Risk Assessment for Environmental Applications: Integrated Analysis of Spatial Data Using Multi-temporal Digital Orthophotos and Remote-sensing Satellite Images

A recently instituted National Park, in Southern Italy, is offering a wide experience in landscape knowledge and planning from multiple sources finalized to the environmental analysis. The study is conducted, in conjunction with the Italian Ministry of Environmental Affairs, to construct a large multi-disciplinary data-base for monitoring environmental risk and a GIS based management tool. The full integration of multi temporal digital orthophotos, on a scale of 1:10.000 and 1m ground resolution, with historical and actual vector and raster maps, GPS ground acquisition and Landsat and Ikonos rectified satellite images, was made possible by geometric transformation in the same cartographic projection and datum. The risk assessment is actually analyzed, using multi-temporal land covers, about the vegetation, forestry, hydrogeology and quarries topics. The paper, concerning the hydro-geological order, describes the linkage between spectral analysis through satellite images and aerial photo coverage on the “stone grinding”: this change of soil composition, executed for agricultural improvements, provides an high increase of terrain permeability. The area of the National Park, about 1.500 Km, has given the possibility to test advanced GIS procedures upon a very large region with a high number of correlated information levels.