José I. Barredo

Modelling dynamic spatial processes: simulation of urban future scenarios through cellular automata

One of the most potentially useful applications of cellular automata (CA) from the point of view of spatial planning is their use in simulations of urban growth at local and regional level. Urban simulations are of particular interest to urban and regional planners since the future impacts of actions and policies are critically important. However, urban growth processes are usually difficult to simulate. This paper addresses from a theoretical point of view the question of why to use CA for urban scenario generation. In the first part of the paper, complexity as well as other properties of digital cities are analysed. The role of the urban land use allocation factors is also studied in order to propose a bottom-up approach which integrates the land use factors with the dynamic approach of the CA for modelling future urban land use scenarios. The second part of the paper presents an application of an urban CA in the city of Dublin. A simulation for 30 years has been produced using a CA software prototype. The results of the model have been tested by means of the fractal dimension and the comparison matrix methods. The simulation results are realistic and relatively accurate confirming the effectiveness of the proposed urban CA approach.

Mapping and assessment of ecosystems and their services: An analytical framework for ecosystem assessments under action 5 of the EU biodiversity strategy to 2020

In the EU, many ecosystems and their services have been degraded 1,2 . Target 2 focuses on maintaining and enhancing ecosystem services and restoring degraded ecosystems by incorporating green infrastructure in spatial planning. This will contribute to the EUs sustainable growth objectives and to mitigating and adapting to climate change, while promoting economic, territorial and social cohesion and safeguarding the EUs cultural heritage. It will also ensure better functional connectivity between ecosystems within and between Natura 2000 areas and in the wider countryside. Target 2 incorporates the global Aichi target 15 agreed by EU Member States and the EU in Nagoya to restore 15% of degraded ecosystems by 2020. It is also a direct response to Aichi targets 2 and 14 of the Global Strategic Plan for Biodiversity, 2011-2020 of Convention of Biological Diversity 3 .

Modelling Future Urban Scenarios in Developing Countries: An Application Case Study in Lagos, Nigeria

We consider urban sustainability issues in developing countries, with a focus on urban growth. The need for urban management tools that are able to provide prospective scenarios is addressed. Urban simulations can represent a useful approach to understanding the consequences of current planning policies—or their incompleteness. Nevertheless, simulations of future urban growth are usually quite difficult without tools which embrace the complexity of the urban system. We describe an urban-growth simulation for the city of Lagos in Nigeria, in which an urban cellular automata (CA) prototype is used. We propose a bottom-up approach which integrates land-use factors with the dynamic approach of CA for modelling future urban land-use scenarios. The model for Lagos was calibrated and tested with the aid of measured time-series data on land use, through a set of spatial metrics and κ-coefficients. A twenty-year simulation, until 2020, was run. The simulation results are realistic and achieve a high level of detail, confirming the effectiveness of the proposed model.

Mapping and Assessment of Ecosystems and their Services: Indicators for ecosystem assessments under Action 5 of the EU Biodiversity Strategy to 2020

Environment Europe Direct is a service to help you find answers to your questions about the European Union Summary The second MAES report presents indicators that can be used at European and Member States level to map and assess biodiversity, ecosystem condition and ecosystem services according to the Common International Classification of Ecosystem Services (CICES v4.3). This work is based on a review of data and indicators available at national and European level and is applying the MAES analytical framework adopted in 2013.

Potential Flood Hazard and Risk Mapping at Pan-European Scale

In the last decade Europe has experienced a number of unusually longlasting rainfall events that produced severe floods, e.g. in the Netherlands, Belgium, France and Germany in 1993 and 1995, the Czech Republic, Poland and Germany in 1997, in North Italy (in 1994 and 2000), in the UK (e.g. in 1998 and 2000), Tisza (in 2000 and 2001), in the Elbe and Danube in 2002, and in 2005 in Romania and the northern Alpine region. There seems to be a trend of increasing flood hazard. This may support projections of future climate indicating that further increases in severe floods in North and Northwest Europe are likely (e.g. IPCC 2001). The Joint Research Centre of the European Commission (JRC) provides EU policy support on flood issues, especially focused on cross-border river basins. In addition to the work on the development of an early warning system at the pan-European scale (EFAS, the European Flood Alert System), JRC carries out flood mitigation and forecasting case studies in the Elbe and Danube catchments, and flash floods, climate change effects and flood risk mapping at European scale [1].

Robust modelling of the impacts of climate change on the habitat suitability of forest tree species

In Europe, forests play a strategic multifunctional role, serving economic, social and environmental purposes. However, forests are among the most complex systems and their interaction with the ongoing climate change – and the multifaceted chain of potential cascading consequences for European biodiversity, environment, society and economy – is not yet well understood. The JRC PESETA project series proposes a consistent multi-sectoral assessment of the impacts of climate change in Europe. Within the PESETA II project, a robust methodology is introduced for modelling the habitat suitability of forest tree species (2071-2100 time horizon). Abies alba (the silver fir) is selected as a case study: a main European tree species often distributed in bioclimatically complex areas, spanning over various forest types and with multiple populations adapted to different conditions. The modular modelling architecture is based on relative distance similarity (RDS) estimates which link field observations with bioclimatic patterns, projecting their change under climate scenarios into the expected potential change of suitable habitat for tree species. Robust management of uncertainty is also examined. Both technical and interpretation core aspects are presented in an integrated overview. The semantics of the array of quantities under focus and the uneven sources of uncertainty at the continental scale are discussed (following the semantic array programming paradigm), with an effort to offer some minimal guidance on terminology, meaning and methodological limitations not only of the proposed approach, but also of the broad available literature – whose heterogeneity and partial ambiguity might potentially reverberate at the science-policy interface. ► How to cite: ◄ de Rigo, D., Caudullo, G., San-Miguel-Ayanz, J, Barredo, J.I., 2017. Robust modelling of the impacts of climate change on the habitat suitability of forest tree species. Publication Office of the European Union, Luxembourg. 58 pp. ISBN:978-92-79-66704-6 , https://doi.org/10.2760/296501

Developing a Forest Data Portal to Support Multi-Scale Decision Making

Forests play a pivotal role in timber production, maintenance and development of biodiversity and in carbon sequestration and storage in the context of the Kyoto Protocol. Policy makers and forest experts therefore require reliable information on forest extent, type and change for management, planning and modeling purposes. It is becoming increasingly clear that such forest information is frequently inconsistent and unharmonised between countries and continents. This paper presents a forest information portal that has been developed in line with the GEOSS and INSPIRE frameworks. The web portal provides access to forest resource data at a variety of spatial scales, from global through to regional and local, as well as providing analytical capabilities for monitoring and validating forest change. The system also allows for the utilisation of forest data and processing services within other thematic areas. The web portal has been developed using open standards to facilitate accessibility, interoperability and data transfer.

Continental-Scale Living Forest Biomass and Carbon Stock: a Robust Fuzzy Ensemble of IPCC Tier 1 Maps for Europe

Forest ecosystems play a key role in the global carbon cycle. Spatially explicit data and assessments of forest biomass and carbon are therefore crucial for designing and implementing effective sustainable forest management options and forest related policies. In this contribution, we present European-wide maps of forest biomass and carbon stock spatially disaggregated at 1km x 1km. The maps originated from a spatialisation improvement of the IPCC methodology for estimating the forest biomass at IPCC Tier 1 level (IPCC-T1). Using a categorical map of ecological zones within the mapping technique may originate boundary effects between the ecological zones. This may induce undue artifacts in the outcomes, as evident in previously published maps generated with the IPCC-T1 methodology. Here we present a novel method for IPCC-T1 biomass mapping which mitigates these artifacts. We propose the use of a fuzzy similarity map of the FAO ecological zones computed by estimating the relative distance similarity (RDS) of each grid-cells climate and geography with respect to the FAO ecological zones. A robust ensemble approach was used to merge an array of simple models with spatially distributed fuzzy set-membership. This allowed the boundary artifacts to be reduced, while mitigating the impact of model semantic extrapolation. The chain of semantically enhanced data-transformations is described following the semantic array programming paradigm. Preliminary results obtained from the application of this novel approach are presented along with a discussion of its impact on the derived maps.

GEOLAND spatial planning observatory: How remote sensing data can serve the needs of urban and regional planning

The objective of the geoland is to develop and demonstrate reliable, affordable and cost efficient European geo-information services, supporting the implementation of European directives and their national, regional and local implementation, as well as European and international policies. The observatory for spatial planning (OSP) generates products and services based on earth observation (EO) data, other geo-spatial as well as socioeconomic data contributing to the information needs of spatial planning. In this paper we will focus on presenting the results of the two first years of geoland OSP, namely indicators and urban growth scenarios and on analysing their usefulness in regional and urban planning. The process of calculating indicators on the basis of combining earth observation data with socio-economic data has been carried out at three levels: European level, national/transnational level and subnational level. The indicators are linked to urban issues, urban-rural interaction and environmental topics. In addition to making the spatial data more useful for users e.g. urban and regional planners, the indicators have been developed and calculated following fully scientific criteria. Many of the developed indicators have been devised bearing in mind issues linked to various aspects of sustainable development. Landscape fragmentation, access to green urban areas and degree of urban sprawl yield useful information for planners about the present state of the environment and if the direction of the development is towards a more sustainable future or not. Urban planning is very future oriented task. Most available tools such as indicators are linked to past and present. There is a clear need for development and testing of models which would help urban and regional planners to simulate in an easy and reliable way the future development of the city and more over what kinds of impacts different development scenarios induce. In order to bridge this gap geoland spatial observatory has done various tests with two types of land use models: settlement growth model and cellular automata model. Both models have proved to produce reliable simulations for urban land use changes. Urban and regional planners participating in the project are convinced about the added value these types of models can provide with both in the planning process and in political decision-making.

Measuring and modeling urban dynamics: impact on quality of life and hydrology

The objectives and methodology of the MAMUD research project are presented in this paper. MAMUD is an acronym for Measuring and Modeling Urban Dynamics: Impact on Quality of Live and Hydrology. The research will be conducted over a four year period (2007-2011). The major goal is to investigate how earth observation can contribute to a better monitoring, modeling and understanding of urban dynamics, and its impacts on the urban and suburban environment.