Jiang, L., Kang, J. and Schroth, O. (2015) Prediction of the visual impact of motorways using GIS. Environmental Impact Assessment Review, 55. 59 - 73. ISSN 0195-9255
Abstract
Large scale transportation projects can adversely affect the visual perception of environmental quality and require adequate visual impact assessment. In this study, we investigated the effects of the characteristics of the road project and the character of the existing landscape on the perceived visual impact of motorways, and developed a GIS-based prediction model based on the findings. An online survey using computer-visualised scenes of different motorway and landscape scenarios was carried out to obtain perception-based judgements on the visual impact. Motorway scenarios simulated included the baseline scenario without road, original motorway, motorways with timber noise barriers, transparent noise barriers and tree screen; different landscape scenarios were created by changing land cover of buildings and trees in three distance zones. The landscape content of each scene was measured in GIS. The result shows that presence of a motorway especially with the timber barrier significantly decreases the visual quality of the view. The resulted visual impact tends to be lower where it is less visually pleasant with more buildings in the view, and can be slightly reduced by the visual absorption effect of the scattered trees between the motorway and the viewpoint. Based on the survey result, eleven predictors were identified for the visual impact prediction model which was applied in GIS to generate maps of visual impact of motorways in different scenarios. The proposed prediction model can be used to achieve efficient and reliable assessment of visual impact of motorways.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2015 Elsevier. This is an author produced version of a paper subsequently published in Environmental Impact Assessment Review. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. Article available under the terms of the CC-BY-NC-ND licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > School of Architecture (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 18 Sep 2015 17:02 |
Last Modified: | 22 Jul 2017 05:12 |
Published Version: | https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eiar.2015.07.001 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Elsevier |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1016/j.eiar.2015.07.001 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:88874 |