Exposition to human influence - ArcGIS toolbox and raster for Slovakia

"Exposition to human influence" is a new spatial variable for the land use and land cover change modelling, approximating the intensity of human influence on the landscape. The “exposition” simulates the dilution of human activity from settlements (source points with information about population size or other human activity quantification) to landscape, based on the accessibility. Exposition to a settlement is directly proportional to its population size and inversely proportional to the cost distance from this settlement. Cost distance uses sine of the slope angle as a cost raster to simulate a barrier effect of the terrain. Overall exposition to human influence sums all expositions to individual settlements in a region. Resulting raster field created for Slovakia achieves an observable resemblance to the actual intensity of land use, derived from Corine Land Cover map. The ArcGIS tool developed for the exposition computation is supplemented.