Pilar Chias

Wind farms: GIS-based visual impact assessment and visualization tools

Landscape is gradually being considered an essential resource and, therefore, is a variable to be included in land planning and protection designations. A structured method of landscape assessment, which links descriptions, classification, analysis, and evaluation, will provide an integrated framework within which the problem of scenic impact from renewable energy sources can be debated and solved. Perceptual qualitative and quantitative data – such as road networks, land cover, satellite imagery, and aerial photography – can be used for site description and analysis or for 3D modeling and GIS-based visualization work. The case study in which our method was applied demonstrates the impact of wind turbines and wind farms, as well as their cumulative effects in Sierra de Pela (Soria and Guadalajara, Spain).

Visualising Ancient Maps as Cultural Heritage: A Relational Database of the Spanish Ancient Cartography

The analysis of the historical evolution of the territories and landscapes has been seldom based upon the study of old cartographic documents; they have been always set in a second place after texts and writings. Trying to bridge this gap, we have designed and implemented a relational database of the ancient maps and charts that are already preserved in the main Spanish collections, archives and libraries, that includes the possibility to access to a a high resolution digital image of each one of them. The personalized queries to the database will allow the scholars and searchers to visualise the document together with its main features.

Spatial Data Infrastructures and Spanish Cultural Heritage: The INSPIRE Framework Applied to the Monastery of El Escorial

The INSPIRE Directive established an Infrastructure for Spatial Information in Europe (INSPIRE), aiming to enable the interoperability and harmonization of spatial data sets and services across Europe. There are two main data specifications inside INSPIRE that might concern cultural heritage data: the Data Specification on Protected Sites, and the Data Specification on Area Management/Restriction/Regulation Zones and Reporting Units. These data specifications include the technical documentation of the application schema that defines the content and structure of the data required by one or more applications. Cultural heritage also overlaps the Data Specification on Buildings, for architectural heritage is to be taken as constructed buildings under that data specification. Nonetheless, many heritage features do not fit within the definition of a building. The Cultural Heritage Application Schema developed by IDEE (Infraestructuras de Datos Espaciales) [Spatial Data Infrastructures] Working Group suggests the inclusion of cultural heritage protected areas as a special kind of protected site, and develops a minimal schema to include information about the real world protected entity. This approach involves some difficulties. As a case study we propose the Monastery of San Lorenzo de El Escorial and the surrounding Royal Estates.

Open Source Tools, Landscape and Cartography: Studies on the Cultural Heritage at a Territorial Scale

© 2012 Chias and Abad, licensee InTech. This is an open access chapter distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Open Source Tools, Landscape and Cartography: Studies on the Cultural Heritage at a Territorial Scale

Geolocating and Georeferencing: GIS Tools for Ancient Maps Visualisation

The e-Library on Ancient Spanish Cartography has been created inside the frame set by the European Union about the Europe’s digital cultural heritage to give a response to the real demand among citizens and within the research community. With this aim we have applied the most advanced information and communication technologies (ICTs) to make ancient Spanish maps and views accessible through Internet. On a first stage we have built a relational multiformat and multilingual database that included high resolution images of the cartographic documents and that supported the online accessibility structured by levels. This platform has been recently improved by implementing an open GIS based on the data sets of the e-Library. GIS tools have enlarged the usability of the system as the traditional geolocation searches are now completed with the queries based on maps’ georeferencing. The GIS on Ancient Spanish Maps suggests a new concept in digital map libraries.

The Peninsular War 1808–1814: French and Spanish Cartography of the Guadarrama Pass and El Escorial

Many roads which still cross the Sierra de Guadarrama mountain range to connect the two plateaus in the centre of Spain date back to Roman times. The mountain passes of Somosierra, Navacerrada, La Fuenfria and Guadarrama were consolidated between the Middle Ages and the eighteenth century as necessary stages on the routes from Bayonne (France) to Madrid and Andalusia. In particular, the passes of La Fuenfria and Guadarrama linked the San Lorenzo de El Escorial Monastery and Segovia with the Spanish capital, and were progressively improved by the Bourbon kings, as was reflected in detail in Spanish maps. As strategic passes, they played an important role during the Peninsular War, and consequently they were also mapped by English and French cartographers. Much of the cartography from before, during and after this war comprises a largely unpublished collection of very interesting maps that are held in Spanish archives. The objectives of this research were, firstly, to study and disseminate the maps of these mountain passes produced around the time of the war. Secondly, to analyse the collaboration of Spanish cartographers with their European colleagues, a process which began with Philip V in 1700 and continued throughout the eighteenth century. And, thirdly, to analyse the influence of this cartography on post-war maps.

Colonial Urban Planning and Land Structures in the Philippines, 1521-1898

Abstract The Spanish Colonial period in the Indies extends from 1492 to 1898, when the last colonies - Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines - attained their independence. The Philippines depended on the Spanish Crown from 1521, the date of the first settlement on the Island of Cebu. More than two hundred new cities were founded along the archipelago with the traditional grid structure, but some with other urban typologies have not been studied before. At the beginning they were mostly located on the coast and later became port cities, but the ensuing exploration of inland territories led to the construction of new settlements, later linked through a network of roads, railroads and navigational routes. Based upon the ancient cartography of the Philippines that the authors have recently discovered in the principal Spanish repositories, the present article studies these unexplored and unpublished fields of research, analyzing the different urban patterns, as well as the territorial structures that were consolidated during the Spanish Colonial period in the Archipelago.

More than the Usual Searches: a GIS Based Digital Library of the Spanish Ancient Cartography

Inside the frame established by the Council of the European Union about Digital Libraries, we are creating a complete and multilingual database on Spanish ancient cartography. It gathers the documents located in the different archives, that yet today remain disperse and even unknown. We are also implementing an open Geographic Information System, that surpasses the usual operability of the traditional multiformat databases. Allowing to establish more complex relationships among all this information, the GIS enlarges the different queries and searches, and spreads online a more personalised information. This new methodology has been created with the aim of being implemented all around the European Union. Based upon the study of old cartographic documents, the system will allow searches and analysis of the historical evolution of the territories and landscapes.