Buildings and terrain unified – multidimensional dual data structure for GIS

© 2016 Wuhan University. 3D city models are widely used in many disciplines and applications, such as urban planning, disaster management, and environmental simulation. Usually, the terrain and embedded objects like buildings are taken into consideration. A consistent model integrating these elements is vital for GIS analysis, especially if the geometry is accompanied by the topological relations between neighboring objects. Such a model allows for more efficient and errorless analysis. The memory consumption is another crucial aspect when the wide area of a city is considered – light models are highly desirable. Three methods of the terrain representation using the geometrical–topological data structure – the dual half-edge – are proposed in this article. The integration of buildings and other structures like bridges with the terrain is also presented

An investigation into the development of a facilities management system for the University of Cape Town

Includes bibliographical references

GIS platform for management of shallow geothermal resources

Premi extraordinari doctorat UPC curs 2015-2016, àmbit d’Enginyeria CivilThis thesis promotes an efficient use of shallow geothermal energy by means of an integrated management system to organize its exploitation. Shallow geothermal energy is a renewable resource based on thermal energy exchange with the ground. Due to the growth in demand for this energy, the development of management techniques to organize the exploitation of this resource is mandatory to protect both groundwater and the users' rights. Shallow geothermal performance of underground is closely related to groundwater behavior, so it is necessary to understand and improve the knowledge about it. Thus, an integrated methodology is proposed for the 3D visualization of underground resources related to groundwater. A set of tools named HEROS3D was developed in a GIS environment to support the generation of 3D entities representing geological, hydrogeological, hydrochemical and geothermal features. The GIS technology also gives a wide-ranging support to environmental modeling, either conceptual or numerical, especially to groundwater modeling. However, there is a scarcity of tools to implement the conceptual model in numerical modeling platforms. This transition needs of specific methodologies to adapt the geometries and alpha-numerical data from the conceptual model to the numerical model to get optimal numerical results. Although most necessities can be satisfied with inherent GIS tools, there are particular steps in the implementation of hydrogeological conceptual model into the numerical modeling software that have not been solved yet. To overcome this gap, a set of tools is presented, named ArcArAz. It focuses on the configuration of geometry and parameterization for groundwater numerical models. Once both the hydrogeological conceptual model and the numerical model are defined, a solid basis for management of Shallow Geothermal energy is available. This thesis proposes two methodologies for the management of this energy resource at two different scales: for a regional scale and for a metropolitan scale. The first GIS methodology provides a response to the need for a regional quantification of the geothermal potential that can be extracted by Boreholes Heat Exchangers and its associated environmental impacts. For the first time, advection and dispersion heat transport mechanisms and the temporal evolution from the start of operation of the BHE are considered in the regional estimation of the variables of interest. A sensitivity analysis leads to the conclusion that the consideration of dispersion effects and temporal evolution of the exploitation prevent significant differences up to a factor 2.5 in the heat exchange rate accuracy and up to several orders of magnitude in the impacts generated. To deepen the management of Shallow Geothermal Energy, this thesis proposes to establish a market of shallow geothermal energy use rights which would allow managing this resource at a metropolitan scale. This methodology is based on a GIS framework and is composed of a geospatial database to store the main information required to manage the installations and a set of GIS tools used to define, implant and control this use rights market. Thermal impacts derived from the exploitation of this resource can also be registered geographically, by taking into account the groundwater flow direction and adjusting the thermal impact to the available plot.Esta tesis promueve el uso eficiente de la geotermia somera a través de un sistema integrado de gestión de este recurso. La geotermia somera es un recurso renovable que se basa en el intercambio de energía con el suelo. Los Intercambiadores de calor, o Borehole Heat Exchangers (BHEs) se están popularizando como sistema para explotarla. Debido al crecimiento en la demanda de geotermia somera, es imprescindible establecer una gestión integrada de este recurso para organizar su explotación y proteger tanto a las aguas subterráneas como a los beneficiarios de esta energía renovable. Debido a que la geotermia somera está íntimamente relacionada con el comportamiento de las aguas subterráneas, es imprescindible ahondar y mejorar su conocimiento. Para ello, se propone una metodología para la visualización tridimensional de los recursos subterráneos relacionados con la hidrogeología. Se ha desarrollado un conjunto de herramientas, llamado HEROS3D, en un entorno SIG. Estas herramientas facilitan la creación de entidades tridimensionales que representan datos geológicos, hidrogeológicos, hidrogeoquímicos y geotermales. Están relacionadas con una base de datos donde tanto la información bruta como la interpretada se encuentran almacenadas. La tecnología SIG también da soporte, no sólo a la modelación conceptual, sino también a la numérica, especialmente en el caso de la hidrogeología. Para facilitar la implementación de los modelos conceptuales en las plataformas de modelación numérica, esta tesis presenta un segundo conjunto de herramientas llamado ArcArAz. Estas herramientas ofrecen soluciones a los problemas más comunes relacionados con la configuración de la geometría de entrada al modelo numérico, así como su parametrización. Las bases para una gestión eficiente de la geotermia somera se establecen llamado ArcArAz. Estas herramientas ofrecen soluciones a los problemas más comunes relacionados con la configuración de la geometría de entrada al modelo numérico, así como su parametrización. Las bases para una gestión eficiente de la geotermia somera se establecen una vez que hemos definido y están disponibles tanto el modelo hidrogeológico conceptual como el modelo numérico. En relación a este aspecto, en esta tesis se proponen dos metodologías de gestión enfocadas a escalas diferentes: escala regional y escala metropolitana o local. La primera metodología SIG ofrece una respuesta a la necesidad de una cuantificación regional del potencial geotérmico somero que puede extraerse con intercambiadores de calor o Borehole Heat Exchangers, así como sus impactos térmicos asociados. Por primera vez pueden tenerse en cuenta en la estimación regional de las variables de interés la advección y dispersión de calor, como mecanismos de transporte de calor, así como la evolución temporal desde el inicio de la explotación. Un análisis de sensibilidad demuestra que la consideración de los efectos de dispersión así como el régimen temporal de la explotación supone diferencias de hasta 2.5 veces el potencial extraído y hasta de varios ordenes de magnitud en los impactos térmicos generados. Para profundizar en la gestión de la geotermia somera a escala local, esta tesis propone establecer un mercado de derechos de uso de este recurso. Esta metodología se ha implementado en un ambiente SIG y está compuesta de una base de datos donde se almacena la información principal necesaria para gestionar las instalaciones y de un conjunto de herramientas para definir, implantar y controlar este mercado de derechos de uso de geotermia somera. Los impactos térmicos derivados de la explotación de este recurso pueden quedar registrados geográficamente, teniendo en cuenta la dirección de flujo de las aguas subterráneas y ajustando estos impactos a la superficie de la parcela disponible una vez que hemos definido y están disponibles tanto el modelo hidrogeológico conceptual como el modelo numérico. En relación a este aspecto, en esta tesis se proponen dos metodologías de gestión enfocadas a escalas diferentes: escala regional y escala metropolitana o local. La primera metodología SIG ofrece una respuesta a la necesidad de una cuantificación regional del potencial geotérmico somero que puede extraerse con intercambiadores de calor o Borehole Heat Exchangers, así como sus impactos térmicos asociados. Por primera vez pueden tenerse en cuenta en la estimación regional de las variables de interés la advección y dispersión de calor, como mecanismos de transporte de calor, así como la evolución temporal desde el inicio de la explotación. Un análisis de sensibilidad demuestra que la consideración de los efectos de dispersión así como el régimen temporal de la explotación supone diferencias de hasta 2.5 veces el potencial extraído y hasta de varios ordenes de magnitud en los impactos térmicos generados. Para profundizar en la gestión de la geotermia somera a escala local, esta tesis propone establecer un mercado de derechos de uso de este recurso. Esta metodología se ha implementado en un ambiente SIG y está compuesta de una base de datos donde se almacena la información principal necesaria para gestionar las instalaciones y de un conjunto de herramientas para definir, implantar y controlar este mercado de derechos de uso de geotermia somera. Los impactos térmicos derivados de la explotación de este recurso pueden quedar registrados geográficamente, teniendo en cuenta la dirección de flujo de las aguas subterráneas y ajustando estos impactos a la superficie de la parcela disponibleAward-winningPostprint (published version

Geomatics in physiognomic landscape research: A Dutch view

Geomatics is a technology and service sector focussing on the acquisition, storage, analysis and management of geographically referenced information for improved decision-making. Landscape physiognomic and research –and its GI science application. The geomatics developments since 40 years confront us with many new algorithms and a variety of geo data. Due to these the interest in physiognomic research has been increased. This article links the variety of geodata and its processing functions to the landscape physiognomic research framework. This link is based on an overview of the geo data, the intended applications in landscape physiognomic research and the functions to perform. The article provides an overview of geographical data using/driving methods and applications that may support physiognomic landscape research that longs from methods that rely on geo-data that ranges from a administratively defined (INSPIRE), professional experiment acquired  up to collected by volunteers. These methods may act manifold: describe, proof and project of space as could be perceived, imagined and created from both perspectives affectively and cognitively. Besides to communicate results the methods include persistently also analysis by visualization. Other findings are the interest in changing objects of the landscape and perception via moving subjects

3D Spatial Data Infrastructures for web-based Visualization

In this thesis, concepts for developing Spatial Data Infrastructures with an emphasis on visualizing 3D landscape and city models in distributed environments are discussed. Spatial Data Infrastructures are important for public authorities in order to perform tasks on a daily basis, and serve as research topic in geo-informatics. Joint initiatives at national and international level exist for harmonizing procedures and technologies. Interoperability is an important aspect in this context - as enabling technology for sharing, distributing, and connecting geospatial data and services. The Open Geospatial Consortium is the main driver for developing international standards in this sector and includes government agencies, universities and private companies in a consensus process. 3D city models are becoming increasingly popular not only in desktop Virtual Reality applications but also for being used in professional purposes by public authorities. Spatial Data Infrastructures focus so far on the storage and exchange of 3D building and elevation data. For efficient streaming and visualization of spatial 3D data in distributed network environments such as the internet, concepts from the area of real time 3D Computer Graphics must be applied and combined with Geographic Information Systems (GIS). For example, scene graph data structures are commonly used for creating complex and dynamic 3D environments for computer games and Virtual Reality applications, but have not been introduced in GIS so far. In this thesis, several aspects of how to create interoperable and service-based environments for 3D spatial data are addressed. These aspects are covered by publications in journals and conference proceedings. The introductory chapter provides a logic succession from geometrical operations for processing raw data, to data integration patterns, to system designs of single components, to service interface descriptions and workflows, and finally to an architecture of a complete distributed service network. Digital Elevation Models are very important in 3D geo-visualization systems. Data structures, methods and processes are described for making them available in service based infrastructures. A specific mesh reduction method is used for generating lower levels of detail from very large point data sets. An integration technique is presented that allows the combination with 2D GIS data such as roads and land use areas. This approach allows using another optimization technique that greatly improves the usability for immersive 3D applications such as pedestrian navigation: flattening road and water surfaces. It is a geometric operation, which uses data structures and algorithms found in numerical simulation software implementing Finite Element Methods. 3D Routing is presented as a typical application scenario for detailed 3D city models. Specific problems such as bridges, overpasses and multilevel networks are addressed and possible solutions described. The integration of routing capabilities in service infrastructures can be accomplished with standards of the Open Geospatial Consortium. An additional service is described for creating 3D networks and for generating 3D routes on the fly. Visualization of indoor routes requires different representation techniques. As server interface for providing access to all 3D data, the Web 3D Service has been used and further developed. Integrating and handling scene graph data is described in order to create rich virtual environments. Coordinate transformations of scene graphs are described in detail, which is an important aspect for ensuring interoperability between systems using different spatial reference systems. The Web 3D Service plays a central part in nearly all experiments that have been carried out. It does not only provide the means for interactive web-visualizations, but also for performing further analyses, accessing detailed feature information, and for automatic content discovery. OpenStreetMap and other worldwide available datasets are used for developing a complete architecture demonstrating the scalability of 3D Spatial Data Infrastructures. Its suitability for creating 3D city models is analyzed, according to requirements set by international standards. A full virtual globe system has been developed based on OpenStreetMap including data processing, database storage, web streaming and a visualization client. Results are discussed and compared to similar approaches within geo-informatics research, clarifying in which application scenarios and under which requirements the approaches in this thesis can be applied

Integrated modelling for 3D GIS

A three dimensional (3D) model facilitates the study of the real world objects it represents. A geoinformation system (GIS) should exploit the 3D model in a digital form as a basis for answering questions pertaining to aspects of the real world. With respect to the earth sciences, different kinds of objects of reality can be realized. These objects are components of the reality under study. At the present state-of-the-art different realizations are usually situated in separate systems or subsystems. This separation results in redundancy and uncertainty when different components sharing some common aspects are combined. Relationships between different kinds of objects, or between components of an object, cannot be represented adequately. This thesis aims at the integration of those components sharing some common aspects in one 3D model. This integration brings related components together, minimizes redundancy and uncertainty. Since the model should permit not only the representation of known aspects of reality, but also the derivation of information from the existing representation, the design of the model is constrained so as to afford these capabilities. The tessellation of space by the network of simplest geometry, the simplicial network, is proposed as a solution. The known aspects of the reality can be embedded in the simplicial network without degrading their quality. The model provides finite spatial units useful for the representation of objects. Relationships between objects can also be expressed through components of these spatial units which at the same time facilitate various computations and the derivation of information implicitly available in the model. Since the simplicial network is based on concepts in geoinformation science and in mathematics, its design can be generalized for n-dimensions. The networks of different dimension are said to be compatible, which enables the incorporation of a simplicial network of a lower dimension into another simplicial network of a higher dimension.The complexity of the 3D model fulfilling the requirements listed calls for a suitable construction method. The thesis presents a simple way to construct the model. The raster technique is used for the formation of the simplicial network embedding the representation of the known aspects of reality as constraints. The prototype implementation in a software package, ISNAP, demonstrates the simplicial network's construction and use. The simplicial network can facilitate spatial and non spatial queries, computations, and 2D and 3D visualizations. The experimental tests using different kinds of data sets show that the simplicial network can be used to represent real world objects in different dimensionalities. Operations traditionally requiring different systems and spatial models can be carried out in one system using one model as a basis. This possibility makes the GIS more powerful and easy to use

The Heritage Digital Twin: a bicycle made for two. The integration of digital methodologies into cultural heritage research

The paper concerns the definition of a novel ontology for cultural heritage based on the concept of digital twin. The ontology, called Heritage Digital Twin ontology, is a compatible extension of the well-known CIDOC CRM ISO standard for cultural heritage documentation and incorporates all the different documentation systems presently in use for cultural heritage documentation. In the authors' view, it supports documentation interoperability at a higher level than the ones currently in use and enables effective cooperation among different users.Comment: Submitted to Open Research Europe. 30 pages, 9 figure

The development of GIS to aid conservation of architectural and archaeological sites using digital terrestrial photogrammetry

This thesis is concerned with the creation and implementation of an Architectural/Archaeological information System (A/AIS) by integrating digital terrestrial photogrammetry and CAD facilities as applicable to the requirements of architects, archaeologists and civil engineers. Architects and archaeologists are involved with the measurement, analysis and recording of the historical buildings and monuments. Hard-copy photogrammetric methods supporting such analyses and documentation are well established. But the requirement to interpret, classify and quantitatively process photographs can be time consuming. Also, they have limited application and cannot be re-examined if the information desired is not directly presented and a much more challenging extraction of 3-D coordinates than in a digital photogrammetric environment. The A/AIS has been developed to the point that it can provide a precise and reliable technique for non-contact 3-D measurements. The speed of on-line data acquisition, high degree of automation and adaptability has made this technique a powerful measurement tool with a great number of applications for architectural or archaeological sites. The designed tool (A/AIS) has been successful in producing the expected results in tasks examined for St. Avit Senieur Abbey in France, Strome Castle in Scotland, Gilbert Scott Building of Glasgow University, Hunter Memorial in Glasgow University and Anobanini Rock in Iran. The goals of this research were: to extract, using digital photogrammetric digitising, 3-D coordinates of architectural/archaeological features, to identify an appropriate 3-D model, to import 3-D points/lines into an appropriate 3-D modeller, to generate 3-D objects. to design and implement a prototype architectural Information System using the above 3-D model, to compare this approach to traditional approaches of measuring and archiving required information. An assessment of the contribution of digital photogrammetry, GIS and CAD to the surveying, conservation, recording and documentation of historical buildings and cultural monuments include digital rectification and restitution, feature extraction for the creation of 3-D digital models and the computer visualisation are the focus of this research

Interoperability of Traffic Infrastructure Planning and Geospatial Information Systems

Building Information Modelling (BIM) as a Model-based design facilitates to investigate multiple solutions in the infrastructure planning process. The most important reason for implementing model-based design is to help designers and to increase communication between different design parties. It decentralizes and coordinates team collaboration and facilitates faster and lossless project data exchange and management across extended teams and external partners in project lifecycle. Infrastructure are fundamental facilities, services, and installations needed for the functioning of a community or society, such as transportation, roads, communication systems, water and power networks, as well as power plants. Geospatial Information Systems (GIS) as the digital representation of the world are systems for maintaining, managing, modelling, analyzing, and visualizing of the world data including infrastructure. High level infrastructure suits mostly facilitate to analyze the infrastructure design based on the international or user defined standards. Called regulation1-based design, this minimizes errors, reduces costly design conflicts, increases time savings and provides consistent project quality, yet mostly in standalone solutions. Tasks of infrastructure usually require both model based and regulation based design packages. Infrastructure tasks deal with cross-domain information. However, the corresponding data is split in several domain models. Besides infrastructure projects demand a lot of decision makings on governmental as well as on private level considering different data models. Therefore lossless flow of project data as well as documents like regulations across project team, stakeholders, governmental and private level is highly important. Yet infrastructure projects have largely been absent from product modelling discourses for a long time. Thus, as will be explained in chapter 2 interoperability is needed in infrastructure processes. Multimodel (MM) is one of the interoperability methods which enable heterogeneous data models from various domains get bundled together into a container keeping their original format. Existing interoperability methods including existing MM solutions can’t satisfactorily fulfill the typical demands of infrastructure information processes like dynamic data resources and a huge amount of inter model relations. Therefore chapter 3 concept of infrastructure information modelling investigates a method for loose and rule based coupling of exchangeable heterogeneous information spaces. This hypothesis is an extension for the existing MM to a rule-based Multimodel named extended Multimodel (eMM) with semantic rules – instead of static links. The semantic rules will be used to describe relations between data elements of various models dynamically in a link-database. Most of the confusion about geospatial data models arises from their diversity. In some of these data models spatial IDs are the basic identities of entities and in some other data models there are no IDs. That is why in the geospatial data, data structure is more important than data models. There are always spatial indexes that enable accessing to the geodata. The most important unification of data models involved in infrastructure projects is the spatiality. Explained in chapter 4 the method of infrastructure information modelling for interoperation in spatial domains generate interlinks through spatial identity of entities. Match finding through spatial links enables any kind of data models sharing spatial property get interlinked. Through such spatial links each entity receives the spatial information from other data models which is related to the target entity due to sharing equivalent spatial index. This information will be the virtual properties for the object. The thesis uses Nearest Neighborhood algorithm for spatial match finding and performs filtering and refining approaches. For the abstraction of the spatial matching results hierarchical filtering techniques are used for refining the virtual properties. These approaches focus on two main application areas which are product model and Level of Detail (LoD). For the eMM suggested in this thesis a rule based interoperability method between arbitrary data models of spatial domain has been developed. The implementation of this method enables transaction of data in spatial domains run loss less. The system architecture and the implementation which has been applied on the case study of this thesis namely infrastructure and geospatial data models are described in chapter 5. Achieving afore mentioned aims results in reducing the whole project lifecycle costs, increasing reliability of the comprehensive fundamental information, and consequently in independent, cost-effective, aesthetically pleasing, and environmentally sensitive infrastructure design.:ABSTRACT 4 KEYWORDS 7 TABLE OF CONTENT 8 LIST OF FIGURES 9 LIST OF TABLES 11 LIST OF ABBREVIATION 12 INTRODUCTION 13 1.1. A GENERAL VIEW 14 1.2. PROBLEM STATEMENT 15 1.3. OBJECTIVES 17 1.4. APPROACH 18 1.5. STRUCTURE OF THESIS 18 INTEROPERABILITY IN INFRASTRUCTURE ENGINEERING 20 2.1. STATE OF INTEROPERABILITY 21 2.1.1. Interoperability of GIS and BIM 23 2.1.2. Interoperability of GIS and Infrastructure 25 2.2. MAIN CHALLENGES AND RELATED WORK 27 2.3. INFRASTRUCTURE MODELING IN GEOSPATIAL CONTEXT 29 2.3.1. LamdXML: Infrastructure Data Standards 32 2.3.2. CityGML: Geospatial Data Standards 33 2.3.3. LandXML and CityGML 36 2.4. INTEROPERABILITY AND MULTIMODEL TECHNOLOGY 39 2.5. LIMITATIONS OF EXISTING APPROACHES 41 INFRASTRUCTURE INFORMATION MODELLING 44 3.1. MULTI MODEL FOR GEOSPATIAL AND INFRASTRUCTURE DATA MODELS 45 3.2. LINKING APPROACH, QUERYING AND FILTERING 48 3.2.1. Virtual Properties via Link Model 49 3.3. MULTI MODEL AS AN INTERDISCIPLINARY METHOD 52 3.4. USING LEVEL OF DETAIL (LOD) FOR FILTERING 53 SPATIAL MODELLING AND PROCESSING 58 4.1. SPATIAL IDENTIFIERS 59 4.1.1. Spatial Indexes 60 4.1.2. Tree-Based Spatial Indexes 61 4.2. NEAREST NEIGHBORHOOD AS A BASIC LINK METHOD 63 4.3. HIERARCHICAL FILTERING 70 4.4. OTHER FUNCTIONAL LINK METHODS 75 4.5. ADVANCES AND LIMITATIONS OF FUNCTIONAL LINK METHODS 76 IMPLEMENTATION OF THE PROPOSED IIM METHOD 77 5.1. IMPLEMENTATION 78 5.2. CASE STUDY 83 CONCLUSION 89 6.1. SUMMERY 90 6.2. DISCUSSION OF RESULTS 92 6.3. FUTURE WORK 93 BIBLIOGRAPHY 94 7.1. BOOKS AND PAPERS 95 7.2. WEBSITES 10