Bluesky maps Britain’s ancient hedgerows from the air
High-resolution aerial photography and colour infrared imagery supplied by Bluesky is being used to help preserve Britain’s hedgerows. In a pioneering new development by Environment Systems – a geographic and environmental information consultancy – hedgerow features are being mapped automatically from the image data, considerably reducing the time and cost involved in more traditional field mapping exercises.
Hedgerows are a highly valued resource, but receive little protection under planning and environmental regulations. As a result there has been a huge loss of hedgerows over the last 50 years. Hedgerows are a respected part of our cultural heritage and historic record, essential for marking ownership boundaries and controlling the movement of livestock, however with the availability of accurate maps, GPS and fencing these reasons are now less valid. In today’s world hedgerows are becoming increasingly important for their great value to wildlife and the natural landscape. They also play an important role in preventing soil loss, reducing pollution, and for their potential to regulate water supply and reduce flooding.
For a major habitat and environmental resource there is no exact record of the extent of hedgerows in Britain, and such data is prohibitively expensive to provide by field survey. Environment Systems, using the Bluesky data, has developed a semi-automated methodology for hedgerow mapping. The red, green, blue and colour infrared spectral bands of the imagery are optimised and automated digitising techniques are used to extract hedgerow features. The output from this process is a geographic information system (GIS) ready polygon hedgerow dataset complete with length, areas and condition indicator attributes.
“The key driver for this research has been to develop a rapid, low cost approach, requiring little operator interaction, to produce a hedgerow baseline that identifies the presence and extent of hedgerows over large areas,” commented Steve Keyworth, Director of Aberystwyth based Environment Systems Ltd. “The Bluesky data is ideal for this as it provides the key input; four band digital imagery, at a sufficiently high resolution with the most up to date coverage.” Environment Systems has seen considerable interest from local authorities and government organisations, keen to produce a cost-effective record of this important habitat and landscape resource.
The data supplied by Bluesky for this development project is part of the GeoPerspectives product range, which offers nationwide coverage of high resolution, up to date aerial photography and CIR imagery, photogrammetrically derived Digital Terrain Models (the earth’s surface excluding buildings and vegetation) and Digital Surface Models (the earth’s surface including buildings and vegetation). Bluesky is also able to provide ultra detailed LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) data and services and a Thermal Survey capability. GeoPerspectives data is available to purchase online at www.bluesky-world.com.
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Editor’s Notes:
Bluesky is a UK-based specialist in aerial imaging and remote sensing data collection and processing. An internationally recognised leader with projects extending around the globe, Bluesky is proud to work with prestigious organisations such as Google, the BBC and Government Agencies.
Bluesky has unrivalled expertise in the creation of seamless, digital aerial photography, 3D landscape/cityscape visualisations and prints and also runs a national mapping centre, providing digital mapping, satellite imagery and aerial photography including ultra-high resolution imagery of cities and towns.
Environment Systems is a geographic and environment information consultancy specialising in the development and use of geographic information technology in the environment, agriculture, land and property sectors.
Environment Systems works with business, central government, agencies, local government and the third sector offering a core technical capability in consultancy, services and research for GIS data capture and analysis, image interpretation and classification, 3D geo-processing and visualisation and training.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 10th, 2009 at 4:04 pm and is filed under Aerial Photography, GeoPerspectives . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
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