Infrastructure Engineering - Research Publications

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    Hierarchical spatial reasoning applied to spatial data infrastructures
    RAJABIFARD, ABBAS ; ESCOBAR, FRANCISCO ; Williamson, Ian P. ( 2000)
    Many countries throughout the world believe they can benefit both economically and environmentallyfrom better management of their spatial data assets, enabling them to access and retrieve complete andconsistent datasets in an easy and secure way. This has resulted in the development of the Spatial DataInfrastructure (SDI) concept at various political and/or administrative levels. The SDI concept has beenrepresented by different descriptions of its nature, however, currently these demonstrate an overlysimplisticunderstanding of the concept.The simplicity in existing definitions has been slow to incorporate the concept of an integrated, multilevelledSDI formed from a hierarchy of inter-connected SDIs at corporate, local, state/provincial,national, regional (multi-national) and global (GSDI) levels. Failure to incorporate this multidimensionality,and the dynamic mechanistic and functional roles of the SDI, have rendered manydescriptions of SDI inadequate to describe the complexity and the dynamics of SDI as it develops, andthus ultimately constrain SDI achieving developmental potential in the future.As a result, the objective of this paper is to demonstrate the fitness and applicability of HierarchicalSpatial Reasoning (HSR) as a theoretical framework to demonstrate the multi-dimensional nature ofSDIs. It is argued that by better understanding and demonstrating the nature of an SDI hierarchy, anySDI development can gain support from a wider community of both government and non-governmentdata users and providers. The findings presented in this paper build on the authors' experiences inRegional SDI (multi-national) development and HSR.
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    Hierarchical spatial reasoning applied to the automated design of administrative boundaries using GIS
    Eagleson, S. ; Escobar, F. ; Williamson, I. P. ( 2000)
    Throughout history, humankind has segmented and delineated the geospatial environment in various ways to support administrative, political and economic activities. To date, the majority of spatial boundaries have been constructed in an uncoordinated manner with individual organisations generating individual boundaries to meet individual needs. This practice has resulted in boundary layers that even the most sophisticated GIS (Geographic Information System) technology is unable to cross analyse accurately. Consequently, geospatial information is fragmented over a series of boundary units. The objective of this paper is to investigate new methods for the organisation of spatial data by applying the principles of Hierarchical Spatial Reasoning (HSR), where HSR can be used as the theoretical framework for investigating the hierarchical structuring of space and for providing new methods for accurate data exchange. Also, to present the issues found in the development of a prototype developed for delineating boundaries within the GIS environment. This prototype has been constructed utilising the state of Victoria, Australia as a working laboratory for development and analysis.