Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
using the photogrammetric scanner DSW200 Helava into the TIFF format with
resolution of 1.500 dpi. The orthophotomap was created by scanning the aerial
photographs with accuracy of 14
m, which is approximately equal to 1.800 dpi
(dots per inch) and corresponds to the pixel size of 50 cm. A georeferencing and
orthorectification of the aerial photographs took place within the Erdas Imagine and
ArcView 9.2 programs (for reading information in GIS).
µ
7.4 Land-Use Changes and Transformations of Landscape
Function
The Bílina area is an area where the function of the landscape completely changed
during its development. It changed from originally purely agricultural (one of the
most fertile regions in Bohemia), to industrial-agricultural, and eventually as far as
urban and totally devastated landscape. Immediate negative anthropogenic impact
affects the area northwest of Bílina city. The area had already been mined for
coal since the Eighteenth century. Large capacity pit mining extended formerly
local mining from the 1960s, uncovered the surface of the landscape, and created
vast anthropogenic forms of topography (mining pits and tips). In the 1970s, three
municipalities vanished. There was a total population of 4.000 people there before
World War Two. A similar situation was present southeast of Bílina city, where
Radovesice tip was created. Shortly after the Second World War, Radovesice had
the character of a small town with more than 1.400 inhabitants. In the 1970s, earth
was taken to the location of the old mines, and the municipality Radovesice was
buried under a huge elevation. These changes caused a decrease in the proportion
of agricultural land from 70% before the Second World War to the current 10%.
Conversely, other areas (mainly mining sites) increased from 4 to 65% (Fig. 7.2).
Modern construction and transformation of the landscape in the last few decades
has completely changed the character of the landscape. Extensive industrial and
large-scale, high-rise apartment-building construction, together with artificial forms
of relief, overpower the predominantly original natural and urban environment. All
these also cause a negative perception of the landscape, in spite of the developing
restoration work on the Radovesická tip. Perhaps only the renovated historical cen-
tre of Bílina city, with a town square based on the medieval ground plan with a
towering castle above, could be described as a positive cultural-historical “oasis” of
the Bílina area. This green island is the site of Kyselka, a former spa (see typology,
rate of concentration and development of population).
The densely forested mountain region of the Petrovice area was settled in the
Twelfth century in connection with mineral extraction. The first settlers came from
the Czech inland; later, immigrants from Germany dominated (mainly miners with
their families). After the decline of mining, a mainly self-sufficient type of agricul-
ture and logging started to push through. The largest landscape character change
connects to events after the Second World War. After the post-war resettlement
of the German population, the area remained permanently underpopulated. The
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