Developing a responsive web platform for the systematic monitoring of coastal structures

Abstract

Portugal’s privileged location and the extension of its coastline has led to the construction and maintenance of a large set of port infrastructures. These structures were built primarily to ensure the tranquillity of the protected areas in the harbour basins, but they also support, among others, the control of sedimentation, as they guide the currents and protect water withdrawn from thermoelectric plants. The rubble-mound breakwater is the most common of these structures and its characteristics impose maintenance and repair works throughout its lifetime. To avoid significant costs or, even worse, the collapse of the structure, the need for these works must be evaluated in advance. This is achieved through the evaluation of the breakwater’s Present Condition but also by its comparison with past situations. The Present Condition is periodically checked on-site and all relevant data is systematically gathered. The integration of the data collected during several inspections enables additional comparisons and analyses, supporting the characterisation of the Evolution and Risk conditions. Data collection at periodic inspections of these structures was, until recently, conducted manually, using paper forms and photographs. This was a slow and error prone process. To improve productivity, a monitoring tool, supported by a map-based online geographic information system (WebGIS) was developed. This platform is a device responsive mobile system which adapts to the location of the user’s device, enabling the geo-referencing and analysis of the structures concerned. The system includes facilities for the collection of structural information and also supports the association of Media data, such as photos and videos. In this paper, the developed platform is presented in detail focusing on information requirements, architecture, and the functionality available to the user. The resulting platform has been successfully evaluated by involved researchers from the Portuguese National Laboratory for Civil Engineering (the end users of the system) and by non-expert users.