On the 25th of June, we were honored by the visit of Dr. Jasper van Vliet from the Institute for Environmental Studies of the Vrije University Amsterdam to the Earth Observation Center (EOC) of the German Aerospace Center (DLR).
Jasper gave an inspiring guest lecture titled “Improved mapping and modelling of urban development for impact assessment” at the GZS seminar series organized by our EORC guest lecturer Dr. Simon Plank from DLR.
Here is the abstract of the talk: Urban areas are central to a range of sustainability challenges, ranging from land take and the loss of natural habitat to the exposure to climate change impacts. As a result, a large number of models have been presented that project future urban land change under different scenario conditions. The sustainability of future developments depends strongly on the characteristics of urban land, including for example the density, the building material, and the presence of slums. Yet, most of urban change models include only one type of urban land, corresponding with areas recognized as built-up land in satellite imagery. This severely limits their relevance for understanding urban development in general and for sustainability assessments specifically. In this presentation I will explore the characteristics that are potentially relevant for better representing urban land in assessments and models, including the potential of remote sensing to provide information on these characteristics. Moreover, I will present some prototype models that go beyond simulating changes in built-up land only, and explore direction for further development.
Jasper van Vliet and our professor Hannes Taubenböck have collaborated in a couple of joint research works over the past years. Please see their joint works here:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0034425722001900
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0034425720302297
