Profile

Biography

Steve has worked at the SEI centre in the University of York since 1991 and became Deputy Director in 1999.

He specialises in the use of geographic information systems (GIS) and spatial modelling within the Institute's various projects. His research has primarily focussed the methods and applications of participatory GIS (PGIS) for development and planning activities which have been applied in developing countries assessing issues around natural resource management such as agriculture water management and the in the UK investigating a range of environmental concerns including air quality, rural inequalities and urban redevelopment.

Steve’s recent research has included developing PGIS methods to encourage community engagement on environmental issues including environmental and social histories through the Open Air Laboratories Project (OPAL) funded by the Big Lottery. These engagement activities have been undertaken with a mixture of so called hard-to-reach groups and school children including those in deprived UK communities.

He has extensive experience of project management and has provided training and capacity building support for various institutes in diverse locations including Ghana, Tanzania, Burkina Faso, South Africa, China, Ivory Coast and India. In addition he has undertaken lecturing for masters and doctoral students in the Universities of York (UK), Turku (Finland), ITC (the Netherlands) and Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana).

He has written over 26 academic papers and book chapters over the past ten years and been principal or co-investigator in grants with a value of £750K over the past six years.

He is currently involved in a wide variety of SEI research projects and activities including:

• GIS for Participation (GIS-P)
• Rural Economy and Land Use Programme - Social and Environmental Conditions in Rural Areas (SECRA) Dataset
• Open Air Laboratories (OPAL)
• Land Cover Mapping

Research

Current projects

GIS for Participation (GIS-P)

GIS-P techniques fall within the suite of approaches termed Participatory GIS (PGIS). GIS-P specifically aims to:

• enhance effective communication and understanding
• facilitate greater stakeholder involvement in decision-making
• monitor the impacts of management plans and policies on the resource base and livelihood strategies

Steve has been involved in the successful development of these techniques for assessing sustainable communal land management in South Africa, for enhancing public participation in the identification of air quality management areas (AQMA) in the UK and assessing perceptions of the environmental risks of breast cancer (as part of ESRC funded project). Most recently the techniques have been used to investigate ‘hard to reach’ groups knowledge and ideas on local urban development issues in a variety of UK cities through the EPSRC Distillate and InSITU projects.

In addition Steve has helped develop these techniques to evaluate model outputs with expert stakeholders.

Rural Economy and Land Use Programme - Social and Environmental Conditions in Rural Areas (SECRA) Dataset

Steve was part of the team that developed the original dataset on social and environmental conditions in rural areas of (SECRA). The spatial dataset is intended to encourage and enable researchers and policy makers to include both social and environmental perspectives in their consideration of rural problems. As part of the new RELU funded grant the dataset will be expanded and focussed on the identification of inequalities in rural areas. These will then be assessed on the ground using participatory GIS techniques to investigate the environmental injustice associated with these inequalities.

Open Air Laboratories (OPAL)

Steve is involved in the project funded by the UK National Lottery that will involve participation in environmental science by local communities. The GIS for participation technique will be used to engage with the local communities, investigating their experiences of soil quality, biodiversity and air pollution and to identify where (and why) these issues are most significant.

Land Cover Mapping

Steve has been involved in the development of the 'SEI Land Cover Map – 2006 Revision'. This is small scale (approx 1:5,000,000) and covers the whole of Europe. The map was developed for continental assessments of pollution impacts and is being used by the UN-ECE and EMEP for determining the implications of ozone deposition on crops, forests and semi-natural ecosystems. The data has been classified to the EUNIS habitat classification scheme with more detailed information available for agriculture and forest habitats. Steve is also involved in advising on the use of spatial data and GIS within SEI research. He has performed training and advisory work for a number of agencies including EPTRI (India), African Development Bank (Côte D'Ivoire) and Grahamstown University (South Africa).

Publications

Selected publications

• Cinderby, S. "How to reach the 'hard-to-reach': the development of Participatory Geographic Information Systems (P-GIS) for inclusive urban design in UK cities". Area, forthcoming 2009
• Huby, M., Cinderby, S., White, P.C.L., and de Bruin, A., forthcoming, "Measuring inequality in rural England: the effects of changing spatial resolution" Environment and Planning A
• Jones, P., Kelly, C., May, A., and Cinderby, S. "Innovative Approaches to Option Generation", European Journal of Transport and Infrastructure Research, Issue 9(3) pp237-258
• Cinderby, S., Snell, C. and Forrester, J. "Participatory GIS and its application in governance: the example of air quality and the implications for noise pollution" Local Environment Vol 13. Issue 4. pp: 309-320

Teaching