Aree urbane

Urban Areas

Large cities, like all other towns, suffer from the effects of the use but above all from the misuse of territorial resources. There is therefore an ever increasing need for modern and efficient tools to control urban expansion, territorial degradation, and to analyse situations that pose risks for the environment and man .

Urban Expation

Multi-temporal analysis of urban areas, obtained by superimposing images of the same territory taken at different times, offers the possibility of spotlighting the changes that have taken place over the years and to follow the urban development of any given area over time. Current law envisages that by December 2003 every Municipal Administration will be autonomous in running the Urban and Agricultural Cadastre within its territory.

IPT has created a solution, called SITCOM, that is in the forefront both as regards the technological choices but also as regards the ease of entry for the consumer, whether he be the Administration or the local citizen, able to operate the entire procedure to register censed data, from its creation to the time of consultation and certification and at each and every intermediary stage in administrative, tax and censorial operations. The solution proposed by IPT has been created in individual forms, each for a specific topic (Building Cadastre, Agricultural Cadastre, Tax, unauthorized building, P.R.G.) for the purposes of enabling the Administration concerned to select the most suitable level of operations to adopt for its activities, both in relation to the degree of detail sought, and in relation to the simplicity of inclusion in its existing structure.

The basic solution is made up of the following Forms:

City Planning
Buildings Cadastre
Agricultural Cadastre
Tax
Unauthorised Building

The uniqueness of the solution proposed by IPT is indicated by the integration of paper information and digital information of a cartographic and cadastral map type with digital images of the territory received directly by satellite via its receiving station in Italy. In the three images below, the deficiency, both of the cartography and of the overflight, in conducting a census, with a certain consistency of the true situation is only too apparent.

Census and control of unauthorized building.

Census and control of unauthorized building

The problem of unauthorized building has always been the Achilles Heel for local government, both because there is no reliable storical documentation, and because the resources for managing the problem are limited and wasted in red tape.

Today, the control and suppression of such abuses can also become a source of income through the acquisition of amnesties, pardons and of taxes derived directly or indirectly from the same.

The means used to-date to manage such problems have proved to be of little effect. Indeed, simple cartography, indispensable for numerous Institutional and productive activities, has suffered from a constitutional defect that derives from methodologies used to-date for its production.

It is well-known that official cartography is accurate but suffers from a misalignment with the true situation because of the lack of resources available for its timely up-dating. Images obtained from aerial overflights are costly and, by reason of their very nature, are already old by the time they come into existence; the planes fly only periodically, at a very high cost and with many limitations dictated by the aeronautical authorities.

Remote sensing by satellite offers a valid solution to these problems. As the overflights are continuous, updating is therefore guaranteed and the cost is much less than that of other solutions. Images of the territory obtained from remote sensing by satellite can be used as a solution capable of supplying updated cartographic products at the proper time, consistent with the context. In this way, images obtained using this technology can fill the time gap between the need for urgent information and the possibility of having official reference material

Territorial Degradation
One of the most widespread environmental problems is the existence of discontinued quarries and sites used as illegal dumping grounds. On the basis of the geometric scale of the problem to be faced, it is possible with the aid of multi-spectral remote sensing technology by satellite to supply basic elements for the inventory and classification of dumps and areas subject to degradation.

Analysis of covering materials
The correct management of urban areas presupposes a knowledge of the materials with which the dwellings have been constructed. Aerial multi-spectral remote sensing permits the identification of the covering materials used in construction. In particular, attention is given in the following example to the material used in the case of cement and asbestos covering, the latter being particularly harmful to human health.

cortesy of CNR Lara