ALPMON FINAL REPORT - ARC systems research

Contract ENV4-CT96-0359 ALPMON
1 Introduction
The Alpine environment, one of the most sensitive of Europe's terrestrial ecosystems, is exposed to
immediate and considerable environmental threat. The International Convention on the Protection of
the Alps demands comprehensive counter-measures and recommends that an Alpine information
system should be implemented. The goal of the project was to compile a basic landscape register for
an Alpine Monitoring System (ALPMON) by means of combined analysis of diverse satellite sensors of
Alpine landscapes selected for their typical characteristics. This system shall serve as the basis for
planning proposals. The feasibility of the Alpine Monitoring System was tested using specific
applications in the fields of disaster management, tourism management and national park
management as well as by merging the results with CORINE-Landcover. These applications were
carried out in close co-operation with the responsible experts so that the procedures developed can be
put into practice.
1.1 Objectives
While the Alps represent one of the most sensitive ecosystems in Europe the pressure on them, due to
an aggressive development drive in the past, huge numbers of tourists as well as environmental
damage, is far greater than on other environments. Forests have recently been subjected to
particularly damaging natural as well as human influences. New kinds of damage to forests, the
catastrophic storms of 1990 and 1999, and the resultant, and lasting problem of the bark beetle, and
global climatic changes have weakened the resilience of alpine forests. Far-reaching changes have
also been anticipated for agricultural land. Intensive farming and the excessive use of fertilisers,
overgrazing, forest grazing, and grass-cutting adversely diminish the potential of the alpine regions as
agricultural patrimony. Concurrently with this development we also find that more and more alpine
pastures are no longer being grazed or cultivated, so that the pastures are gradually taken over by
spreading forest. The resultant change in the face of the landscape typically associated with the Alps
has a negative impact on tourism, an important economic factor. A third area of concern is the use of
alpine land for tourism which increasingly is at odds with the aims of nature and landscape
preservation. The cumulative effect of all these factors often proves disastrous, resulting in irreversible
changes in the composition and distribution of regional plant communities as well as in agricultural and
forest areas.
The International Convention on the Protection of the Alps (short: Alpine Convention) thus concluded
that alpine environment is under imminent threat, and demands comprehensive counter-measures.
Far-sighted national and cross-border planning, considering the manifold and often competitive land
use claims, is necessary to ensure that preventive measures can be implemented by nature
conservation councils, regional planning departments, tourist boards and forestry and agricultural
authorities. The success of such measures crucially depends on the availability of information about
the land cover/land use patterns found and their development dynamics. It is not sufficient to record
alpine subsystems using high-resolution equipment. Rather, information concerning the development
of regional structures over wider areas needs to be included. Some inventory projects undertaken
today at least partly meet this requirement (e.g. Berchtesgaden National Park), yet due to the high cost
and labour intensity associated with the processing of aerial photographs and ground analyses these
investigations are generally restricted to small areas.
Satellite remote sensing represents an ideal instrument for objective, large-scale and updateable data
acquisition especially of data related to regional structures and used as a basis for the planning of
corrective measures and their monitoring. Moreover, compared to other inventory systems it offers a
highly cost efficient alternative. One further advantage of this instrument is the fact that satellite images
can synoptically record wider areas, and another the fact that using this data it is possible to observe
the same areas repeatedly which permits monitoring over many years. The latter is essential when
dealing with a sensitive ecosystem such as the Alps.
1.2 Aim and Context of ALPMON
The project aimed at the compilation of a basic landscape register for an alpine monitoring system
(ALPMON) which shall serve as the basis for planning purposes. The components of the alpine
monitoring system were, firstly, derived from the results of a classification of TM, SPOT and high
resolution satellite images and, secondly, extrapolated from thematic maps. The remote sensing data
results represent the most up-to-date GIS level, which can provide information about the alpine
JR, RSDE, ALU, LMU, Seibersdorf, WSL 5