CIS – Coastal Information System and CWA

Description

According to O’Dea et al, 2007 Coastal Information Systems (CISs) can be defined as “a collection of digital maps and datasets with supplementary tables, illustrations and information that systematically illustrate the coast, oftentimes with cartographic and decision support tools”. Most useful and powerful CISs are those accessible on-line that are generally identified as Coastal Web Atlas (CWAs). They may be simply tools for serving a geospatial database via a web interface. Alternatively, the most recent generation of web atlas links multiple servers of data together, and provides interactive tools using the latest visualisation technology. ICAN (the International Coastal Atlas Network) - an informal group of organisations who have been meeting to scope and implement data interoperability approaches to coastal web atlases – is a good source of information on CWAs.
Various examples of European CWAs are available; these may differ for scope, scale of application, target users, complexity, data typology, available data and information, etc. Some illustrative cases are:

HELCOM Map and Data Service for the Baltic Sea;

MAREANO - Marine Area Database for Norwegian coastal and marine regions;

North Sea Atlas for the Dutch coastal and marine area;

Kustatlas – the Belgian Coastal Atlas;

Coastal Information System of the Oder Estuary in Germany and Poland;

MIDA – Marine Irish Digital Atlas;

Coastal Information System of the Channel Coast Observatory;

Coastal and marine information system of Emilia Romagna Region in Italy.
CWAs evolve continuously and other relevant cases are surely available or might be available in the next future; therefore above CWAs just represent some illustrative cases.

Data and information on climate change impacts and vulnerability are often included in CISs and CWAs, in particular as far as sea level rise is concerned.