The environmental criteria for the site location were broken down into two factors and two constraints--distance to water and distance to endangered species factors, and a water and an endangered species constraint.
Obviously the site could not be located over ocean, lakes or rivers, and wetlands are far too sensitive for any sort of development. A water constraint coverage (watercon) was created with a 100 m buffer around all water features to prevent contaminants and excess erosion going into the water. These concerns decrease (suitability increases) as you move away from water features, leveling off at maximum suitability at a distance of 800 m. Suitability then begins to decrease at 1200 m, since we want the tourists to experience a water ecosystem on their hikes while staying at the resort. A symmetrical j-shaped function was used in FUZZY (after creating a distance from water coverage) to symbolize this on the waterfuzz map.
Note: The reason the water features on the map below have a suitability rating of around 100, is because of the symmetrical function used in FUZZY. These areas, however, will be deemed unsuitable when combined with the water constraints map.
As an environmentally responsible eco-tourism resort, the protection of endangered species was also a top priority. A boolean constraint map was created for all endangered and protected species habitat on Vancouver Island, as well as an extra 1000 m buffer around these areas. To further increase the protection of these species, suitability for the site was made to decrease the closer it was to endangered species habitat. Again, using the maximum day hike distance of a 20 km round trip, suitability does not reach its maximum until 10,000 m beyond endangered species habitat.
**A complete outline of the project methodology is visible on the cartographic model on the next page**