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Derek Van Berkel
Associate Professor
On Sabbatical
Geospatial Data Sciences
Conservation + Restoration
Cities + Mobility + Built Environment
Cross-cutting
Office
2538 Dana
Lab website
Websites
About
Derek Van Berkel studies how geospatial data, artificial intelligence and participatory mapping can help communities understand and respond to climate change, environmental risk and land-use change.
His research focuses on climate adaptation and migration, flood resilience, urban and landscape change, conservation, and the ways people perceive and value environments. Much of his current work examines cities and communities in the Great Lakes region and East Africa, including how places can prepare for climate-driven migration, flooding and other environmental changes.
Van Berkel combines GIS and geospatial data science with machine learning and artificial intelligence, spatial statistics, remote sensing, agent-based and land-change modeling, social media and street-level imagery, and participatory GIS. He develops interactive mapping and decision-support tools that allow residents, planners and policymakers to contribute local knowledge, explore future scenarios and combine community perspectives with environmental models and large spatial datasets.
Derek Van Berkel studies how geospatial data, artificial intelligence and participatory mapping can support communities in understanding and responding to climate change, environmental risk and land-use change.
Van Berkel is Principal Investigator of the Great Lakes Integrated Sciences and Assessments (GLISA), a regional climate adaptation program that connects climate science with communities and decision-makers across the Great Lakes. His research focuses on climate adaptation and migration, flood resilience, urban and landscape change, conservation, and the ways people perceive and value environments. Much of his current work examines cities and communities in the Great Lakes region and East Africa, including how places can prepare for climate-driven migration, flooding and other environmental changes.
Van Berkel combines GIS and geospatial data science with machine learning and artificial intelligence, spatial statistics, remote sensing, agent-based and land-change modeling, social media and street-level imagery, and participatory GIS. He develops interactive mapping and decision-support tools that allow residents, planners and policymakers to contribute local knowledge, explore future scenarios and combine community perspectives with environmental models and large spatial datasets.
His work aims to make increasingly complex social and environmental data useful for real-world decisions—particularly decisions about where communities grow, how they prepare for climate risks, how landscapes are managed and conserved, and how diverse forms of knowledge and community priorities can be incorporated into those decisions.
Publications
Van Berkel, D., Gautam, N., Carter, N. H., Di Minin, E., Zhang, Y., Mei, H., Yin, S., & Tomkins, S. (2026). YouTube content on wildlife engages audiences but rarely drives meaningful conservation action. *Communications Sustainability, 1*, 26.
Estabrook, T., Van Berkel, D., Jorns, J., & Lemos, M. C. (2026). Exploring climate-induced migration impacts on urban growth. *Computers, Environment and Urban Systems, 123*, 102368.
Lemos, M. C., Maillard, L., Herbert, N., Domingue, S. J., Jagannathan, K., Wong-Parodi, G., Goto, E. A., Gill, D., Van Berkel, D., et al. (2025). Scaling up actionable climate knowledge. *Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 122*(50), e2515771122.
Van Berkel, D. B., Estabrook, T., Fox, N., Bejarano, R. A., Maillard, L., Gill, D., Goto, E. A., & Lemos, M. C. (2023). PPGISr: An R package for Public Participatory GIS. *SoftwareX, 22*, 101389.
Ghermandi, A., Langemeyer, J., Van Berkel, D. B., Calcagni, F., Depietri, Y., Vigl, L. E., et al. (2023). Social media data for environmental sustainability: A critical review of opportunities, threats, and ethical use. *One Earth, 6*(3), 236–250.
Van Berkel, D., Kalafatis, S., Gibbons, B., Naud, M., & Lemos, M. C. (2022). Planning for climate migration in Great Lake legacy cities. *Earth’s Future, 10*(10), e2022EF002942.
van Zanten, B. T., Van Berkel, D. B., Meentemeyer, R. K., Smith, J. W., Tieskens, K. F., & Verburg, P. H. (2016). Continental-scale quantification of landscape values using social media data. *Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 113*(46), 12974–12979.
Research
Great Lakes Climate Adaptation (GLISA)
As Principal Investigator of GLISA, NOAA’s Great Lakes Climate Adaptation Partnership, Van Berkel leads research and engagement that connects climate science with communities and decision-makers across the Great Lakes region. GLISA works with cities, Tribal communities, practitioners and regional partners to co-develop climate information, tools and approaches that support decisions about flooding, extreme weather, climate migration and other emerging climate risks.
Website: https://glisa.umich.edu/
Funding: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
Planning for Climate Migration in the Great Lakes and East Africa
Examines how climate change may reshape migration and urban growth in Great Lakes cities and communities in the Lake Victoria Basin, including Detroit, Milwaukee, Buffalo, Kampala and Mwanza. The project combines migration research, spatial modeling and community knowledge to help cities anticipate where people may move and how housing, infrastructure and services can adapt.
Project: CLARS – Climate Adaptation and Resilience Strategies
Funding: National Science Foundation and international partners
Community Mapping for Flood Resilience
Works with Great Lakes communities to identify where residents experience flooding, which places they consider most vulnerable and what interventions they prioritize. Participatory GIS and interactive mapping tools connect this local knowledge with flood and climate models so that communities can use both lived experience and technical information in adaptation planning.
Project: GLISA – Great Lakes Integrated Sciences and Assessments
Funding: NOAA
AI and Geospatial Data for Urban Housing
Develops artificial intelligence and geospatial methods to assess housing and neighborhood conditions from street-level imagery and other urban datasets, with ongoing work in Detroit. The research explores how scalable AI tools can support identification of property conditions and neighborhood change while addressing questions about accuracy, transparency, governance and responsible use in public decision-making.
Project: Van Berkel Lab – AI and Urban Geospatial Research
Interactive Tools for Climate and Community Planning
Develops PIVOT (Participatory GIS Urban Development Tool) and related geospatial decision-support tools that let residents and planners map local knowledge, compare neighborhoods and cities, explore future scenarios and combine community priorities with environmental models. Current applications address flooding, climate adaptation, urban planning and climate migration across communities in the Great Lakes region and East Africa.
Project: PIVOT – Participatory GIS Urban Development Tool
Funding: NOAA/GLISA
Digital Data, AI and Conservation
Studies what social media, online videos and other large digital datasets reveal about how people experience, value and respond to wildlife and landscapes. Current research uses machine learning and spatial analysis to understand public engagement with conservation and to determine when large-scale digital traces can—and cannot—provide useful evidence for environmental decision-making.
Selected research: YouTube content on wildlife engages audiences but rarely drives meaningful conservation action
Modeling Future Urban and Landscape Change
Uses spatial simulation, agent-based models and land-change models to examine how cities and landscapes may develop under alternative climate, migration and planning scenarios. Research in Michigan and Colorado investigates how development policies and population change can alter urban growth and exposure to hazards such as flooding and wildfire.
Selected research: Exploring climate-induced migration impacts on urban growth
Education
- Ph.D. Spatial Analysis and Decision Support, VU University Amsterdam, 2012.
- M.S. Human Geography and Urban Planning, Utrecht University, 2007.B.A. Human Geography, University of Calgary, 2004.
Affiliations
- Principal Investigator (PI), GLISA | PI, CLARS | PI, CHIRRP
In the News
In the Media