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LiDAR-based three-dimensional street landscape indices for urban habitability

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Abstract

Streets are like the skeleton of a city. They not only guarantee urban traffic functions and facilitate business activities, but also perform an integral component of the urban landscape. Urban habitability, that is to judge whether a place is suitable for people to live, has been a popular topic for years. A mobile laser scanning (MLS) system can obtain close-range three-dimensional (3D) light detection and ranging (LiDAR) data of the sides and surfaces of urban streets. This study explored the possibility of analyzing urban street space landscapes based on MLS LiDAR, and proposed four LiDAR-based 3D street landscape indices for urban habitability: 3D green biomass, street enclosure, sunshine index, and landscape diversity index. Experiments performed in Jianye District of Nanjing (China) showed that these four street landscape indices accorded well with the actual situation and they reflected user perception of street space. Thus, the proposed indices could help us to assess urban landscape from a 3D perspective. To sum up, this study suggest a new type of data for landscape study, and provide an automatic information acquirement for urban habitability assessment.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant 41622109, and Grant 41371017.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Jiangsu Provincial Key Laboratory of Geographic Information Science and Technology, Nanjing University, Nanjing, China

    Liang Cheng, Song Chen, Sensen Chu, Shuyi Li, Yi Yuan, Yu Wang & Manchun Li

  2. Collaborative Innovation Center for the South Sea Studies, Nanjing University, Nanjing, China

    Liang Cheng

  3. Collaborative Innovation Center of Novel Software Technology and Industrialization, Nanjing University, Nanjing, China

    Liang Cheng

  4. Department of Geographic Information Science, Nanjing University, Nanjing, Jiangsu Province, 210093, People’s Republic of China

    Liang Cheng, Song Chen, Sensen Chu, Shuyi Li, Yi Yuan, Yu Wang & Manchun Li

  5. Jiangsu Center for Collaborative Innovation in Geographical Information Resource Development and Application, Nanjing, 210023, China

    Manchun Li

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  1. Liang Cheng
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  2. Song Chen
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  3. Sensen Chu
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  4. Shuyi Li
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  5. Yi Yuan
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  6. Yu Wang
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  7. Manchun Li
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Correspondence to Song Chen.

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Responsible editor: H. A. Babaie

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Cheng, L., Chen, S., Chu, S. et al. LiDAR-based three-dimensional street landscape indices for urban habitability. Earth Sci Inform 10, 457–470 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12145-017-0309-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12145-017-0309-3

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