Remote Sensing for spatial planning in Balnerio Hermenegildo and Barra do Chu, Southern coast of Brazil. Chiaffitelli, R.

;Gandra, T.B.R.; Gruebel, K.; Crivellaro, C. e Carvalho, R.V. The Santa Vitoria do Palmar is a coastal city located in the Rio Grande do Sul state, Southern Brazil, and comprises two beaches: Balnerio Hermenegildo and Barra do Chu. These beaches have great environmental, economic and touristic importance to the city. A spatial plan is proposed aiming to achieve a more rational and sustainable development of human activities in the area. Remote sensing data were used in a Geographical Information System base to map land use and cover of these areas. Once high scale maps were needed, Quickbird images were acquired, with approximately 0.6 meters of spatial resolution and a squared area of 25 km2 each. Color compositions were separated in bands using the software Idrisi Andes in order to perform automatic classification procedures. The resulting images were rectified to a Universal Transverse Mercator projection using first order nearest neighbour rules and around 30 control points. The root mean square error was 4 meters. GPS data were used as geographic reference material. A multi-criteria evaluation was used to develop signatures and classify images in environmental units. Some features (coastline, streets, rivers, urban areas,etc.) had to be digitalized on screen, as well as the legally protected areas. The software ArcGis 9.2 was used to build the GIS-based database. Some of the environmental and social problems detected in area are the following: coastal erosion, high seasonal population variation driven by the tourism in summer months, erosion caused by deforestation near rivers, illegal occupation of the dune fields, and urbanization of protection areas. Hermenegildo has a total area of 22.2 km, divided in urban areas (5.2 %), dunes (8.0 %), wetlands (16.1 %), introduced forests (6.9 %), sandy fields (14.8 %), and grassland (42.6 %). The Barra do Chu has the following environmental units distribution: grassland (43.7 %), urban areas (27.3), sandy fields (13.3 %), introduced forests (10.4 %), erosive barriers (3.5 %), dunes (1.7) and beaches (1.0 %). In both cases, a significant part of the permanent preservation areas, defined by law as a buffer of 300meters along the shoreline, is urbanized (38 % in Hermenegildo and 10 % in Chu). The outputs of this work as well as the complete GIS database will be soon available for the local government and community. This is the first step in including technology and scientific knowledge as an integrated strategy in the spatial planning, decision-making, and conflict resolution in the region.

PDF created with pdfFactory trial version www.pdffactory.com