The Inside Story: News from The Royal Canadian Geographical Society Urban weather decoder Homegrown fishery It's a winner Budapest-bound The survey says ...

As the world's leading expert on urban microclimates, Vancouverite Tim Oke gets inundated with requests as varied as the weather itself. At home, for example, the University of British Columbia geography professor has been called on to assess the cause of serious road accidents: he studies the climate at a crash site and reports on icing, sunlight, location of trees, anything that might have affected driving conditions at the time.

Beyond our borders, Oke has looked at the sway of Hong Kong highrises to predict whether or not this would disrupt laser communications during a typhoon, and has been asked by several cities to advise on how to handle chemical or radioactive releases in city streets: the way wind flows around tall buildings can affect chemical dispersion and emergency responses.

During his 40-year career, Oke has also elevated the field of urban climatology — the study of how cities affect weather patterns — from a purely academic science to a more predictive one, with countless practical applications ranging from air quality to water and energy conservation. He is being honoured with the 2005 Massey Medal for outstanding achievement in the field of Canadian geography. Established by Governor General Vincent Massey in 1959, the award is administered by The Royal Canadian Geographical Society.

Oke's enthusiasm has inspired a number of his students to become important international players in climatology, says James Voogt, a professor of geography specializing in urban climates at the University of Western Ontario in London. "He's an eloquent writer and speaker," says Voogt, who completed his master's and Ph.D. under Oke. "He's able to fully understand the science, but also to present it in a way that makes it more widely accessible."

More recently, Oke has been helping the Meteorological Service of Canada develop a new model, to be operational in a few years, that will more accurately forecast the weather for cities specifically, rather than larger regions.

"We will really be forecasting for Canadians, because 80 percent of us are living in cities," he says. "At present we just forecast for the big spaces in between."

- Monique Roy-Sole

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This summer, Halifax native Martha Stiegman is revisiting her Maritime roots to explore the symbiotic link that exists between healthy fish stocks and healthy communities.

Winner of The Royal Canadian Geographical Society's annual $5,000 Maxwell Studentship in Human Geography, Stiegman, a master's student at Concordia University in Montréal, is looking at how managing resources at the local level is strengthening ties between aboriginal and nonaboriginal fishing villages in southwestern Nova Scotia.

Unlike conventional fisheries management, which Stiegman describes as increasingly privatized and corporate, a community-based approach transfers control to local stakeholders and incorporates indigenous knowledge.

Violent clashes between First Nations and nonnative fishermen in places like Burnt Church, N.B., made national headlines after the 1999 Marshall decision recognized native treaty rights and led to off-season fishing. But what was not widely reported, says Stiegman, was the peaceful way some small fishing communities in southwest Nova Scotia developed local management plans everyone could agree upon.

Besides stock stewardship, however, the strong social component of community-based resource management fosters dialogue between aboriginal and non-aboriginal groups. Stiegman is interviewing fishermen, community leaders and other stakeholders this summer for a documentary that looks at the co-operation which developed among these seemingly disparate groups once they realized they wanted the same thing.

"They are trying to preserve the resource that their culture and way of life is based upon," she says.

"I think the stand they're taking is very principled and inspired."

- Katie Wallace

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Nathan Friedman of Kamloops, B.C., who placed second this year, and Daniel Siracusa of Burnaby, B.C., second last year, will join Yao in forming Team Canada at the National Geographic World Championship, being held in Budapest, Hungary, July 10-15.

The team will go head to head with geographical whiz kids from 20 other countries, and "Jeopardy!" quizmaster Alex Trebek will join them to host the final round.

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Which province is home to the Hibernia oil field? If you guessed Newfoundland and Labrador, you join 67 percent of the 2,106 Canadians who correctly answered that question in a recent survey conducted by the Canadian Council for Geographic Education (CCGE).

As part of a multi-year program to improve geographic literacy in Canada, the survey aimed to gauge how much the average Canadian knows about the subject.

Questions ranged from political and social geography to cartography and travel.

The CCGE will co-host an academic symposium this summer with The Canadian Association of Geographers, followed by a series of "internet town halls" in the fall.

"We're aiming to boost public awareness of geography," says CCGE chair Beth Dye, "and the importance of geographic knowledge and skills in today's global economy."

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