Europe’s Green Arteries—A Continental Dataset of Riparian Zones

Weissteiner, Christof J.; Ickerott, Martin; Ott, Hannes; Probeck, Markus; Ramminger, Gernot; Clerici, Nicola; Dufourmont, Hans; Sousa, Ana Maria Ribeiro de

doi:10.3390/rs8110925

Cited by 41 publications

(55 citation statements)

References 36 publications

(24 reference statements)

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“…RZ consists of three products: Delineation of Riparian Zones (DRZ), Land Cover/Land Use (RZ LC/LU) and Green Linear Elements (GLE) [47]. Moreover, the DRZ product consists of three components [48] of which the Delineation of Potential Riparian Zones (DRZP) was used. DRZP is derived from weighing hydrological and geomorphological parameters, among other input data (Table 1), to express the likelihood of an area to host riparian features and hence to provide riparian-related benefits.…”

Section: Copernicus Land Monitoring Service: Riparian Zones and Corinmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Especially due to the full, open and free European Copernicus Land Monitoring Service (CLMS) [45] and after the launch of Sentinel-2 (S2) B in March 2017, increasing its revisit time to just five days [46]. Specifically, the Riparian Zones products from the CLMS local component were used since they provide detailed data on these areas' land cover/land use class and disposition to deliver riparian ES [47,48]. Moreover, S2 data has been used due to its high spatial resolution to overcome this weakness of the bio-geophysical indices offered in the CLMS [49].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Assessment of Green Infrastructure in Riparian Zones Using Copernicus Programme

et al. 2019

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This article presents an approach to identify Green Infrastructure (GI), its benefits and condition. This information enables environmental agencies to prioritise conservation, management and restoration strategies accordingly. The study focuses on riparian areas due to their potential to supply Ecosystem Services (ES), such as water quality, biodiversity, soil protection and flood or drought risk reduction. Natural Water Retention Measures (NWRM) related to agriculture and forestry are the type of GI considered specifically within these riparian areas. The approach is based on ES condition indicators, defined by the European Environment Agency (EEA) to support the policy targets of the 2020 Biodiversity Strategy. Indicators that can be assessed through remote sensing techniques are used, namely: capacity to provide ecosystem services, proximity to protected areas, greening response and water stress. Specifically, the approach uses and evaluates the potential of freely available products from the Copernicus Land Monitoring Service (CLMS) to monitor GI. Moreover, vegetation and water indices are calculated using data from the Sentinel-2 MSI Level-2A scenes and integrated in the analysis. The approach has been tested in the Italian Po river basin in 2018. Firstly, agriculture and forest NWRM were identified in the riparian areas of the river network. Secondly, the Riparian Zones products from the CLMS local component and the satellite-based indices were linked to the aforementioned ES condition indicators. This led to the development of a pixel-based model that evaluates the identified GI according to: (i) its disposition to provide riparian regulative ES and (ii) its condition in the analysed year. Finally, the model was used to prioritise GI for conservation or restoration initiatives, based on its potential to deliver ES and current condition.

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Section: Copernicus Land Monitoring Service: Riparian Zones and Corinmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessment of Green Infrastructure in Riparian Zones Using Copernicus Programme

et al. 2019

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“…Advances in remote sensing can contribute to overcoming these limitations. Classification of satellite imagery has already been used to map riparian buffers successfully (Goetz, ; Klemas, ), even generating a European continental map by combining the images with ancillary data such as elevation (Weissteiner et al, ). However, land cover heterogeneity and the small patch sizes of riparian areas in human‐dominated landscapes hamper the ability to map forests at the habitat level (i.e.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Modelling riparian forest distribution and composition to entire river networks

Pérez‐Silos

Álvarez‐Martínez

Barquín

2019

Applied Vegetation Science

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Aim: Developing a methodology to map the distribution of riparian forests to entire river networks and determining the main environmental factors controlling their spatial patterns. Location: Cantabrian region, northern Spain. Methods: We mapped the riparian forests at a physiognomic and phytosociological level by delimiting riparian zones and generating vegetation distribution models based on remote sensing data (Landsat 8 OLI and LiDAR PNOA). We built virtual watersheds to define a spatial framework where the catchment environmental information can be specified for each river reach, in combination with the vegetation map. In order to determine the drivers that play a significant role in the observed spatial patterns in riparian forests, based on our data sets we modelled interactions between environmental information and riparian vegetation by using the Random Forest algorithm. Results: The modelling results obtained reliably reproduced the variation of riparian forest structure and composition across Cantabrian watersheds. The produced maps were highly accurate, with a more than 70% overall accuracy for forest occurrence. A clear differentiation between Eurosiberian (habitats 91E0 and 9160) and Mediterranean (92E0) riparian forests was shown on both sides of the mountain range. Topography and land use were the main drivers defining the distribution of riparian forest as a physiognomic unit. In turn, altitude, climate and percentage of pasture were the most relevant factors determining their composition (phytosociological approach). Conclusions: Our study confirms that anthropic control ultimately defines the distribution of vegetation in the riparian area at a regional to local scale. Human disturbances constrain the extension of forest patches across their potential distribution defined by topoclimatic boundaries, which establish a clear limit between Mediterranean and Eurosiberian biogeographical regions.

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“…Similarly, Alber and Piégay () generated maps of erodible fluvial corridors to support river management, and Weissteiner et al . () generated a European continental map of riparian extent deficiencies.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Michez et al (2017) provided a regional map of riparian corridors that was used to target actions on the most altered reaches. Similarly, Alber and Piégay (2011) generated maps of erodible fluvial corridors to support river management, and Weissteiner et al (2016) generated a European continental map of riparian extent deficiencies.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

LiDAR‐based fluvial remote sensing to assess 50–100‐year human‐driven channel changes at a regional level: The case of the Piedmont Region, Italy

Bizzi

Piégay

Demarchi

et al. 2018

Earth Surf Processes Landf

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Remote Sensing (RS) technology has recently offered new and promising opportunities to analyze river systems. In this paper, we present a calibration of characteristic Hydraulic Scaling Law (HSL) using a regional database of river geomorphic features. We consistently linked discharge with channel geometry features for estimated Bankfull Channel Depth (eBCD), Active Channel Width (ACW), and Low Flow water Channel Width (LFCW), which are continuously available from RS data along the river course. We then used historical information and external sources of information on channel reaches that were relatively unaffected by human pressure over periods ranging from a few decades to a century (measured in comparable geographical areas) to infer relatively Unaltered HSLs (rUHSLs). Adopting rUHSL validated with available local historical evidence on channel geometry, we were able to assess historical changes in channel geometry consistently over the entire region and within the studied temporal window. The case study was conducted for the Po basin in the Piedmont Region, north‐west Italy. From our analysis, it emerges that regionally 74% of the river network has riverbed incisions exceeding 1 m, while 66% of channels have halved their historical widths with a total of 617 ha of land subtracted from the active channel. LFCW is, on average, wider in Alpine rivers compared with those located in the North Apennines. Although it is currently not possible to measure the accuracy of these estimates, the evidence generated is coherent with available historical information, characteristic hydraulic scaling laws, evidence from relatively unaltered reaches and the available literature on local fluvial systems. This methodology provides robust, novel and quantitative information regarding decadal to secular channel changes that have occurred on a regional scale. This new layer of information enriches our ability to rationally address assessments of large‐scale past and future channel trajectories. © 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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Europe’s Green Arteries—A Continental Dataset of Riparian Zones

Cited by 41 publications

References 36 publications

Assessment of Green Infrastructure in Riparian Zones Using Copernicus Programme

Assessment of Green Infrastructure in Riparian Zones Using Copernicus Programme

Modelling riparian forest distribution and composition to entire river networks

LiDAR‐based fluvial remote sensing to assess 50–100‐year human‐driven channel changes at a regional level: The case of the Piedmont Region, Italy

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