A view on GIS- supported preventive conservation of world heritage

Abstract

Monitoring and planning processes related to land use management in a spatial context, considering spatial interaction over time, always necessitate complex human decisions. Spatio-temporal decisions are about evaluating alternative answers to a variety of questions that can be categorized as “how?”, “when?”, “how long?”, “what?” and “what if?” questions. A decision in whatever planning process is a commitment to action, is goal specific and has to do with prediction of the future effects of the choices made. Some of the questions that guide spatial intervention planning can be answered using the analytical functionalities of standard GIS-software. However, when optimisation in the presence of multiple goals and criteria are at stake, spatial analysis needs to be complemented with adapted ranking and multicriteria evaluation techniques. In the last decades, worldwide efforts have contributed to a common language in spatiotemporal decision support. From the development of spatiotemporal decision support systems for forestry planning in South American and European context, a theoretical framework and a generic spatiotemporal Decision Support System (stDSS) generator tool were proposed. From this shared experience, the present short paper offers a view on the monitoring and planning needs as raised by the World Heritage City Preservation Management project vlirCPM, for human settlements in the Southern Andes of Ecuador. The main conclusion is that in order to define the requirements of decision support, practical goals and temporal scope must be very clear. Decision support system design, data management and complexity depend on proper formulation and stakeholder consensus on the questions, values and criteria to be handled by planning support tools. No computerized decision support tool will replace multi-actor decision making and has to be complemented and integrated with expert knowledge, multidirectional communication flows and documentation in order to offer a flexible “toolkit” to those involved with planning goals and action.