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3D CITY MODELLING OF ISTANBUL HISTORIC PENINSULA BY COMBINATION OF
AERIAL IMAGES AND TERRESTRIAL LASER SCANNING DATA
S. Buhur a , Th. Kersten b , G. Biiytiksalih 3 , K. Jacobsen c , I. Baz a , S. Dursun 3 , D. Sagir 3
3 Bimtas, Tophanelioglu Cad. ISKI Hizmet Binasi No:62 K.3-4, 34460 Altunizade-Istanbul, Turkey - ibaz@gyte.edu.tr,
gbuyuksalih@yahoo.com, selvidursun@hotmail.com, dileksagir_@hotmail.com
b HafenCity University Hamburg, Department Geomatics, Hebebrandstrasse 1, D-22297 Hamburg, Germany
- thomas.kersten@hcu-hamburg.de
c Leibniz University Hannover, Institute of Photogrammetry and Geoinformation, Nienburger Str. 1, D-30167
Hannover, Germany -jacobsen@ipi.uni-hannover.de
Commission VII, WG 6
KEY WORDS: Aerial, City, Cultural Heritage, Integration, Modelling, Project, TLS, Visualization
ABSTRACT:
There is an increasing demand for 3D city models for many applications and users worldwide. Some of this growth in demand has
been caused by the increase in public availability of open geospatial viewers (e.g. Google Earth, Virtual Earth). Although the
Historic Peninsula of old Istanbul was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1985, no documentation of this important area
has yet been carried out. In 2006 the Istanbul Greater Municipality’s Directory of the Protection of Historical Environment initiated
the “Historical Peninsula project”, which comprises a project area of 1500 ha and approximately 48,000 buildings in crowded and
frequently narrow streets. Therefore, BIMTAS, a company of the Greater Municipality of Istanbul, started the documentation and
modelling of all buildings in the area of the Historic Peninsula by terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) and aerial imagery in the same
year. Although the data acquisition/recording of the project area could be completed within a time slot of 15 months, the 3D
mapping and modelling turned out to be a hugely time-consuming challenge. The entire production environment from data
acquisition to 3D mapping and modelling of the buildings is described in this paper, whereby the focus is emphasized on the latter.
The combination of terrestrial laser scanning data and aerial imagery for deriving new products of 3D city models at different levels
of detail is presented.
1. INTRODUCTION
Several disciplines like urban planning, architecture,
telecommunication, tourism, environmental protection and
many others have an increasing demand for digital 3D city
models, in order to use such complex data for planning,
analyses, visualization and simulation in different applications.
Additionally, the open geospatial viewers (e.g. Google Earth,
Virtual Earth) increase the demand on 3D city models. To
satisfy this increasing demand for such data, the city models
must be acquired quickly, precisely, in detail, and with full
completeness and in an economic manner. The Historic
Peninsula of old Istanbul (Fig. 1) is one of the most important
tourism locations in Turkey and is a challenge for 3D city
modelling due to its complex building and roof structures.
Due to its importance these "Historic Areas of Istanbul" were
added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1985. It is
located on the southern shore of the Golden Horn, which
separates the old city centre from the northern and younger
parts of the European side. The Historic Peninsula ends with the
Theodosian land walls in the west. The peninsula is surrounded
by the Sea of Marmara on the south and the Bosporus on the
east.
A brief introduction into the Historic Peninsula project is given.
The production environment for roof mapping using aerial
imagery, façade mapping with terrestrial laser scanning data
and 3D modelling with the combination of both data is
described.
Figure 1. Istanbul Historic Peninsula
2. THE ISTANBUL HISTORIC PENINSULA PROJECT
The inner city wall area of Istanbul known as Historical
Peninsula consists mostly of archaeological, urban and
