town environments has long been held by residents in many of the world's “more developed” countries. Although the rural proportion of the U.S. population has shrunk to a minority over the last century, fondness for rurality continues to manifest itself in a number of ways. Attachment to the rural ideal or rural idyll can be considered as attachment to the idea of a type of place, rather than specific place attachment. Based on literature, field observation, computer searches, and data from the U.S. Census of Agriculture, connections to idea(l)s of rurality apparent in popular culture are identified and illustrated. These include rural and agricultural tourism, small‐scale farming and large‐lot rural subdivisions, urban agriculture, farmers’ markets and community‐supported agriculture, creation of housing developments around farm activities, and rural‐named housing and business developments. Idealized relationships with rurality call upon health and well‐being, connecting to nature, aesthetics, privacy, and respect and nostalgia for rural livelihoods.

Rethinking Sustainability within the Viticulture Realities Integrating Economy, Landscape and Energy

Sustainability is often explained through three dimensions (society, economy and environment). However, such a definition currently appears to be restricted. Sustainable development often includes the energy issue. An example of realities founded on bioenergy are agro-energy districts. These realities involve all the three dimensions of sustainability, integrating also the energy dimension and fueling a potential circular economy. Based on these premises, the most affluent rural subdivision in Italy is that of wine. The wine sector has experienced a recent growth of its economic market, diverging from other agricultural activities and enlarging its cultivated surface areas. In this sense, the local landscape has also changed. Owing to the strong inclination of the wine sector in adopting sustainable strategies and measures, agro-energy districts can be the following future phase in viticulture realities as a cutting-edge business in the modern agricultural sector, implementing new strategies and opportunities.

Low birthweight in rural Cameroon: an analysis of a cut-off value

BackgroundLow birthweight (LBW) is a major predictor of early neonatal mortality which disproportionately affects low-income countries. WHO recommends regional definitions for LBW to prevent misclassifications and ensure appropriate care of babies with LBW. We conducted this study to define a clinical cut-off for LBW, and to determine the predictors and adverse foetal outcomes of LBW babies in a rural sub-division in Cameroon.MethodsWe conducted a retrospective register analysis of 1787 singleton deliveries in two health facilities in the Northwest Region of Cameroon. Records with no birthweight or birthweight less than 1000 g, babies born before arrival, multiple deliveries and deliveries before 28 weeks gestation were excluded from this study. The 10th percentile of birthweights was computed to obtain a statistical cut-off value for the LBW. To assess the clinical significance of the newly defined cut-off value, we compared the prevalence of adverse foetal outcomes between LBW (birthweight <10th percentile) and heavier babies (birthweight ≥10th percentile) in our study population.ResultsThe 10th percentile of the birthweights was 2700 g. Preterm delivery was the lone predictor of LBW (aOR = 2.0, 95% CI = 1.3–3.1; p = 0.001). LBW babies were more likely to be stillborn (OR = 9.6; 95% CI = 4.2–21.6; p < 0.001) or asphyxiated at the 5th minute (OR = 2.0; 95% CI = 1.2–3.3; p = 0.006), compared with heavier babies. Also, 6.1% of babies who had a birthweight between 2500 and 2700 g were more likely to be stillborn compared to heavier babies.ConclusionThis study suggests that the clinical cut-off for LBW in this rural community is 2700 g; with 6.1% of babies born with LBW probably receiving inadequate care as the traditional cut-off value of 2500 g proposed by WHO is still used to define LBW in our setting. Further studies are necessary to define a national cut-off value for harmonisation of LBW definitions in the country to prevent misclassifications and ensure appropriate neonatal care.

Derechos colectivos a la naturaleza en los procesos de suburbanización de los suelos rurales en Filandia y Montenegro-Quindío

Este artículo busca identificar las conexiones y rupturas de los derechos colectivos a la naturaleza en los procesos de urbanización de los suelos suburbanos en los municipios de Filandia y Montenegro en el Departamento de Quindío. El texto aborda la implementación de las normas al respecto del uso y la ocupación de estos suelos; la identificación de los diferentes actores que intervienen en el proceso de parcelación; y la revisión historiográfica del paisaje para evidenciar los cambios de usos del suelo en estos procesos. Como principales resultados se destacan la vulneración del conjunto de normas que regula el uso y la ocupación del suelo suburbano; así mismo se evidenció que no hay prácticas de parcelación – subdivisión rural asociado a desarrollos sostenibles, generando conflictos ambientales como la demanda en aumento del recurso hídrico, la transformación del paisaje, el agotamiento de la flora y fauna nativa y la pérdida de suelos aptos para la actividad agrícola, poniendo en riesgo la sostenibilidad alimentaria. La principal recomendación es para las administraciones locales que ven una alternativa de desarrollo en estos procesos, pero que, al estar desprovistos de instrumentos de gestión y financiación del suelo, impiden la captura de las rentabilidades obtenidas por los privados.

The Edmonton-Calgary corridor: Simulating future land cover change under potential government intervention

The region connecting Edmonton and Calgary, the two largest cities in Alberta, contains rich agricultural land and is one of the most rapidly changing areas in the province. There is little legislation to restrict urban sprawl or adequately protect agricultural land or native grasslands, and there has been little research to predict future alteration. The main study objectives are, therefore, to assess historical changes in the Edmonton-Calgary corridor from 1984 to 2013 and simulate the future landscape change to 2022 under potential government intervention scenarios. Satellite imagery from Landsat, used in conjunction with biogeophysical variables, was used to create a history of cover in the Edmonton-Calgary area. This history of the environment can be used as a baseline to project changes into the future. Testing different legislative scenarios under two major branches of modifying rates of change or locations of change can be used to identify effective policies for limiting damage to the environment while still allowing for urban growth. Five scenarios were created for this purpose: (1) business as usual, (2) increased rate of urban expansion, (3) no urban expansion, (4) implementation of greenbelts around urban areas, (5) protection of the best agricultural land. This study finds that over the past 30 years, urban area has nearly doubled in size, targeting predominately farmland, especially due to an increase in rural subdivisions. Each scenario impacts growth differently, however, greenbelts and the no expansion model decease growth the most, while the agricultural protection is comparable to the business as usual scenario.

Place, identity and stigma: blocks and the ‘blockies’ of Tara, Queensland, Australia

This article explores the role of geographical context in generating a stigmatised identity among residents of Tara rural subdivisions in the coal seam gas fields in Queensland’s Western Downs. The research was based on qualitative interviews with Tara ‘Blockies’, as these residents are commonly referred to, that revealed how their existence in the middle of an agrarian region resulted in the assignation of a stigma that has marked them as different, and subsequently devalued their status. We explain that this distinction and category division of the normals, referring to Tara’s Agrarian residents, from the ‘stigmatised’ led to an antagonistic relationship that prevented successful socio-cultural assimilation. We demonstrate how an immoral place becomes disadvantaged, resulting in poor well-being, and how imposed labels threaten the self-esteem of its occupants.

Mediating water governance: point‐of‐use water filtration devices for low‐income communities along the US–Mexico border

Small‐scale decentralised facilities and household‐level water purification technologies (HWTs) have become unconventional modes of delivering potable water. This paper examines how HWTs transformed from a temporary solution to unsanitary drinking water conditions in the global South to a legitimised technological fix for communities that experience chronic household water insecurity in the United States. We examine the discursive and material processes through which HWTs are applied in periurban and rural subdivisions on the Texas–Mexico border, called colonias. HWTs, through the intervention of social entrepreneurs, experts, and the state, mediate water governance by rearticulating the individual solution and foreclosing a collective or political process to improve community water systems for colonia residents.

DEPÓSITOS DE ARGILA ORGÂNICA MOLE – UM EXEMPLO EXTREMO NA BACIA DO RIO BARIGUI

The Barigui River is a tributary of the Iguaçu River, located at Parana State, Brazil. This river is the main waterstream of the Metropolitan Area of Curitiba, Southern Brazil. In the flood plain of the Barigui River final stretch,nearby its delta at the Iguaçu River, very soft organic clay deposits are found. The region suffered until someyears ago predatory mining activities of both clay and sand, for construction material purposes. Consequently,a degradation process took place resulting in lack of vegetation, excavation open pits and random materialsdump areas. Simultaneously several engineering activities have been installed along the river banks such as thePetrobras Oil Refinery (located at the right bank), the Santa Rita Rural Subdivision, the CIC Sewage TreatmentPlant of the State owned company Sanepar, the Bolívia-Brazil Gas Pipeline (Gasbol) and the Rio Bonito HousingDevelopment (all located along the left bank). The flood plain area considered herein is located on the river leftbank, encompassing approximately an area of 500 m wide by 1000 m long. This paper describes the geologicaland geotechnical characteristics of the flood plain area, presenting results of several soil tests. A discussion aboutsome practical experiences, including engineering difficulties and solutions implemented during the constructionof the facilities above described, are shown. This paper concludes that even though the local organic clay depositsare very soft and compressible, this natural material of the Barigui River flood plain area presents uniqueengineering behavior, much more complex than well known problematic soils.

An Analysis of Socio-Economic Strains and Population Gains: Urban and Rural Communities of Canada 1981-2001

Important demographic shifts have occurred in Canada in the last decades. As a consequence of these shifts, many geographical communities have won or lost substantial number of residents between 1981 and 2001. Using the CCS (consolidated census subdivision) data set of the Agriculture Division of Statistics Canada, the paper explores the linkages between socio-economic strains and population changes affecting communities in a variety of regional and provincial contexts. A total of 2,607 rural and urban consolidated census subdivisions were examined across five census periods. Quasi simplex structural equation models using unemployment, earnings and poverty as indicators were tested on a variety of communities located in various OECD regions and provinces. Although the predictive power of strains on population gains was found to be limited in the models, a higher level of strain was persistently found to be negatively associated with population gains regardless of regional and provincial groupings of communities. Socio-economic strains were also observed to be relatively stable over time across a variety of geographies.

Resident Attitudes to Farmland Protection Measures in the Northern Rivers Region, New South Wales

In-migration to popular ‘sea change’ and ‘tree change’ regions has produced conflicts between rural land users. In the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales, new residential developments have been built on much of what was previously prime agricultural land, while farmers (in particular, those negatively affected by the deregulation of the dairy industry) have sought to secure retirement incomes by subdividing land for sale. Although developers, local councils and individual farmers sometimes see eye to eye on the mutual benefits of in-migration and population growth, land use has none the less become the subject of a hotly contested local political battle. Conflicts occur at the interface of growing urban developments and surrounding farmland, with new residents finding the sights, sounds and smells of rural production intrusive. More generally, there is considerable concern that the best farmland in the region may be lost to urbanisation and rural residential subdivision. This paper discusses the results of a survey that collected opinions from local residents about the pressures on the region's land uses by in-migration, the future role of farmland as both an economic and cultural landscape, and views on proposed measures to protect prime farmland in the region. Results highlighted a strong and consistent ‘pro-farmland’ and ‘pro-protection’ attitude throughout the region, and across social groups. Yet, variations emerged when respondents were asked about why they attribute value to agricultural landscapes. For some, ‘economic’ values dominated, while for others, value was attributed in ways that reflected an emerging ethos of ‘localism’ and village lifestyle. Although values differed, a clear message from this study is that the population of Australia's pre-eminent ‘sea change’ region strongly support measures to curb urban development and the more destructive consequences of a dynamic property market.

Assessing Background Ground Water Chemistry beneath a New Unsewered Subdivision

Previous site-specific studies designed to assess the impacts of unsewered subdivisions on ground water quality have relied on upgradient monitoring wells or very limited background data to characterize conditions prior to development. In this study, an extensive monitoring program was designed to document ground water conditions prior to construction of a rural subdivision in south-central Wisconsin. Previous agricultural land use has impacted ground water quality; concentrations of chloride, nitrate-nitrogen, and atrazine ranged from below the level of detection to 296 mg/L, 36 mg/L, and 0.8 microg/L, respectively, and were highly variable from well to well and through time. Seasonal variations in recharge, surface topography, aquifer heterogeneities, surficial loading patterns, and well casing depth explain observed variations in ground water chemistry. This variability would not have been detected if background conditions were determined from only a few monitoring wells or inferred from wells located upgradient of the subdivision site. This project demonstrates the importance of characterizing both ground water quality and chemical variability prior to land-use change to detect any changes once homes are constructed.

Landscape legacies: Koala habitat change in Noosa Shire, South-east Queensland

Present day Australian landscapes are legacies of our colonial history, while future landscapes will be legacies of ecological processes and human impacts occurring today. This paper investigates the legacies of European settlement of Noosa Shire, South-east Queensland, with particular emphasis on the economic and political drivers and the resultant loss and fragmentation of Koala Phascolarctos cinereus habitat. Patterns of habitat loss between 1860 and 1970 were quantified at a coarse level from historical and land tenure records, while changes over the past 30 years were mapped at a finer spatial resolution from aerial photography and satellite imagery. Periods of high economic growth and to lesser extents depression are linked to increased vegetation clearing. Fifty per cent of P. cinereus habitat has been lost since 1860, with habitat class 2A (30-<50 per cent of preferred habitat trees) and 2C (10-<30 per cent of preferred habitat trees) suffering the highest proportion of loss. The period of greatest habitat loss was between 1890 and 1910, linked to the development of the dairy industry in the western half of Noosa Shire. A second significant phase of loss occurred since 1970, linked to the planting of exotic pine plantations, urbanisation and rural subdivision, with 35 per cent of remaining habitat being cleared, mainly in the southern part of the Shire. The cumulative loss of habitat has been accompanied by increasing levels of habitat fragmentation indicated by reduced patch size and increased patch linearity. Further analysis of the temporal aspects of habitat change is required in order to test the hypothesis that there is a relaxation period between the timing of habitat loss and current pattern of habitat occupancy of P. cinereus populations.

Incidence of enteric viruses in groundwater from household wells in Wisconsin.

Recent studies on the contamination of groundwater with human enteric viruses have focused on public water systems, whereas little is known about the occurrence of viruses in private household wells. The objective of the present study was to estimate the incidence of viruses in Wisconsin household wells located near septage land application sites or in rural subdivisions served by septic systems. Fifty wells in seven hydrogeologic districts were sampled four times over a year, once each season. Reverse transcriptase PCR (RT-PCR), followed by Southern hybridization, was used to detect enteroviruses, rotavirus, hepatitis A virus (HAV), and Norwalk-like viruses (NLVs). In addition, cell culture was used to detect culturable enteroviruses. Companion water samples were collected for total coliforms, Escherichia coli, fecal enterococci, F-specific RNA coliphages, nitrate, and chloride analyses. Among the 50 wells, four (8%) were positive for viruses by RT-PCR. Three wells were positive for HAV, and the fourth well was positive for both rotavirus and NLV in one sample and an enterovirus in another sample. Contamination was transient, since none of the wells was virus positive for two sequential samples. Culturable enteroviruses were not detected in any of the wells. Water quality indicators were not statistically associated with virus occurrence, although some concordance was noted for chloride. The present study is the first in the United States to systematically monitor private household wells for virus contamination and, combined with data for public wells, provides further insight on the extent of groundwater contamination with human enteric viruses.

In Search of Arcadia: The Persistence of the Rural Idyll in New Zealand Rural Subdivisions

Arcadian ideals have long been important in western culture. They underpinned projects for colonial settlement and continue to be manifest today in urban perceptions of rural lifestyle throughout the English speaking world. Results from a study of 58 existing or intending smallholders around Christchurch, New Zealand, highlight the way Arcadian ideals and values motivate people to move to the country, and to remain there. They reveal both similarities and contrasts between contemporary New Zealand ideals of the rural way of life and those reported from North America and Europe, and have a number of practical planning implications.