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The utilization of urban underground space (UUS) offers an effective solution to urban problems but may also negatively affect urban development. Therefore, UUS development needs better concerted guidelines to coordinate various urban systems and the multiple components of the underground world. Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which should be viewed as important yardsticks for UUS development, do not explicitly mention urban underground space, although many of them are affected by both the positive and negative consequences of its development. To fill this gap, this review lays the foundations of relevant UUS concepts and uses exemplary cases to reveal that 11 out of 17 SDGs can be linked with UUS uses. These linkages also manifest that land administration, integrated planning, architectural design, and construction technology are critical dimensions for increasing the contributions of UUS to the realization of SDGs. To achieve multi-disciplinary synergies among these four critical dimensions, a collaborative approach framework based on spatial data infrastructure is required. Thus, this work provides academics and practitioners with a holistic view of sustainable UUS development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three-dimensional (3D) spatial information models are increasingly being adopted to help communicate the spatial dimensions of complex built environments. Land administration practices in multi-owned developments include the subdivision, registration and management of legal interests associated with private, communal and public properties, which are often located along the vertical dimension. The spatial structure of each legal interest is normally composed of invisible spaces, defined as the inside and outside of multi-owned developments, as well as physically built structures. Additionally, a wide variety of legal boundary types mark out the spatial limits of the individual parts of each legal interest. These legal boundaries are typically delineated by either relying on fixed surveying measurements or referencing physically existent objects. This article provides a critical assessment of 3D spatial information models in terms of their capabilities for modelling legal interests and legal boundaries defined in the Victorian jurisdiction. We classify these models into three categories: purely legal, purely physical and integrated. This assessment provides the basis for developing a new 3D spatial information model, which would subsequently support a pathway towards realising the Victorian land administration system in a 3D digital environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The majority of the world’s population do not have access to proper land administration systems to register their land and property information. The land community has come to believe that this problem is strongly related to the data collection process, where the use of highly accurate, expensive and time-consuming spatial data collection methods such as field surveying, is overemphasised. To overcome this, innovative spatial data collection methods are employed in many jurisdictions (e.g. using GPS for low-cost boundary surveys, using the power of citizen in the process of data collection). However, little is known about the parameters that affect the choice of a spatial data collection method to be appropriate for its intended purposes. Arguably, establishing a fit-for-purpose data capture method for collecting or updating RRRs related to land and property is essential for enabling the range of land administration functions around the world. This paper reports on a systematic study to determine a set of parameters that could influence the choice of a spatial data collection method in land administration. Data was collected using a Delphi study, which establishes consensus among land administration experts. This method allowed us to unlock knowledge through an iterative process with controlled feedback. For the first time in this study, an international group of land administration experts reached consensus regarding a set of parameters that should be considered in the process of selecting a fit-for-purpose spatial data collection method. These findings are incorporated to formulate a generic and innovative framework, which could potentially serve as a basis for ensuring that the choice of a spatial data collection method in land administration is fit for purpose. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors compare key elements of the emerging field of Indoor Location-Based Services (Indoor LBS) to those currently found in spatial data infrastructure (SDI) programs. After a brief review of SDIs and Location-Based Services, the corresponding drivers, characteristics and emerging issues within the field of Indoor LBS are introduced and discussed. A comparative framework relates the two in terms of the criteria ‘People’, ‘Data', ‘Technologies', ‘Standards' and ‘Policies/Institutional Arrangements'. After highlighting key similarities and differences, the authors suggested three areas – definition of common framework datasets in Indoor LBS, more effective use of volunteered geographic information by SDI programs and development of appropriate privacy policies by both communities – that may benefit from sharing ‘lessons learned'. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Three-dimensional (3D) developments of land, such as complex high-rises, put enormous pressure on current land administration systems that have ad hoc approaches to 3D property management. These approaches are unable to support effective 3D storage, analysis and visualisation of property information. Effective visualisation is one of the essential components in realisation of a truly 3D cadastre. Currently, several 3D visualisation applications and cadastral prototypes have been developed around the world. However, they do not effectively represent ownership information in 3D because they have not been developed based on 3D cadastral visualisation requirements. After candidate 3D visualisation solutions were compared with user-derived visualisation criteria, a web-based 3D visualisation prototype was designed and developed. The functionality, usability and efficiency of the prototype were evaluated by potential users involved in the registration and management of property. While there was a high level of enthusiasm for the features of the prototype, the results also suggest further directions for development of 3D cadastral visualisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers on Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) widely agree on using tangible social-economic benefits of SDI to advocate development of SDI’s. However, identification of such benefits has proven to be difficult and time-consuming. Based on concepts from the fields of psychology and economics, this paper argues that advocacy for SDI should take the form of publicising the consequences as a result of failure to address SDI. The ability to quantify the costs of accessing spatial data in an environment operating without SDI is an alternative way of providing evidence of the benefits of SDI. This paper presents a model for estimating the costs of accessing spatial data based on a fuzzy logic and time-driven activity-based costing methodology. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Highlights: [•] Integrated land administration processes are essential for effective land delivery. [•] Land policy, administration processes, and spatial data infrastructure should integrate. [•] An assessment framework is required to assess levels of integration. [•] Land administration integration assessment matrix is developed to assess integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights: [•] We identify the challenges and limitations of 2D land & property information. [•] We suggest a framework for sourcing 3D land and property information. [•] We develop & apply an evaluation strategy based on the suggested framework. [•] A thorough evaluation of 3D data sourcing methods is presented. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The Commission on Geoinformation Infrastructures and Standards of the International Cartographic Association (ICA) is working on defining models of spatial data infrastructures (SDIs). SDI models from the enterprise and information viewpoints of the Reference Model for Open Distributed Processing (RM-ODP) have already been presented. Our model from the computational viewpoint identifies the main computational objects of an SDI and their interfaces, which are modelled using Unified Modelling Language (UML) component diagrams. Presented here is the first comprehensive SDI model from the computational viewpoint, which enhances the understanding of the computational objects and their interactions in an SDI. This viewpoint complements the previous two and together, the three viewpoints contribute towards a more holistic interpretation of an SDI, which is independent of specific SDI legislation, technology and implementations. For the computational viewpoint, we identified six computational objects,SDI Registry,SDI Data,SDI Processing,SDI Application,SDI PortrayalandSDI Management, and their provided and required interfaces. We describe the interactions of the computational objects in stakeholder activities and the roles they play in the different processes of SDI development and use, which we identified asInitiation,Creation,Management,Manipulation,Access,Processing,EvaluationandLiaison. Two tables summarise the SDI services that are provided by computational objects for stakeholder activities and SDI processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the huge amount of spatial data created and updated in short time frames and exchanged frequently over the Web, the demand for updating dataset and metadata in real time to provide users with the most up-to-date, precise, reliable, and complete metadata is increasing dramatically. So far, different metadata-updating approaches have been introduced to the spatial industry of which their issues and challenges have prohibited them from being adopted widely. Using the detached metadata data model and being limited to some dataset formats are some of these issues. To respond to this challenge, this article presents a new synchronization approach to automatically update the ISO 19115 core metadata elements which are affected by the (vector-based) dataset modification. Based on this approach, this article describes the major technical requirements considered necessary for the implementation phase, such as an integrated data model to couple dataset and metadata rooted in Geography Markup Language (GML) Application Schema, a mapping software application to support required Web Services, a user-friendly interface providing a visual modification facility, and an automatic metadata-updating process which is dataset format neutral. In order to prove the synchronization concept, the automatic synchronization approach has been prototyped and integrated with the GeoNetwork opensource environment. This article discusses the architecture designed for implementing the prototype system which contains three layers: storage, service (consisting of a synchronization service entitled ‘SYNC’), and application. The standards and open source technologies selected to develop the prototype system such as deegree, GeoNetwork, PostGIS, GML, Web Feature Service-Transaction, and CSW are then explained in more detail. Finally, the issues and challenges encountered during the implementation phase and the future direction are discussed in this article. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Many nations lack a coherent national approach to land administration. Instead, land information and processes are frequently disaggregated across states, provinces, cantons, counties, or municipalities. This is particularly the case in federated countries. The growing body of land administration theory often assumes or prescribes the need for national systems; however, the justification for this approach requires further explanation. Without justification, nations that maintain disaggregated systems lack the impetus to unlock the opportunities veiled within their disparate land administration systems. Moreover, a nation''s ability to respond effectively to emerging national and global-scale issues such as climate-change is greatly impeded. This paper aims to explain the need for national land administration infrastructures. Qualitative case studies of the Australian context and the method of triangulation inform the justification. The research reveals most drivers can be classified into six overarching subsets: adherence to international standards by national governments, better federal or central governance, improved shared governance, scale of economies for lower levels of government, opportunities and savings for business, and social inclusion for citizens. Unfortunately, specific drivers are found to be complex and changeable, as political, scientific and environmental debates raise policy issues: there is no single solution. As an alternative, nations must seize on the specific drivers relevant to their context. They must employ them to transform disparate land administration systems into multi-purpose national land administration infrastructures that deliver benefits to all stakeholder groups. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The integration of multisource heterogeneous spatial data is one of the major challenges for many spatial data users. To facilitate multisource spatial data integration, many initiatives including federated databases, feature manipulation engines (FMEs), ontology-driven data integration and spatial mediators have been proposed. The major aim of these initiatives is to harmonize data sets and establish interoperability between different data sources. On the contrary, spatial data integration and interoperability is not a pure technical exercise, and there are other nontechnical issues including institutional, policy, legal and social issues involved. Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) framework aims to better address the technical and nontechnical issues and facilitate data integration. The SDIs aim to provide a holistic platform for users to interact with spatial data through technical and nontechnical tools. This article aims to discuss the complexity of the challenges associated with data integration and propose a tool that facilitates data harmonization through the assessment of multisource spatial data sets against many measures. The measures represent harmonization criteria and are defined based on the requirement of the respective jurisdiction. Information on technical and nontechnical characteristics of spatial data sets is extracted to form metadata and actual data. Then the tool evaluates the characteristics against measures and identifies the items of inconsistency. The tool also proposes available manipulation tools or guidelines to overcome inconsistencies among data sets. The tool can assist practitioners and organizations to avoid the time-consuming and costly process of validating data sets for effective data integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The development of an effective spatial data infrastructure (SDI) often occurs in a fragmented organizational environment requiring a high level of inter-organizational collaboration. Different organizations from various jurisdictions need to work together closely when agreeing on how they will jointly register, store, use and share data and how they will make their data available to the wider society. However, this collaboration is generally regarded as very difficult. For example people often resist data sharing across organizational boundaries due to loss of control, power and independency. Organizational issues are thus considered one of the fundamental constraints to inter-organizational sharing of spatial data. How can we overcome these constraints? In the spatial community, the term awareness is often regarded as a tool for minimizing problems concerned with inter-organizational collaboration. However, a major problem in using the term awareness in discussions of inter-organizational collaboration is that awareness is undefined and often misused as a term in the community. The (over)-use of the term awareness, without having a rigorous definition to rely on makes it harder to understand and develop collaboration issues. The difficulty in quantifying and describing issues in collaboration makes the development of effective SDIs problematic for the developers of these structures. This paper therefore suggests that the development of SDIs should be based on a conceptual framework that clearly addresses the problems spatial organizations currently encounter. As a result, the focus of this paper is on the nature and role of awareness. It explores why and how awareness plays a fundamental role in overcoming organizational constraints and in developing collaboration between organizations. The paper discusses the concept of awareness in the area of organizational collaboration in the spatial community, explains the important role awareness plays in the development of spatial data infrastructures, and introduces a methodology to promote awareness. Furthermore, the paper aims to make people in the community more aware of the use of the term “awareness”—when to use it, how to use it and especially important, how not to use it. The paper will investigate awareness in the field of land administration systems. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The Commission on Spatial Data Standards of the International Cartographic Association is working to define formal models and technical characteristics of Spatial Data Infrastructures (SDI). To date, this work has been restricted to the Enterprise and Information Viewpoints from the ISO Reference Model for Open Distributed Processing standard. The Commission has developed models for these two viewpoints. These models describe how the different parts of an SDI fit together in the viewpoints in question. These models should be seen as a contribution towards the overall model of the SDI and its technical characteristics. During the model development process, the roles of the different Actors in an SDI in the Enterprise and Information Viewpoints have also been identified in Use Case diagrams of an SDI. All the models have been developed using the Unified Modeling Language. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper reviews the emergence of the spatial dimension of marine and coastal zone administration, and examines several initiatives around the world that contribute to this idea. Spatial data have been recognised as an important resource to improve decision-making and resource management in both the land and marine environments in terms of sustainable development. Many countries are developing Spatial Data Infrastructures (SDIs) to improve access and sharing of spatial data, however, most of these initiatives stop at the coastline. Recently, global and regional activities such as the 3rd United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and the Sustainable Development Strategy for the Seas of East Asia (SDS-SEA) have brought to international attention the importance of effective administration of the marine and coastal environments. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The spatial data infrastructure literature reveals significant gaps in metadata systems concerning their efficiency and effectiveness for end-users. The literature proposes improvements to make the metadata systems more user-friendly. These improvements include new metadata elements and user interfaces that are in concert with each other. In this paper, we implement the proposed improvements in a prototype system and engage with end-users to assess if the proposals help users' expectations. The prototype is evaluated by conducting think-aloud protocol (TAP) usability testing and semi-structured interviews with end-users. The result demonstrates an increased level of satisfaction about existing systems and some more areas to improve. We conclude that a synchronised development approach for the spatial metadata and the user interface will increase the usability of the metadata for data discovery and selection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spatial metadata profiles have been designed and evolved by data custodians to manage, share, discover, and use spatial data. The end-users of spatial data often do not have much input in designing the profiles. The spatial data infrastructure literature reveals that they question the usability of spatial metadata. This paper analyzes the usability of metadata profiles by engaging end-users and clarifying their requirements in response to this problem. Over 60 users from 18 countries were engaged using an online survey based on a purposive sampling method. The results show that the most widely used metadata standard, ISO 19115, provides metadata elements to accommodate most user requirements for searches. However, an extension to the standard is necessary to assist users in discovery and selection. Two new metadata elements are proposed as part of the extension. The extension also involves changing the obligation type of existing elements to improve data discovery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Role of indicators in measuring sustainability is critically evaluated. • Role of SDI in solving the shortcomings of indicators is discussed. • UADI has been developed using Ontology as a core component. • Selected transport sustainability indicators are quantified manually and using UADI. • Indicators quantification by user and UADI are compared considering 5 technical lenses. This paper examines capabilities of a new Spatial Data Infrastructure called Urban Analytics Data Infrastructure (UADI 1 1 Spatial Data Infrastructure called Urban Analytics Data Infrastructure), through deriving and evaluating transport sustainability indicators. The UADI was developed in Australia to support multi-disciplinary and cross-jurisdictional analytics to overcome the challenges related to model generalisation, data accessibility, data integration, data heterogeneity and city performance benchmarking. In this paper, the UADI were evaluated through 5 technical lenses of: data accessibility; integration; harmonisation; data reliability and model reliability. The paper shows that using open geospatial standards in UADI enabled transport sustainability indicators to be derived through accessing and integrating different spatial data layers and the process of mapping data to ontology facilitated data harmonisation. In addition, the input data, tool processing, and output of ontology-based transport sustainability indicators could be traced in UADI, which addresses the challenge of model and data reliability. The paper highlights the role of spatial data infrastructures in decision support systems for uncertainty analysis and promoting smart cities and resilient environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spatial metadata is a critical part of any spatial data infrastructure, which enables the organising, sharing, discovery and use of spatial data. This paper highlights a knowledge gap in the usability of the metadata systems for the end–users. It then addresses the gap by applying the User Centred Design approach to investigate the usability of metadata records. The research engages with end–users concerning efficiency and effectiveness of metadata systems, and end–users' satisfaction and expectations. The results indicate significant gaps with the effectiveness and efficiency of metadata systems for spatial data discovery and selection. Inconsistency and irrelevant information in the metadata records were found in the title, keywords, abstracts, data quality and other elements of the metadata. Additionally, essential improvements were identified for user interfaces. Discouraging presentation of the metadata is a prominent problem found in the interface of the metadata systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Data heterogeneity is one of the most challenging problems in urban data analytics. When obtained from various providers or custodians, datasets for the same domain themes may dramatically differ in formats due to many reasons such as historical legacies, changing definitions or standards across jurisdictions etc. It hinders urban analysts and researchers from understanding and using these data and makes results comparison and interpretation obscure. Ontology, usually created by domain experts, offers a comprehensive representation of knowledge including concepts, relations and properties in a domain. It defines the real world in abstract and offers a universal and stable schema for data harmonisation. This paper proposes a fast, extensible solution for eliminating data heterogeneity by using ontology. Starting from conceptualising domain knowledge to domain ontology, we discuss a two-level mapping mechanism which bonds the nexus between data and ontology using mapping rules. A semantic translation engine is also introduced to automate the data harmonisation process. A real case - urban density indicators computation - also demonstrates the usability of the proposed framework and the results show strong potentials for applying this method to broader urban analytics application scenarios. Highlights • This paper presents a new means of using the ontology to resolve heterogenous data problems in urban analytics. • The practice of developing domain ontology from domain knowledge is articulated. • The heterogeneities among datasets are eliminated by applying two level of mapping mechanism. • A semantic translation engine is implemented to convert mapped data layers into a consolidated format described in the ontology schema. • An urban density analysis tool which can handle heterogeneous data is created to test the usability of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The motives for constructing Spatial Data Infrastructures (SDIs) are often based on their anticipated benefits for society, economy, and environment. According to those widely articulated but rarely proven benefits, SDI coordinators have been defining more specific objectives to be achieved by their SDIs. However, there is a limited number of assessment approaches that are able to demonstrate whether SDIs indeed realize the intended goals. In this article we develop, apply and evaluate an assessment view for evaluating the extent to which SDIs realize their goals. The assessment view has been developed stepwise using the Multi-view SDI assessment framework as a guideline. The application of the proposed view in the Dutch SDI demonstrates its potential. In addition, the evaluation of the proposed view by the potential users confirms to a certain extent its usability. The results also show that the ease of determining assessment indicators depends on the precision with which the SDI goals are formulated. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]