The GIS Architecture Elements for the Coastal Areas Along the Adriatic Sea

Abstract

The study of the national and cross-border Adriatic coastal areas will be approached by using an interdisciplinary method. A comparative reading will focus on an analysis of the main variations undergone by the area and will try to define all the elements involved in those areas where a conflicting presence exists between high quality environmental factors on the one hand and anthropological aggression on the other. In this paper we present the aim of the GES.S.TER. project, that is the creation of a protocol for territorial analysis – namely the G.I.S.A.E. Adriatic (Geographical Information System for Activities along the Coast). The Project is financed by the Interreg IIIA Programme Adriatic Cross Border from 2004 to 2007 (prof. Donatella Cialdea is the Head of GESS.S.TER.). Moreover the Project will be a case-study analysed by the GISIG - Geographical Information Systems International Group. The areas covered by the project include the national Adriatic coast, in particular the coastal area of Molise, and the cross-border coasts of Albania and Croatia (both partners in the project). In the definition of the characteristics that a territorial information system of aid to the GES.S.TER project should have, the parameters for the collection of data and for the reordering of the information, which was already in our possession, have been established. Another necessary step has been that of revising and coordinating the existing sources, keeping in mind that the final purpose of the system is to define the objective landscape qualities, we find ourselves having to face the problem of combining, and consequently, comparing, information coming from different sources. Five resource systems have been selected: physical-environmental; landscape-visual; historical-cultural; agricultural-productive; Demographic-tourism. A further source of information comes from the analysis carried out during the drawing up of the Vast Area Environmental Landscape Territorial Plans and we have defined the criteria for the selection of the indicators. These indicators will be useful for an evaluation of transformations through time of the territories, in order to prepare the documents for the strategic environmental assessment procedures too.