Abstract
Landslide inventories, usually including digital inventory maps and linked alphanumeric attributes, are the most important input for further landslide zoning. However, to allow landslide susceptibility, hazard and risk assessment the inventory databases should contain information on the location of landslide phenomena, types, history, state of activity, magnitude or size, causal factors and the damage caused. Yet, in Europe it is not known which national (or regional) landslide databases contain all this information, and thus allow landslide risk assessment. Therefore this study presents a review of existing national landslide databases in Europe together with a number of regional databases, and proposes improvements in agreement with the EU Soil Thematic Strategy, and with INSPIRE Directive.
Replies received to a detailed questionnaire learned that currently 22 out of 37 contacted European countries have a national landslide database. Six other countries only have regional databases. In total the databases contain so far more than 642,000 landslides. About half of the databases contain less than 50% of all landslides in the country and also information on landslide history, triggering factor and consequences is generally only available for less than 25% of the landslides in the databases. A positive observation is that 60% of the databases are updated at least once a year or after a major event. The spatial data are almost always collected with traditional methods such as field surveys, and analysis of aerial photographs and historical records. 67% of the databases use a classification system adapted from Cruden and Varnes (Cruden DM, Varnes DJ (1996) Landslide types and processes. In: Turner AK, Schuster RL (eds) Landslides, investigation and mitigation, Special Report 247: Transportation Research Board. National Research Council, National Academy Press, Washington, DC, pp 36–71), so it should be possible to define a limited number of major landslide types and activity classes to be used in all databases. Other problems with regard to interoperability and harmonisation are due to differences in language, the absence of a digital database where spatial and alphanumeric information is linked (the case for 58% of the databases), and the restricted accessibility.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Cruden DM, Varnes DJ (1996) Landslide types and processes. In: Turner AK, Schuster RL (eds) Landslides, investigation and mitigation. National Academy, Washington, DC, pp 36–71, Special Report 247: Transportation Research Board. National Research Council
Dikau R, Cavallin A, Jager S (1996) Databases and GIS for landslide research in Europe. Geomorphology 15:227–239
Di Mauro C, Vetere Arellano AL, Ranguelov B, Hervás J, Peckham R, Christou MD, Duffield JS, Wood M, Nordvik JP, Lucia AC (2003) Questionnaire: risk mapping – natural and technological risk and contaminated lands. Special Publication No. I.03.222, JRC, Ispra, 108p
EC (2006a) Thematic strategy for soil protection. COM(2006)231 final, Brussels, 12p
EC (2006b) Proposal for a directive of the European Parliament and of the Council establishing a framework for the protection of soil and amending directive 2004/35/EC. COM(2006)232 final, Brussels, 30p
EC (2007) Directive 200/7/2/EC of the European Parliament and the Council of 14 March 2007 establishing an Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community (INSPIRE). Official Journal of the European Union, L108/1-14, Luxembourg, 14p. http://inspire.jrc.ec.europa.eu
Eckelmann W, Baritz R, Bialousz S, Bielek P, Carre F, Houskova B, Jones RJA, Kibblewhite MG, Kozak J, Le Bas C, Toth G, Varallyay G, Yli Halla M, Zupan M (2006) Common criteria for risk area identification ac-cording to soil threats. European Soil Bureau Research Report n. 20, EUR 22185 EN, Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, Luxembourg, 94p
Günther A, Van Den Eeckhaut M, Reichenbach P, Hervás J, Malet JP, Foster C, Guzzetti F (2011) New developments in harmonized landslide susceptibility mapping over Europe in the framework of the European soil thematic strategy. In: Proceedings of the 2nd world landslide forum, Rome, this volume, 3–9 Oct 2011
Hervás J (2012) Landslide inventory. In: Bobrowky PT (ed) Encyclopedia of natural hazards. Springer, Heidelberg (ISBN 978-90-481-8699-0) (in press)
Hervás J, Günther A, Reichenbach P, Chacón J, Pasuto A, Malet J-P, Trigila A, Hobbs P, Maquaire O, Tagliavini F, Poyiadji E, Guerrieri L, Montanarella L (2007) Recommendations on a common approach for mapping areas at risk of landslides in Europe. In: Hervás J (ed) Guidelines for mapping areas at risk of landslides in Europe. Proceedings experts meeting, Ispra. JRC Report EUR 23093 EN, Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, Luxembourg, pp 45–49, 23–24 Oct 2007
INSPIRE Thematic Working Group Natural Risk Zones (2011) D2.8.III.12 Data specification on natural risk zones – draft guidelines, version 2.0 (22/06/2011). INSPIRE Thematic Working Group Natural Risk Zones, 175p. http://inspire.jrc.ec.europa.eu/index.cfm/pageid/2/list/1
RAMSOIL (2007–2008) RAMSOIL: risk assessment methodologies for SOIL threats. http://eusoils.jrc.ec.europa.eu/projects/Ramsoil/data.html
Schweigl J, Hervás J (2009) Landslide mapping in Austria. JRC Report EUR 23785 EN, Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, Luxembourg, 61p
Van Den Eeckhaut M, Hervás J (2012) State of the art of national landslide databases in Europe and their potential for hazard and risk assessment. Geomorphology 139–140:545–558
Acknowledgments
Special thanks go to all the contact persons and organizations that took the effort to complete the questionnaire. This study has been carried out in the framework of the EU-FP7 project SafeLand: Living with landslide risk in Europe: Assessment, effects of global change, and risk management strategies (Grant Agreement 226479; http://www.safeland-fp7.eu/). The authors thank all the project partners that have contributed to the distribution of the questionnaire to the responsible organizations in their country. Special thanks go to Dr. J.P. Malet and Prof. J. Corominas for reviewing the questionnaire, and to R. Tomas, V. Lima and M. Van Liedekerke (JRC) for providing information on the INSPIRE regulation status.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2013 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Van Den Eeckhaut, M., Hervás, J., Montanarella, L. (2013). Landslide Databases in Europe: Analysis and Recommendations for Interoperability and Harmonisation. In: Margottini, C., Canuti, P., Sassa, K. (eds) Landslide Science and Practice. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-31325-7_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-31325-7_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-642-31324-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-642-31325-7
eBook Packages: Earth and Environmental ScienceEarth and Environmental Science (R0)