DEDAN KIMATHI UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLGY

P.O BOX PRIVATE BAG, NYERI, KENYA.

SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING

CIVIL ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT

UNIT TITLE: INTRODUCTION TO GIS AND REMOTE SENSING.

UNIT CODE: GGI 4203.

TITLE: CAT 1

NAME: KIPNGETICH EVANS.

REG. NO: E024-01-0841/2017.

LECTURER: Ms. CAROLINE

 a) Define GIS from an information System point of view 2 Marks
As an information system GIS from an information system as;
An information system that is designed to work with data referenced by spatial or
geographic co-ordinates thus GIS is a database system with specific capabilities for
partially referenced data as well as set of operations for working with data
Duecker ,1979 defined GIS as a special case of information systems where the
database consists of observation on spatially distributed features, activities or events
which are definable in space point lines or areas.

b) Outline various sources of GIS data and describe the factors that you would use
to evaluate various data source 8 Marks
Sources of GIS data.

Obtaining Data from external sources: Creating the same dataset multiple times for the same
area is a time and resource intensive process. One can import data from data repositories.
Some of these are freely available while others are available at a price. Internet is the best
way to search geographic data. The internet gives information about geographic data catalogs
and vendors. National agencies of a state also disseminate geographic data through their web
portals or through other digital media on demand made by the users.
Photogrammetry: This is the science of making measurements from aerial photographs and
images. Photogrammetry is used for making 3D measurements from models made using
stereo pairs of photographs. To make a 3Dmodel, there must be 60% overlap along each
flight line and 30%overlap between flight lines. The measurements from overlapping pairs
of photographs are captured using stereo plotters. These build a model and allow 3D
measurements to be captured, edited, stored and plotted.
Surveying: Ground surveying is based on the principle of determining the 3D location of a
point with the help of angles and distance measured from other known points. Survey starts
from a benchmark position. The location of all surveyed points is relative to other points
Remote sensing data capture: Remote sensing refers to the technique of deriving the
information about the objects without getting in physical contact with them. The
information is derived from the measurements of the amount of electromagnetic (EM)
radiations reflected, emitted or scattered from the objects under observation. The response is
measured /captured by the sensors deployed in air or in space
Factors to consider when evaluating source of GIS data.

Cost-benefit analysis: Experience indicates that data collection and maintenance accounts for
60 per cent to 80 per cent of the total cost in terms of time and money of a fully operational
GIS.The benefit derived depends on the access to the right data at the right time.

The data quality required: Data quality of the GIS data depends on the source of the data as
some sources may lack temporal continuity or may have missing or outdated data

Spatial data requirements and data needs: The choice for obtaining GIS data should meet the
client’s requirement or the requirements foe the task for which it is intended for.

Geospatial data handling facilities available: The choice of GIS data should consider the
geospatial data handling facilities available

c) Describe three commonly used raster data structures 10

Marks

Raster data structure refers to the storage of the raster data for data processing and analysis by
the computer. According to (Chang, 2010) there are mainly three commonly used raster data
structures which include;
1. cell-by-cell encoding
2. run-length encoding
3. quadtree
1. Cell-by-cell encoding
It is an intensive method encodes a raster data by creating records for each cell value by row
and column. Raster data is normally stored row by row from the top left corner. This is a
simplest data structure characterized by sub-dividing geographical space into grid cells where
each grid cell contains a value. This method encodes a raster by creating records for each cell
value by row and column.

Row1:00001000
Row2:00001100
Row3:00011100
Row4:00011100
Row5:01111100
Row6:01111110
Row7:01111110
Row8:00000000

2. Run-length encoding
This method encodes cell values in runs of similarly valued pixels and can result in a
highly compressed image file. The run-length encoding method is designed to handle
the problem that the grid often contains redundant or missing data. It is useful in
situations where large groups of neighbouring pixels have similar values for instance
discrete datasets such as land use or habitat suitability. This method is less useful
where neighbouring pixel values vary widely for example continuous datasets such as
elevation.

Row1:5
Row2:56
Row3:46
Row4:46
Row5:26
Row6:27
Row7:27

3. Quadtree
This method divides a raster into a hierarchy of quadrants that are subdivided based on
similarly valued pixels. The division of the raster stops when a quadrant is made entirely
from cells of the same value. A leaf node is a quadrant that cannot be subdivided.
 d) Discuss areas where GIS could be applied in Civil Engineering 10 Marks

The use of GIS technology is gaining interest from a wide range of civil engineering
disciplines due to its potential to offer a new way of resolving environmental difficulties
which could reduce costs, support multi-discipline analysis and improve quality for complex
projects. The merging of cartography, database technology, and statistical analysis makes
GIS to be intensively used in the civil engineering. Each and every phase of infrastructure
life-cycle is greatly affected and enhanced by the enrolment of GIS.The following areas in
civil engineering;

Environment monitoring and analysis: GIS provides exploration to support design

including material consumption, hydrology analysis, soil load analysis, volume calculations,
runoff and air emissions, slope stability, traffic capacity, and erosion control. Environmental
analysis with GIS permits analysis of trends, patterns, and relationships that weren’t evident
without visualization of data.

Construction: This is the stage where all layout plans and paper work design are put into
existence from the real world. GIS is essential in this stage because it helps the professionals
to understand the site conditions. To keep the construction within budget and schedule GIS
guides us about how to utilize our resources on site efficiency engineering make use of GIS
technology.

Land Fill Site Assortment: GIS is a useful tool which can be utilized in the search for
appropriate new landfill sites. It is also powerful technologies that permit correct spatial data
processing covering a bigger number of themes. The arrival of highly sophisticated high-tech
GIS systems, Landsat satellites and digitalized map data and other remote sensing devices
that helps define land use patterns and infrastructural have dramatically improved the GIS
potential to aid the progress of more organized approach to landfill site selection.

Urban Development and Town Planning: The growth of urbanization in many countries has
caused problems of sanitation, power and waste supply, housing, environmental pollutions
and disposal of effluents. For a maintainable development of urban agglomeration, ideal
resources development model and urban land use plan need to be generated by integrating the
information on demographics, natural resources and socio-economic statistics in a GIS
domain with the presently available satellite records.

Watershed Studies Management: GIS improves controls for flow statics, watershed features,
and debris flow probabilities and enables the watershed allocation using Digital Elevation
Models (DEMs). It offers a stable procedure for watershed analysis using scandalized
datasets and DEMs such as climates variables, gauging station locations, land cover and soil
properties. Arc Hydro with ArcGIS offers the flexibility to syndicate watershed datasets from
a map source with river and stream networks.

Hydrological Modelling: GIS provides a framework to model spatially engineering

phenomena for example engineering explores that has been traditionally founded by mapping
such as flood predicting benefit from the efficiency in performing spatial operations.

GIS can be used in disaster management services such as floods and drought warning and
monitoring damage

GIS can be used in Site Analysis: GIS quickly analyses and incorporates various types of
images and information for sites analysis. Its accurate results presented geographically
provide insights into interactions and connections as clients can relate easily to a simple map.
The base map may include serial photos, environmental protection areas, city and zoning
designations soil and topographic maps.

Data Collection: GIS provides tools to accumulate detailed data and document present
settings. As-built surveying with GIS expertise allows the surveyor to provide data into
operational GIS, eradicating costly data conversion and minimizing errors.

e) Discuss events that have shaped GIS in the last decade (2010 to date) 10 Marks
In the last decade there has been Improvement in GIS technology as depicted by the
following.

IT advancements with processors becoming very powerful and storages shifting from
megabytes to Terabytes

Born of open-source GIS due to increased adoption of GIS in the recent years. An open-
source explosion has been sparked by a new revelation in GIS with users getting accustomed
to GIS software. Amazing projects like QGIS are providing any user with a computer with
GIS software.

GIS data has become more and more ubiquitous, for instance, Landsat satellite imagery is
now accessible to all. GIS is now online, in the cloud, and on your mobile. Online
repositories like ArcGIS Online store massive amounts of spatial data.

In the last decade the range of commercial GIS software products have become endless.

Development of real time data. The ability to collect and analyze data in real time brought
GIS to a whole new level. This development improved research processes and mapping
systems. Location-based services such as Uber are among the most common uses for up-to-
the-minute geographic information for example Consumers can track where their drivers are
and how long it’ll take them to arrive. The app also employs real-time data to match users
with the closest ride and directs drivers as per ride requests.

Geospatial data has helped companies in a wide range of industries streamline their
operations by providing greater visibility into key assets and guiding more efficient supply
chains. Consumers can take advantage of current trends in GIS. Some of the latest GIS
technology has brought consumer-facing data to the forefront, empowering smart decisions in
many areas.
Artificial intelligence is one of the rapidly evolving technology that has been applied to GIS
projects in recent years. One most important application for GeoAI is in planning urban
infrastructure and tracking changes in an area over time.