ISSS608 2016-17 T3 Assign SANDHYA VASUDEVA RAO

Mini Challenge 1

Patterns of life for visitors who visited the preserve just for a day:

General road maps for specific car types can be observed in the below two visualizations. It is interesting to observe that the car-types 2 axle car, 2 axle truck, and 3 axle truck and 2 axle bus, and 3 axle bus have the exact same path set by the Nature Preserve authorities for specific car-types.

A plot of Car-type against Gate name clearly shows that - All the one day visitors have camped the least compared to the entries in other gate-names. It is intuitive that visitors who visit just for a day would prefer going around Nature Preserve than camp all day. Type of cars include all the possible car types - 1,2,2P,3,4,5,and 6, with 2P visible at gates and Ranger-stop the most as these are service park vehicles.Most popular car - type is a 2 - axle car (or motorcycle). This is quite intuitive as it makes more sense for one day visitors to come by cars or motorcycles.It is important to notice that all the entrances have similar number of visitors.

Map of the path traveled by one day visitors on May 1st 2015 is as shown below.

Daily patterns can be viewed on the map by selecting the required gate names, day, and car-types which gives Car IDs that meet the filter criteria. There are about 98k visitors that visited the Park just on a single day.Since the nature reserve reaches peak for all the car types except 3 axle truck that sees peak not just in June, July and August but sees the highest peak in September. This is probably because 3 axle trucks are used to clean and dump garbage.Considering the busiest previous 3 months, more 3 axle trucks were used to clean the Nature reserve in September that explains the pattern. The highest peak is observed on 9th July 2015 which was a public holiday in Thailand, and a long weekend. The increase in crowd can be attributed to the holiday.

Patterns of life for visitors who visited the preserve over multiple days:

A plot of Car-type against Gate name for visitors that visited over multiple days is as shown above. The plot is similar to the pattern observed for Single day visitors. Not many people have camped even in this category of visitors which is quite unusual. While in case of single day visits, type of cars included all the possible car types - 1,2,2P,3,4,5,and 6, the pattern observed in terms of car-types used by multiple day visitors is different in the sense that, the 4 axle truck, 2 axle bus and 3 axle bus are least popular. Most popular car - type is again the 2 - axle car (or motorcycle). This is quite intuitive as it makes more sense for visitors to come by cars or motorcycles as it is convenient.

Map of the path traveled by multiple day visitors on May 1st 2015 is as shown below.

Daily patterns can be viewed on the map by selecting the required gate names, day, and car-types which gives Car IDs that meet the filter criteria. There are about 72k visitors that visited the Park just over multiple days.

Unusual Patterns

1) As seen in the above 2 line charts, it can be seen that, June-July-August are the busiest months with the number of visitors hitting the peak. While October-November-December seem to have the lowest. Let us assume that the visitors are coming to see the birds. Birds migrate towards South during Winter ( October-November-December) while migrate towards North during June-July-August. If this were true, then the visitors are coming to the Nature Preserve for a different reason other than bird watching in which case, reduction in the number of birds or birds habitat getting affected is irrelevant to the traffic caused by vehicles in the Nature Preserve. This is applicable both to single day visitors and visitors who visit over multiple days.

2) Camping seems to be least popular, while general gates gets crowded especially among multiple day visitors. This is quote strange considering how the general convention is for the multiple day visitors to camp over days and also go around the Nature Preserve in which case vehicles tend to move through general gates and other entrances. If this inference is true, then the pattern is irrelevant to the popular belief of traffic affecting the birds habitat unless the birds nests are closer to general gates rather than the camps themselves.

Top 3 Patterns and Recommendations

1) In the months of June, July, and August, both single day visitors and multiple visitors see a peak. Especially in the year 2015. 3 axle trucks hit the peak in September. Since these months are also known to be the mating months for the birds, the Preserve should take required measures to curb traffic during these months.

2) 2 axle car (or motorcycle) is the most popular vehicle visited overall in 2 years. However, these car-types may not cause as much sound as the trucks. Except for the peak season where the number of 2 axle car (or motorcycle) hit the peak, measures to curb trucks and other vehicles need to be considered to protect birds from flying away or reduce in number.

3) Camping is not popular compared to general gates and other gate types. This indicates that the movement of vehicles is more than parking of vehicles which curbs traffic at least to an extent. This could be a threat to the habitats as more vehicles keep moving around the preserve which might disturb the birds. Therefore, Park authorities need to encourage camping, reduce buses and motorcycles roaming around the place. Nature Preserve can even introduce alternate means of commute inside such as cycling, and setting up walking trails.