CARTOGRAPHY

JOURNAL OF THE AUSTRALIAN INSTITUTE OF CARTOCRAPHERS

Contents
Editorial page 2

President's message page 3

Bulletin page 5

Recording Northern Territory mining heritage

byM.ZemanandB.Blakeman... ......page20
Relational methods for format conversion of map data
by J. P. Penny .. . . . page 26
Contemporary Cartography: A venture into tourist mapping
by K. .1. Davies . . . . page 36
Tactual rnapping in New South Wales
by J. E. Roberts and R. Bashford . . . page 44
Landsat as a resource management tool in Papua New Cuinea
by N.J. Quinn, W. Harvey, N. Keenan and P. J. Kershaw . . page 58

Letters to the editor page 4

Reviews

Reviews in brief ...... page 70

Abstracts page 71

Literature received ....page75

List of members: December 1985 . .. . page 76

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\RTOCRAPHY CARTOCRAPHY Vol. 15, No. 1, March 1986

 l-andsat as a resource management
tool in Papua New Cuinea
N. J. Quinn, W Harvey, N. Keenan and
P. J. Kershaw

Surveys of coastal and terrestrial contmunities are
important in order to establish an inventory of
national resources. The use of an earth resources
satellite system (Landsat) contains the spectral and
spatial resolution suitable for ntapping shallow
water and terrestrial contmunities in tropical Pa-
pua New Cuinea. lt is suggested that the Univer-
sity of Papua New Cuinea and the University of
Technology initiate a joint multidisciplinary pro-
gram to educate Papua New Guineans in the use
of Landsat.
N. Quinn
Fisheries Department
Papua New Cuinea University of Technology, Lae
W. Harvey
N. Keenan
P. Kershaw
Papua New Cuinea Departnrent of Surveying and
Land Studies
INTRODUCTION
Papua New Cuinea (PNC) is a newly indepen-
dent nation (1975) with a total land area of
461 7OO square kilometres. It consists of the east-
ern half of the island of Nerrr Guinea and a myriad
of smaller islands and has a coastline of over
7000 km. The ocean within the Exclusive Econ-
omic Zone (EEZ) o{ PNC, which the government
must control and regulate, fornrs a vast area over
seven times the land mass.
To date large areas of PNC's seas are poorly
charted (Young 1982; Done 1983) and many coral
reefs are only just being acknowledged in the
scientific literature (Kojis and Quinn 1984; 1985).
The ocean area within PNC's EEZ is covered with
charts varying from scales of 1:1 7OO 000 to
1:12 5OO, the latter for harbours and channel ap-
proaches. For general navigation 1:300 000 charts
are adequate while 1:100 000 charts are nrore
suitable for coastal navigation. Table 1 lists the
chart coverage within PNC's EEZ and the portion
of surveyed area on charts of particular scale. Many
of the surveyed areas are based on incomplete,
erroneous or dated information. Of the
2 339 9OO km2 of ocean area, only 701 97Okm2
are covered by a scale suitable for navigation, and
only 528 580 knr2 of this is surveyed. Much of the
latter area needs to be resurveyed or the existing
data verified (Young 1981). The use of Landsat data
to create a 'Hyregraphic' (Hydrographic Recon-
naissance Craphic at I:100 000) to update hydro-
graphic and bathymetric detail in PNC has been
suggested by Young (1983a; 1983b).
Fundamental to the administration of the EEZ is
a knowledge of the resources located within its
boundary, both in type and distribution. Shallorv

Vol. 15, No. 1, March 1986 58 CARTOCRAPHY

 Table 1: Hydrological Chart Coverage of Papua New Guinea,s EEZ
)nt Ocean area not
% of surveyed cwered by
Coverage of area of charts of
Scale ocean area coverage larger scale

l:12 500 to l:75 000 1"t. 83 1%

1:100 000 to 1:150 000 69 3%
1:250 000 to l:300 000 25ulo 76 2'l"lo
1: l 000 000 to 1:1 700 000 1 009. n.a. 20olo

Source; after Young I 983a,

seas and numerous reefs have always prwed haz- water mapping using Landsat in PNC was comple-
ardous for maritime activities and discouraged ex- ted in April 1985 by the Australian Survey Office in
ploration. conjunction with the Department of Surveying at
Where developing countries must increasingly the University of Queensland (Lyons and Cuerin
rely upon development of their own resources to 1985). This project was funded by the Australian
vly indepen- Development Assistance Bureau and is the fore-
achieve financial independence, it is important
lnd area of runner of a number of pilot projects investigating
that every opportunity be taken to facilitate explo-
; of the east- the application of Landsat digital analysis tech-
ratlon. Efficient exploration and development of
rnd a myriad niques to monitoring of coastal and terrestrial re-
resources will assist developing countries to
line of over sources in PNC and other south-west Pacific
achieve prominence in a competitive international
lusive Ecorr- countries. The Ministry of Primary lndustries in Fiji
market place.
EOVernment is considering using Landsat to define habitats for
rst area over Papua New Cuinea has large areas of shallow- giant clam recolonization (Adams, pers. comm.).
water habitats requiring initial identification or up- Wolanski and others ('l 984) used Landsat to de-
date mapping. As conventional charting methods
; are poorly lineate wakes around islands and follow river
are slow, hazardous and expensive, alternative low plumes in the Culf of Papua.
J many coral
in the
cost rapid remote sensing methods may be em-
Cged
ployed to provide interim information until surveys
l9B4;1985). PROCESSTNG TECHNTQUES
by conventional means can be conducted. For ex-
iovered with
ample, Quinn (1984) used Landsat to monitor the The Papua New Cuinea University of Tech-
700 000 to
noxious weed Salvinia molesta on the Sepik River, nology has two computer systems capable of dis-
channel ap-
0 000 charts
a task that would have normally been done only at playing Landsat digital data. The first
great expense and been plagued with logistic computer-aided analysis of Landsat data uses an
ts are more
problems. interactive program called LANSAT running on a
: 1 lists the
I the portion Additionally, strict environmental laws in PNC PDP 11/34 computer at the Papua New Cuinea
'scale. Many require the monitoring and evaluation of develop University of Technology. The progranr nas written
incomplete, ment projects. Landsat imagery has already proved in Fortran by Dr Frank Honey to accept data from
n. Of the useful to help monitor silt deposition associated the Australian Landsat Station (ALS). The format of
with a proposed port development (Quinn and the ALS Landsat tapes is band interleaved by line.
'O1 970 km2
rigation, and Kojis 1982; 1984) and the techniques may be The data from the Landsat tapes is transferred to
Much of the successfully applied to general areas of environ- an RK-05 disc, where allocated space allows sub-
the existing, mental monitoring and resource management scenes of 512 lines by 512 pixels to be accommo-
Landsat data (Harvey and Kershaw 1985a; 1985b) as well as to dated. A BASIC program called LSSTOR is used to
phic Recon- specific areas such as the surveillance of volcanic copy the data from the tapes to the disc from
pdate hydro- regions (Harvey 1985). where the information is read off for LANSAT. Each
lC has been The use of Landsat to map the shallow water Landsat image is enhanced using an algorithm
habitats such as the Creat Barrier Reef was pro- devised by obtaining spectral signatures from sev-
ofthe EEZ is posed by Smith and others, (1975a; 1975b) and eral areas with suspected similar physical and bio-
,d rvithin its applied by Bina and others (1978) and Jupp and logical features.
ion. Shallow others (1981; 1983). A pilot study into shallow- To display the Landsat data an Electohome col-

.1,
.RTOCRAPHY CARTOCRAPHY Vol. 15, No. March 1986
 our display terminal, a Matrox colour display inter-
face is used. Up to 256 lines by 256 pixels can be
displayed in l0 colours. This systenr, while repre-
senting a technological breakthrough in remote
sensing in the south-west Pacific, has been rather
iimited in its capabilities. The major constraint in
the utilisation of the system in either a research or
educational role has been the inordinately long
screen loading time, varying from twenty-five min-
utes if the system is dedicated to in excess of four
hours if the system is multi-user. During the past
two years the system has often been unavailable
due to the difficulty of acquiring and maintaining
service contracts on high-tech equipment in a re-
mote area.
The second computer analysis uses a BBC mi-
crocomputer (Harvey and Kershaw 1985a). This
system is being developed in-house in order to
retain an interactive analysis capability after the
planned phasing out of the PDP 11/34 in late-
1985. Consideration was given to the purchase of
c
commercial packages for interactive analysis of
remotely sensed data, but financial constraints
prohibited the purchase of the more sophisticated
la
packages; the limitations of the less expensive sys-
'e
tems investigated were considered unacceptable.
The package developed offers an inexpensive
training system which may be installed as a stand-
alone for a single user or networked for a multi-
user requirement. This system has been designed
Jat around a screen resolution of 160 by 128 pixels
;e and has a screen loading time of twenty-five sec-
.)n ( onds.
rere One of the major benefits offered by such a
irt c system is the multiple maintenance options of
to component repair, component replacement or unit
rd tl replacement offered by the adoption of a low cost
for microcomputer, a critical factor in the introduction
of high technology into development countries. A
ru lat second important benefit is the transportability of
la the system to the site of operations, hence offering
:al d near realtime interaction between ground truthing
surveys and signature development and modifi-
cation.
The lmage lnterpretation
\iC's
Raw Landsat imagery of shallow-water habitats
sno such as coral reefs may be difficult to interpret
visually. A dark patch may be interpreted as a deep
ssibil lagoon or sea-grass bed or mud flat and a very
a8e bright area could be a shallow lagoon with white
Vol. 15, No. l, March 1986
sand bottom or coral rubble. 1'he analysis may be
further confused with turbid o1 shallow waler. ll is
therefore necessary that classificalions be con-
ducted with the aid of somefne knowledgeable
about lhe area and post-procesPinB surveys be con-
ducted lo sample localions to 'ferify classifit ations
at least in the initial stages.
The relative area and surfabe configuration of
each colour zone depends on rhe tidal level during
imagery acquisition. A tempgral comparison of
the band zones of the same sfallow-water habitat
should indicate which areas are subject to the
greatest spectral changes durir]r s tidal movement.
Iimitations
Landsat can be used to provide reconnaissance
mapping enabling effective plqnning and manage-
ment of shallow-water habitals. Satellite remote
sensing does not replace the more conventional
methods of shallow-water mqpping, but can re-
duce the tinre and costs associated with them by
supplying supplementary data, or data for conlinu-
ous assessment. Additionally, where data is re-
quired periodically over some considerable time
the costs of conventional metlpods would be pro-
hibitive.
The limitation to the application of Landsat data
exists where there is inappropriate data handling
technology and expertise. tn lhe case of Landsat
there is no requirement for adpptation of satellite
technology to local conditionq as there is no in-
volvement with the sensing eqr.lripment or its oper-
ations. lnvolvement is conffned to the data
produced from the satellite senling and lhis can be
acquired in a usable state in readiness for inlerpret-
alion or manipulation. The two main ldbour inten-
sive activities are in the fnanipulation and
interprelation of the masses 9f dala and in the
production of maps charts or qtatistical data pres-
entat ion s.
Finally, the most immediate poten-
llrni,urion to
tial users in the South Pacific is thal lhere is no
local receiving station in the legion. Hence, sig-
nals for less than of the wate{s in PNC's EEZ are
Vo
currently being received and fhere is no currenl
data irom landsat being receir]zed over any other
area of lhe Soulh Pacific altholgh possibilities ex-
ist for the acquisition of limitel coverage of much
of the region in the near futurel.
CARTOCRAPHY

interdisciplinary program is necessary to educate
the administrators and scientists involved in en-
vironnrental monitoring and in the resource man-
agement of PNC's coastal and terrestrial habitats.
Acknowledgements
We would like to acknowledge the use of the
Landsat facilities of the Department of Survey and
i:i.
il . Land Studies and the computer facilities of the
Papua New Cuinea University of Technology. Mr
i'":' r,' B. Nichols is particularly acknowledged for his
*l :::-.
ii; I .. l' assistance in maintaining the computing infra-
f:' r.'::,,i:.
, n"reans
structu re.
t iiii l
-:.-;l
I :,i :l!:::
:] r1;' :
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ft :i
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