ALPMON FINAL REPORT - ARC systems research

Contract ENV4-CT96-0359 ALPMON
Together with pre-processing (report to WP 8 or 12) a photo-like image is developed. This fusion
image was used for visual interpretation (monitoring of landscape changes), as background (visual
information) in the tourist information system and for visualisation tasks like a 'fly through'.
2.3.1.3.1 Task: tourist information system for hikers
Tourists who come to the area of Tarvisio are mostly hiking tourists. The main season for visits is the
summer. Therefore, the main attention was given to "hiking-tourism". For hiking-tourism it is shown
how remote sensing data and GIS technology can be used for tourist information. An information
system was developed that allows the tourists to choose routes freely and get further information for
these. This additional information is the altitude profile of the trail, how much of the trails length lies on
ground with a particular aspect, and how much of the route goes through forest or open area.
A tourist information system is an open system: More ideas can be added. Further ideas, also with
regard to local public transport service, are given by FISCHER (1998) and FISCHER et al. (1998). For
example, the Swiss hiking trails SAW asked a company to develop an information system that allows
management and analysis of their hiking trails. As a result, this information system is used not only by
the administration but also for tourist information (KROMER et al. 1999). ZIPF (1999) attempted to
interest the tourists in the history of the city of Heidelberg with three-dimensional city sceneries from
different eras.
Such an information system can be used in a variety of ways and places: It can of course be made
available at the Tourist Office in the region itself; it could be used via Internet or in travel agencies. The
presentation in the Internet or travel agency would demand different software. These would have to be
"stand alone" solutions.
The example introduced in this report was developed in order to show up some possibilities. In this part
of the application study for ALPMON, both the fusion image and the classification result 'crown closure'
were used. The information system was build up with ArcView 3.1. The surface adaptation was created
with the dialog designer, the programming was done with the ArcView-inherent language AVENUE.
Further information can be requested with the persons responsible at the University of Freiburg.
Result:
Figure 4 is meant to give an impression about the possibilities of the developed hiking information
system. A hiker has now the possibility to choose a hiking route by himself. For this purpose, he
touches the button "Routen wählen" (choose route). A menu then appears that helps the hiker to lay
out his route and get further information about that route. Several routes can be chosen. These hiking
routes can be chosen freely. Points wished to be reached should be marked here. At least a startingand
an end point must be chosen. Additionally as many intermediate points as desired can be set. In
this way some routes can be tried out by the tourist. The chosen routes are listed behind the item
'Routen:' (routes:) in a dropdown menu and can be called again separately. Under the dropdown menu
in which the individual routes are listed, the routing distance is announced for the selected route. The
routes are tracked in the background with the network analysts function 'Find Best Route'. This
function searches the shortest connection between the chosen points.
After a route has been laid out further information about it can be asked. In our example, the following
possibilities were programmed: Profile chart, exposure and shares of forest / open land. Latter
describes how long the route leads through closed forest, open land and so forth. The same is
computed concerning exposure. The altitude profile gives a view of gradients, differences in levels and
its distribution on the route (Figure 4).
JR, RSDE, ALU, LMU, Seibersdorf, WSL 27