Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
systems which can be used to analyze new and more challenging problems. It can
be argued that a position somewhere between these two extremes better represents
the current state of the art and future expectations.
Location problems typically involve a large set of feasible alternatives, multiple
and conflicting evaluation criteria as well as the contribution and participation of
different actors (decision-makers, stakeholders, interest groups). In order to address
all these issues it is necessary, if not vital, for the analyst to have access to accurate
and reliable information. This requirement can be even more crucial in all those
decision problems such as environmental and land-use planning problems or the
location of public services, where the decision making process requires public
participation, consensus building and conflict resolution. In such cases appropriate
communication tools are required in order to assure that all the information related
to certain complex quantitative phenomena is readily available in a user friendly
representation. Through the management of multi-layered information, modern GIS
are capable of providing a solid and accurate description of such real problems in
terms of the variety and richness of information that can be stored and utilized.
Consequently, in the near future we expect many more applications concerning GIS-
based multi-criteria approaches, consisting in the transformation and combination
of spatial data and decision preferences to obtain information for decision making.
Another fundamental issue is represented by the need for tools, both methodolog-
ical and technological, capable of integrating, in a coherent framework, information
of various nature (data, opinions, preferences) that may be also expressed in
different and, apparently, incompatible languages. In this context, the widespread
use of generalized devices such as smart phones, tablets, or interactive Internet-
enabled televisions, may make GIS a reference platform for developing spatial
decision support systems able to transform and combine data in such a way that
complex problems may be modeled and then appropriately tackled. This aspect may
also stress the potential of GIS as a powerful communication tool with interesting
implications in institutional, political, social and ethical issues.
The technological evolution will also provide new interesting directions of
research as well as opportunities for a whole range of exciting applications.
Recent advances in wireless communication technologies have been adding new
perspectives to technology integration which is crucial in spatial IT management.
More specifically, the increasing popularity of Internet geospatial IT tools such as
Google Earth and the massive availability of location-based systems (i.e. Global
Positioning System) have been making available a huge amount of accurate spatial
information. As a result, Location Based Services (LBS) are expected to proliferate
in the near future since the information available within GIS can drive studies and
applications that model new problems on the basis of the dynamic availability of
customers' positions (people, vehicles, goods). In fact, as argued by Sui (
2005
),
conventional GIS concepts may disappear and GIS functionalities may appear in a
pervasive fashion when the idea of ubiquitous computing comes true.
Despite the rapid progress in the technological aspects of GIS, many of the funda-
mental problems of data modeling, error propagation, uncertainty management and
integration with optimization tools are still open and can still represent interesting
