scholarly journals How can Automatic Identification System (AIS) data be used for maritime spatial planning?

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthieu Le Tixerant ◽  
Damien Le Guyader ◽  
Françoise Gourmelon ◽  
Betty Queffelec

Although the importance of Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) as a concept is know acknowledged and the legal framework is in place, the task of applying it remains a delicate one. One of the keys to success is having pertinent data. Knowing how maritime uses unfold in a spatio-temporal context, and what conflicting or synergistic interactions exist between activities, is crucial. However, this information is especially hard to obtain in a marine environment. As a result this information has often been identified as the missing layer in information systems developed by maritime stakeholders. Since 2002, the Automatic Identification System (AIS) has been undergoing a major development. Allowing for real time geo-tracking and identification for equipped vessels, the data that issues from AIS data promises to map and describe certain marine human activities.After recapitulating the main characteristics of AIS and the data it provides, this article proposes to evaluate how AIS is currently used in MSP at a European level, and to concisely present a series of methods and results obtained within the framework of several operational research projects. The objective is to illustrate how the AIS data processing and analysis can produce adequate information for MSP: maritime traffic density, shipping lanes and navigation flows, hierarchical network of maritime routes, alleged fishing zones, spatio-temporal interactions between activities (potential conflicting uses or synergies). The conclusion looks in particular at the legal questions concerning the use of AIS.

2017 ◽  
Vol 30 ◽  
pp. 39 ◽  
Author(s):  
Damien Le Guyader ◽  
Cyril Ray ◽  
Françoise Gourmelon ◽  
David Brosset

High resolution estimates of bottom towed fishing gears are needed to provide relevant information for natural resource management, impact assessment and maritime spatial planning. The use of satellite-based vessel monitoring system (VMS) data is constrained by data access restrictions as well as rather coarse data resolution. This study focuses on mapping dredge gear fishing grounds using fishing effort estimates at the métier level based on automatic identification system (AIS) data. The performance of the approach was evaluated in terms of correct discrimination between fishing and non-fishing activities for known fishing positions as well as appropriate error propagation. The test was conducted in the Bay of Brest (France) in partnership with a committee of local fishers. The results identified dredge fishing grounds for great scallop (Pecten maximus) in the western part of the Bay of Brest and provided high-resolution information for scientists and local decision makers on the spatial and temporal seasonal variability of fishing effort. The proposed method is semi-automatic and generic making it suitable for other applications.


2017 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 310 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. PETZA ◽  
I. MAINA ◽  
N. KOUKOUROUVLI ◽  
D. DIMARCHOPOULOU ◽  
D. AKRIVOS ◽  
...  

An up-to-date systematic review and unofficial codification of the national fisheries legislation was performed, along with an up-to-date systematic review of environmental, archaeological and maritime legislation, about spatio-temporal restrictions of fishing activities by all fishing gears in the Aegean Sea. Spatio-temporal restrictions established by the European Union and the General Fisheries Commission for the Mediterranean were also reviewed. A database was built, including detailed information on the Fisheries Restricted Areas (FRAs) being identified. All FRAs were mapped, as polygons in Geographic Information System shapefiles. The national fisheries, environmental, archeological and maritime legal framework comprises of 32, 2, 37 and 43 legal acts respectively; EU and GFCM legislation consists of one Regulation and one Recommendation respectively. A total of 511 national (254 of fisheries, 21 of environmental, 85 of archaeological and 151 of the maritime legislation), 6 EU and 4 international FRAs were identified, out of which 85.2% are located in the Aegean Sea and 14.8% in Crete. Towed or mobile gears are restricted in 88.5% of the FRAs, while static gears are restricted in only 10.2% of FRAs. Fish stocks and Posidonia oceanica beds protection are the most common reasons for regulating fishing activities (25.3% and 25.0% respectively). Most of the FRAs (85.4%) impose permanent closures. National fisheries, environmental, archaeological, maritime, EU and international FRAs cover 25.8%, 1.0%, 1.1%, 0.4%, 13.5% and 22.6% of the study area, respectively. The present study provides valuable information for the Maritime Spatial Planning in the Aegean Sea.


2016 ◽  
Vol 70 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-81 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lin Wu ◽  
Yongjun Xu ◽  
Qi Wang ◽  
Fei Wang ◽  
Zhiwei Xu

Mapping global shipping density, including vessel density and traffic density, is important to reveal the distribution of ships and traffic. The Automatic Identification System (AIS) is an automatic reporting system widely installed on ships initially for collision avoidance by reporting their kinematic and identity information continuously. An algorithm was created to account for errors in the data when ship tracks seem to ‘jump’ large distances, an artefact resulting from the use of duplicate identities. The shipping density maps, including the vessel and traffic density maps, as well as AIS receiving frequency maps, were derived based on around 20 billion distinct records during the period from August 2012 to April 2015. Map outputs were created in three different spatial resolutions: 1° latitude by 1° longitude, 10 minutes latitude by 10 minutes longitude, and 1 minute latitude by 1 minute longitude. The results show that it takes only 56 hours to process these records to derive the density maps, 1·7 hours per month on average, including data retrieval, computation and updating of the database.


Author(s):  
Febus Reidj G. Cruz ◽  
Jeremiah A. Ordiales ◽  
Malvin Angelo C. Reyes ◽  
Pinky T. Salvanera

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