new challenges for european regions and urban areas in a...

Sabrina Lai – Dipartimento di Ingegneria del Territorio – Università di Cagliari

E-mail [email protected] | Phone: +39-070-6755206 | Fax: +39-070-6755215

New Challenges for European Regions and Urban Areas in a Globalised World 51st European Congress of the Regional Science Association International

Barcelona, 30 August – 3 September 2011

Marinas and other ports and facilities in Sardinia (Italy) host more than 19,000 pleasure boats and yachts (Osservatorio Nautico Nazionale, 2010)

Problems Uneven distribution along the coastline Diversity (type, dimension, endowment

of facilities for sailors) Network not coherent-cohesive

A plan is needed ...

... but a proper, detailed knowledge of the system of Sardinian marinas and other facilities is missing

Introduction – setting the context

Analysis of current information (both spatial and non-spatial)

Construction of a spatial database

Analysis of inconsistencies among existing data and investigation into their causes:

structure and semantics purpose date of production/update of the data

Construction of a domain ontology as a possible solution to the problem

Introduction – layout

Data sources

Technical and economical feasibility study of Sardinian ports for the recreational craft sector (2004)

Feasibility study on the completion of the network of Sardinian ports for the recreational craft sector (2010)

Second report on the recreational craft sector – year 2010

Spatial Database of the Sardinian Regional Landscape Plan

Multi-resolution Spatial Database of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia

www.sardegnaturismo.it, web portal of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia concerning the tourism sector

websites specialized in providing sailors with services and information

Marina («porto turistico»): an infrastructure consisting of both permanent and temporary structures put in place both on the water and on the seashore, and completely or mainly dedicated to pleasure boats, which can host a range of facilities and services for sailors and yachtsmen.

Minor mooring facility («punto d’ormeggio»): public areas that host temporary and removable structures for the mooring, the launch, the hauling and storage of small pleasure boats.

Landing place («approdo»): a portion of a multi-purpose port reserved for yachts and pleasure boats; it hosts a range of facilities and services for sailors / yachtsmen.

Classification of facilities for pleasure boats Decree of the President of the Republic no. 509 of 1997 , “Regulations on the procedure for the granting of the assets of coastal areas that are state property for the construction of facilities for recreational boating”

«Campo boa»: organized and managed system of mooring buoys.

Commissioned by the Regional Department for Tourism, Handicraft and Commerce.

Adopted in 2004.

Estimates:

56 ports for pleasure boats 29 publicly owned 27 privately owned

13,140 berths

Relies on secondary data.

Data non georeferenced.

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Commissioned by the Regional Department for Public Works

79 ports for pleasure boats …

… generally privately operated …

… hosting a total of 18,584 berths

The study mostly relies on secondary data.

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public sector

public-private partnerships

private sector

40 11

28 Marinas

Landing places

Minor mooring facilities

14375

2100

2073 1828 Marinas

Landing places

Minor m.f.

Mooring buoys

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78 ports for pleasure boats hosting a total of 18,584 berths are reported

11

41

26 Marinas

Multi-purpose ports

Minor mooring facilities

5049

11182

3184

by type by no. of berths

The Sardinian Regional Landscape Plan was approved in 2006

Article 102 of the PIC deals with “transport nodes” (nodi trasporti), which include ports, airports and railway stations

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In the RLP’s Spatial Dataset

transport nodes are represented by means of a Point feature class

46 points classed as

marinas (6) ports for passenger

ships and pleasure boats (40)

14,479 berths

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It is a spatial data set that covers the whole island.

Features come from various sources, various scales ranging from 1:1,000 to 1:10,000.

Data, metadata and technical specifications are freely downloadable from www.sardegnageoportale.it

Data in the MRSD are organised according to a hierarchical three-tier structure (layer, theme, class).

Two classes deal with ports for the recreational craft sector.

Area for port facilities and services (code ST10TE01CL03)

Definition: “the land area needed for storage, embarkation or disembarkation, management of port operations, [that] does not incorporate the portion of water area necessary for port operations.”

It includes areas that belong to ports and are used both for the exchange of goods and for the transit of passengers.

Attributes of the class 01 name Attribute type: alphanumeric 02 port Attribute type: alphanumeric, enumerated 01 maritime port 02 river port 03 inland port 04 other 03 usage Attribute type: alphanumeric, enumerated 01 public 02 commercial 03 industrial 04 recreational 05 military 06 private 07 generic 5

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Port buildings and other man-made structures

(code ST02TE02CL09)

Definition: “buildings and other man-made structures pertaining to the inner area of a port”

Attributes of the class 01 type Attribute type: alphanumeric, enumerated

01 pier 03 port 04 quay 06 pontoon 07 lighthouse and other lights 08 buoy 09 dolphin structures 10 dry dock 12 crane 13 mooring

02 acad layer Attribute type: alphanumeric

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Alghero

Cagliari

Carloforte Villasimius

Calasetta

Aim: providing sailors & yachtsmen with information

58 ports listed - a total of 14,795 berths

some are geographically referenced and superimposed on satellite imagery by means of the geo-visualizer “Sardegna 3D”

Info provided varies

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Province no. of ports berths

Cagliari 11 3,117

Carbonia-Iglesias 7 1,400

Nuoro 2 324

Ogliastra 2 750

Olbia-Tempio 23 6,633

Oristano 2 520

Sassari 11 2,051

Medio Campidano 0 0

TOTAL 58 14,795

Province

Name

Place

Address

Telephone

Fax

Geographic coordinates

Website

E-mail

Management

Available berths

Maximum permitted length of boats (metres)

Max permitted draught (metres)

Electric energy supplied

Water supplied

Meteo forecast

Waste facilities

Surveillance

Customer services

Booking

Summer transit (info availability)

Showers

Toilets

Assistance

Other services

Nearest airport(s)

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The roots of inconsistencies

Data are not always georeferenced. Georeferenced databases show evidences of incorrect and inconsistent representations of objects.

None of the documents and datasets here analysed aimed at representing the regional system of facilities and ports for the boating sector ...

... rather, we can identify different aims as follows:

to help public decision-makers programme financial investments; to store, analyze and retrieve data related to physical geographical objects to

support the making of urban and regional plans; to provide boaters with information on services available in port areas.

Differences in date of production and updating of information are important ...

... but of greater importance is semantic ambiguity (e.g.: synonymous and polysemic terms)

How many ports? 46? 56? 58? 78?

79? How many berths?

13,140? 14,479? 17,795? 18,458?

19,415?

“It is frequently necessary for multiple data sources to be combined (integrated) and used together in a structured way. As there might be differences in semantics as well as in the

structure of these datasets, the data must be adapted to fit the task … subtle differences in semantics may result in data being improperly integrated” (Mizen et al., 2005)

“It might look obvious, but before thinking at how to structure a dataset, one should tackle the more complex issue of deciding upon what should be in the dataset” (Laurini & Murgante, 2008)

“Enabling reuse of domain knowledge was one of the driving forces behind recent surge in ontology research” (Noy & McGuinness, 2001)

“Currently, there is no comprehensive ontology for the geo-spatial domain, and it is recognized that there are no definitive methods for ontology derivation available to the geographic community ” (Timpf, 2002 in Agarwal, 2005)

Geographic Data & Interoperability

Problem of the past: lack of adequate information

Today:

plenty of available data, both spatial and non-spatial

proliferation of data sets built with no common standards has become an issue

we cannot simply reuse and combine existing data and information

we need to homogenize data and solve semantic conflicts

One of the most important reasons that spurred research on ontologies was the need to reuse existing knowledge

Ontologies try and describe a given domain of interest by identifying

key concepts that define the domain

relations that connect the concepts

existing constraints

interoperability

support database modelling

What is an ontology?

“an explicit specification of a conceptualization” (Gruber, 1993)

“a formal, explicit specification of a shared conceptualisation” (Studer et al., 1998)

“a shared and common understanding of a domain that can be communicated between people and application systems” (Davies et al., 2003)

“a formal description of a domain that is understandable to people and readable between machines” (Hart et al., 2007)

“the manifestation of a shared understanding of a domain that is agreed between a number of agents, and such agreement facilitates accurate and effective communications of meaning, which in turn leads to other benefits such as inter-operability, reuse and sharing” (Agarwal, 2005)

“the creation of an ontology is usually viewed as a knowledge acquisition task, which involves eliciting, analysing and intepreting human knowledge, and transferring this knowledge into a suitable machine representation” (Mizen et al., 2005)

Building an ontology: steps (Hart et al., 2007, Hart and Goodwin, 2007, Kovacs et al., 2006)

1. Identification of purpose and scope

What is the ontology going to be used for? What is going to be included in the ontology? What needs to be left out?

2. Knowledge elicitation:

Identify core concepts Identify secondary concepts Identify relationships between concepts

3. Knowledge structuring

4. Validation

Phase 1: purpose and scope

Purpose: to develop a conceptualization of the network of Sardinian marinas that can be used for the modelling and representation of spatial information

and that can support planning processes.

Scope: only those elements that can be put on a map are included.

The ontology must not be comprehensive it should not include all those entities that somehow relate to the domain

but only those concepts, relationships, constraints that are relevant.

As an ontology domain, it must be reusable within the given domain.

Phase 2: Knowledge glossary: concepts

Table of concept terms (core and secondary) Definitions in Italian – natural language only Use of documentary sources (pieces of legislation, technical documents, dictionaries)

Original Italian term Tentative English translation Definition Source

Approdo turistico Landing place A portion of a multi-purpose port dedicated to recreational boating, which may or

may not also provide services to yachtsmen and host Ancillary activities. DPR no. 509 of 1997

Area a servizio portuale Area for port services and

facilities

Land area needed for storage, embarkation or disembarkation, management of

port operations, that does not incorporate the portion of water area necessary for

port operation. It includes those areas that belong to ports and are used both for

the exchange of goods and for passengers’ transits.

Technical specifications of the MRSD

Banchina Quay

Structure of a port that serves, together with piers and pontoons, to let

passengers on or off a boat or to moor the boat.

A quay defines the inner border of a port basin.

Technical recommendations for the designing

of ports for pleasure boats

Pontile Pier Structure of a port that can be fixed or floating and that serves, together with

quays, to let passengers on or off a boat or to moor the boat.



Porto

commerciale Commercial port Port for the movement of freights and passengers. Dictionary (Il Grande Italiano di Aldo Gabrielli)

Porto di categoria I 1st Category port Port for national security and military defence. State Law no. 84 of 1994

Porto di categoria II, classe I 2nd Category, 1st class port Port that is relevant at the international level. State Law no. 84 of 1994

Porto di categoria II, classe II 2nd Category, 2nd class port Port that is economically relevant at the national level. State Law no. 84 of 1994

Porto di categoria II, classe III 2nd Category, 3rd class port Port that is economically relevant at the regional or trans-regional level. State Law no. 84 of 1994

Posto barca Berth Part of a port’s water basin, adjacent to a quay, a pier or a pontoon, where boats

are moored.



Definitions translated from Italian into English

semantic imprecision in English might occur when

there is no ambiguity in Italian or vice versa

e.g. quay, pier, wharf overlap in some aspects

while the original Italian are unambiguous

this ontology proposed is language-dependent

Phase 2: Knowledge glossary: relations

Relation Definition of the relation in natural language Notes

Is a A an instance of B

Is part of A is a part of B “Is part of” is inverse of “Has part”

Has part A has B as part “Has part” is inverse of “Is part of”

Contains A completely contains B (where A is a human created legal entity or similar such as a county) “Contains” is inverse of “Contained by”

Contained by A is completely within B (where B is a human created legal entity or similar such as a county) “Contained by” is inverse of “Contains”

Does not overlap A and B do not share any physical portion Symmetric relation

Is adjacent to A is positioned such that it physically touches B Symmetric relation

The knowledge glossary is an explicit and shared specification of the entities that constitute the abstract and simplified domain model here developed,

but not a formal specification, yet.

taxonomic

mereonomic

spatial

Software program: Protégé (version 3.4.4 frame oriented)

concepts are arranged in a hierarchical structure, divided into classes and

subclasses

classes and subclasses (sets of concepts) are

defined according to the knowledge glossary

connected one another by means of the relations defined in the glossary

slots are used

to describe classes, subclasses and instances

to assign relationships

Phase 3: Knowledge structuring


Software program: Protégé (version 3.4.4 frame oriented)

concepts are arranged in a hierarchical structure, divided into classes and

subclasses

classes and subclasses (sets of concepts) are

defined according to the knowledge glossary

connected one another by means of the relations defined in the glossary

slots are used

to describe classes, subclasses and instances

to assign relationships

Instances are created

Slots are filled in


The ontology is now

completely defined.

It can be:

continuously updated

graphically

represented as a

graph tree

Nodes: classes,

subclasses and instances

Arcs: relations


Was it worth?

This ontology allows for a better understanding of the domain of interest (Uschold and Gruninger, 1996)

Iterative and continually adjustable learning process Collaboration and participation of experts in the domain field can be included ... ... so as to improve chances of sharing and reusing the ontology in the domain field

Representation & communication of knowledge is not task-dependent Reusability in the domain (updating and refining are possible) Basis for developing task-dependent or application-oriented ontologies in the same domain

The construction of a shared vocabulary that explicitly and unambiguously defines entities of the domain and the relationships Helps reduce semantic conflicts (Las Casas and Scardaccione, 2008),

Makes it possible to address the problems highlighted in the analysis of available data

The ontological representation of the domain Facilitates the modelling of the geographic database Makes it easier to control spatial constraints, as these are defined as slots that explicit spatial

relations between classes

Controlling spatial relations Class “A” Relation Class “B”

Pier Contained in Area for services and facilities

Breakwater Contained in Area for services and facilities

Dock Does not overlap Area for services and facilities

Pier Does not overlap Breakwater

Controlling spatial relations The software looks for and

displays in real time objects

belonging to the feature class

“Pier” not contained within an

object belonging to the feature

class “Area for services and

facilities”

Controlling spatial relations The software looks for and

displays in real time objects

belonging to the feature class

“Docks” that overlap at least

an object belonging to the

feature class “Area for

services and facilities”

An attempt was made to show how the use of ontologies can contribute towards the achievement of two goals:

deepen and better organize existent knowledge concerning a given domain by formalizing the conceptualization of the domain through the construction of a glossary that makes use of a shared language

ensure that spatial entities are compliant with tests designed on the basis of the relationships themselves by making the spatial relationships between defined classes and subclasses explicit

“The term ontology is used more and more in the context of GI Science.

Is ontology then a buzzword or a real paradigm shift?

What is in it? Does it help to solve the open problems in data access and interpretation (semantic interoperability)…?

Does it improve our understanding of geographical space?

Or is ontology a modern flowery phrase for former concepts?” (Winter, 2001)

new challenges for european regions and urban areas in a...

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