40 
TEMPORAL GIS FOR ANALYSIS AND VISUALISATION 
OF CULTURAL HERITAGE 
K. Hosse, M. Schilcher 
Institute of Geodesy, GIS and Land Management, Techn. University of Munich, Arcisstr. 21, 80290 Munich, Germany - 
(karin.hosse, schilcher)@bv.tum.de 
KEY WORDS: Temporal GIS, Cultural Heritage, Database Modelling, Spatio-Temporal Analysis, Visualisation 
ABSTRACT: 
Based on the results of a workshop in 2001, a research project for development of a geographical information system (GIS) for 
cultural heritage has been started at the Techn. University of Munich in co-operation with municipalities and other regional 
authorities in a rural and on agriculture and tourism depended region of the free state of Bavaria. In many institutions valuable data 
of the history of the region and the culture landscape and of architectural monuments have been collected and stored. Overlaying and 
combined information in GIS with considerable analysis and visualisation methods can supply an important contribution for the 
sustainable development of the rural area. Thereby temporal survey and analysis of cultural data are playing a special role. As a result 
of the combination of current and historical data valuable hints arise from the procedures in cultural history and can be used for 
future planning. The paper describes aspects of object-oriented temporal data modelling and application in a large-scaled cultural 
heritage geo information system. 
ZUSAMMENFASSUNG: 
Die Technische Universität München beschäftigt sich seit mehreren Jahren auf Initiative eines Workshops mit Gemeinden und 
anderen behördlichen Verwaltungen mit der Entwicklung eines Geoinformationssystems (GIS) für kulturelles Erbe in einem von 
Landwirtschaft und Tourismus geprägten, ländlich strukturierten Gebiet in Bayern. An vielen Stellen werden wertvolle Daten über 
die Geschichte einer Region, über die historisch Kulturlandschaft und Baudenkmäler gesammelt und gespeichert. Die 
Zusammenführung und gemeinsame Auswertung in einem GIS mit umfangreichen Analyse- und Visualisierungsmethoden kann 
einen wichtigen Fachbeitrag zur nachhaltigen Entwicklung ländlicher Gebiete liefern. Eine besondere Bedeutung hat dabei die 
zeitliche Erfassung und Auswertung der Daten. Durch die Kombination der aktuellen mit historischen Situationen ergeben sich 
wertvolle Hinweise über die Veränderungsvorgänge in der kulturellen Geschichte und können in zukünftige Planungen eingebracht 
werden. Das Manuskript beinhaltet Aspekte zur Modellierung objekt-orientierter temporaler Datenmodelle und deren Anwendung in 
einem großmaßstäbigen Geoinformationssystem für kulturelles Erbe. 
1. INTRODUCTION 
For some years the Techn. University of Munich has been 
working to develop a GIS for cultural heritage in co-operation 
with municipalities and other regional authorities. 
The area under investigation is the Achental, a structurally rural 
region of the free state of Bavaria at the north edge of the Alps, 
near the border to Austria, witch depends on agriculture and 
tourism (Figure 1). 
In many public and private institutions valuable data of the 
history of the region, the culture landscape and of architectural 
monuments have been collected and stored. Overlaying and 
combining this information in GIS with wide analysis and 
visualisation methods can supply an important contribution for 
the sustainable development of the rural area. 
Closely working together with the regional authorities for 
preservation of monuments and historic buildings, with the 
district office, with the district office for rural development, 
municipalities and citizens there was made an analysis of 
requirements to the possibilities of using a GIS for historical 
questions about cultural heritage. 
The paper introduces some results of the analysis of 
requirements and some aspects of modelling a temporal GIS for 
cultural heritage using UML (Unified Modelling Language). 
Figure 1. Location of investigated area 
In the following chapters a prototypic realisation of a temporal 
GIS for cultural heritage is shown, in which the object oriented, 
temporal data model has been implemented in an object 
relational database (Oracle 8i) and therefor is combinable with 
available data in a spatial database (ESRI). 
A platform independent software application based on Oracle 
Extensions to JDBC has been developed to query and visualise 
the historically interesting spatial and attribute data. The access 
from the application to the geo-referenced data and ESRI- 
SDE is made by MapObjects (ESRI).