Monitoring soil creep landsliding in an urban area using persistent scatterer interferometry (El Papiol, Catalonia, Spain)

Analysis of Damage to Buildings in Urban Centers on Unstable Slopes via TerraSAR-X PSI Data: The Case Study of El Papiol Town (Spain)

“…This led the El Papiol municipal government to set up a risk mitigation strategy including: 1) evacuation/repair ordinances for most affected buildings; 2) some control works to reduce the displacement rates; and 3) construction bans within the most affected-areas. A recent study [8], carried out by using geomorphological/geological criteria jointly with historical reports and PSI data, confirmed the instability of the area [ Fig. 2(a)].…”

“…In this way, a constant velocity (i.e., the one computed during PSI observation period) was assumed over 34 years. This assumption, although creep evolving with extremely slow velocity is considered the cause of the slope instabilities in El Papiol area [8], represents a current limit to this letter.…”

“…ones-dating back to the major urbanistic expansion along the southern hill slope-compose the urban fabric. Starting from 1971 and mostly from 1983 on, following periods of heavy rainfall [8], part of the built-up area started exhibiting damages induced by ground instability. This led the El Papiol municipal government to set up a risk mitigation strategy including: 1) evacuation/repair ordinances for most affected buildings; 2) some control works to reduce the displacement rates; and 3) construction bans within the most affected-areas.…”

“…In particular, the authors highlighted the presence of cohesive soils with high clay content affected by soil creep [21] in correspondence of an alteration band of detrital material of Miocene Epoch at about 5 m depth. This phenomenon is characterized by extremely slow displacements that affect the built-up area [8]. The analysis of PSI time-series allowed for a more accurate definition of landslide boundaries [ Fig.…”

“…Measurements of surface displacements derived from the processing of medium-/high-resolution SAR images via Persistent Scatterer Interferometry (PSI) techniques have been successfully applied for slow-moving landslide studies. In particular, the scientific literature is rich of examples mainly focusing on landslide characterization (i.e., detection, mapping, and definition of the state of activity) [3]- [8]. More recently, few authors started to investigate the behavior of single buildings located in landslide-affected areas [4], [9]- [13].…”