International Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics

Volume 116 No. 14 2017, 1-7

ISSN: 1311-8080 (printed version); ISSN: 1314-3395 (on-line version)
url: http://www.ijpam.eu
Special Issue
ijpam.eu

APPLICATIONS OF GIS AND GPS IN CIVIL ENGINEERING

1
S. Venkatraman, K.Anitha2
Assistant Professor 1 2, Department of Civil Engineering, BIST,
BIHER, Bharath University, Chennai.
1
venkatraman.civil@bharathuniv.ac.in

Abstract: GIS and GPS have many applications in the
field of Civil Engineering. In this paper, the applications
that we come across using GIS and GPS are discussed.
Surveying is a vital part of infrastructure development,
from building roads and communication systems to
establishing transportation networks and pipelines. GIS
and GPS provide the surveyor with accurate data in
positioning and mapping. For a construction project to be
successful, many factors including environmental impact,
scheduling conflicts, site safety, budgeting etc; should be
considered. GIS software greatly enhances the optimum
use of land, the functional efficiency of a proposed
design, its marketability etc; GIS is a powerful tool in
management of spatial information and also provides its
potential in forest fire management. There are different
applications of GIS in forest fire management out of
which the most important ones are Hazard mapping,
forest fire simulation and resource management.
Tsunamis are a threat to life and property to any one
living near the ocean front. GIS proves to be an effective
tool for this assessment. The base map of the place before
and after tsunami is obtained. The primary advantage of
using GIS as a data base for transportation data is the fact
that GIS can integrate the spatial data and display the
attribute data in a user-chosen format. It is very helpful in
tracking vehicles and finding easier routes for traveling.
There are various hazards such as nuclear disaster,
chemical disaster, etc., for which a web based application
tool, provides a web-based evacuation preparedness for
citizens living close to nuclear power plant, within mile
radius.
1. Introduction
The Global Positioning System (GPS) is a satellite-based
navigation system made up of a network of 24 satellites
placed into orbit by various countries. GPS was
originally intended for military applications, but in the
1980’s, the governments made the system available for
civilian use. GPS works in any weather conditions,
anywhere in the world, 24 hours a day. There are no
subscription fees or setup charges to use GPS[1-4].
GPS satellites circle the earth twice a day in a very
precise orbit and transmit signal information to earth.
GPS receivers take this information and use triangulation
to calculate the user's exact location. Essentially, the GPS
receiver compares the time a signal was transmitted by a
satellite with the time it was received. The time
difference tells the GPS receiver how far away the
satellite is. Now, with distance measurements from a few
more satellites, the receiver can determine the user's
position and display it on the unit's electronic map. The
24 satellites that make up the GPS space segment are
orbiting the earth about 12,000 miles above us. They are
constantly moving, making two complete orbits in less
than 24 hours. These satellites are traveling at speeds of
roughly 7,000 miles an hour[5-7].
1.1 Geographic Information System
A Geographic Information System, or GIS, integrates
data, hardware, software and GPS to assist in the analysis
and display of geographically referenced information.
Geographical information system is a data processing
system that is capable of gathering, analyzing and
providing geographic information. GIS systems are used
to create maps or display the results of queries for the
location of objects or systems. For example, GIS is
helping researchers measure the speed of glacier melting
in Greenland and Antarctica. GIS can assist in the
analysis of small-scale and localized data, as well, such
as development trends, or watershed analysis [8-10].

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 International Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics
1.2 Application of Gis And Gps
Various applications of GIS and GPS are mentioned
below:
1.3 Surveying
GPS is a positioning technology that has revolutionized
the surveying industry by providing the surveyor accurate
and timely positioning data. For some geomatics
practitioners, the advent of anew technology causes
wholehearted adoption for all surveying functions. This
process begins with a reminder that GPS is only one tool
within the surveyor’s toolbox. A discussion of how to
make sure it is being applied correctly to the task at hand
will be presented. This will cover GPS and other
measurement technologies such as robotic total stations
and digital levels. Suggestions will be given on how to
analyze the surveying project to determine how these
combined technologies can be applied most effectively to
meet your total surveying requirements. Surveying is a
vital part of infrastructure development, from building
roads and communication systems to establishing
transportation networks and pipelines. A centralized
information system based on GIS software provides the
framework for maintaining and deploying critical data
and applications across every aspect of an infrastructure
project, including data collection, planning, construction,
and GPS, especially RTK GPS is a widely accepted
technology for achieving all aspects of the surveying
function. It has been shown to achieve productivity gains
over optical total station from 50% to over 1000%. Being
able to use it in all kinds of weather and at night helps to
increase the progression of the work, especially in
projects where work continues into two or three shifts. Its
ability to not be limited by line of sight, and to work over
a 20 km range from the reference station increases speed
and accuracy. Since data collection is initiated at the
antenna pole, which is located at the point of interest,
quality of the data collected is greatly improved and the
occurrence of blunders is reduced. Keeping in mind that
GPS use will be restricted under some circumstances; the
surveyor needs to have an alternative system to reliably
make a measurement GIS gives a single data source from
which to work. It helps combat data communications ●
errors, eliminating the need for multiple flat files in ●
disparate systems. Centrally hosting applications and data
makes it easy to manage, organize, and integrate
geographic data, including CAD data, from existing
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databases to visualize, analyze, and make decisions[11-
12].
2. Construction
For a construction project to be successful, we must
analyze many factors including environmental impact,
scheduling conflicts, takeoffs, budgeting, site safety, and
logistics Land development involves several areas to
consider including site geometrics, roadways, drainage
systems, utilities, property boundaries, and building sites.
GIS software gives you the tools to capture and create
new data with advanced mobile capabilities that vastly
improve field data collection, inventories, and integration
with GPS measurements. With GIS, this data can be
stored in a central location, giving you the ability to
quickly and easily make any necessary changes[13].
2.1 Land Analysis
GIS software greatly enhances the optimum use of land,
the functional efficiency of a proposed design, its
marketability, and the overall cost-effectiveness of a
project. GIS can be used for terrain, hydrologic, land-use
suitability, and visibility analyses. It can also be used to
assess environmental impacts for determining the
consequences of various regulatory requirements.
2.2 Data Collection
GIS software adds intelligence to spatial data, whether
the data is generated in the field with GPS or remote
sensing data and photogrammetry. We can enter raw
data, measurements, and field sketches directly into the
GIS, enabling us to efficiently manage data in a
geodatabase with other spatial information. GIS
technology is used for collecting, importing, converting,
and storing spatial measurement and computational
fabrics. We can integrate computations such as traverse
least squares, and pre-existing networks as well as import
spatial data feature classes and relationships[14].
2.3 Environmental Applications
2.3.1 Forest fire
Nowadays application of Geographical Information
Systems (GIS) in disaster management has extended
considerably and in some cases it is even unavoidable.
Forest Fire is a natural phenomenon. It is part of the
 International Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics
nitrogen cycle and it helps forests to grow healthy.
However, "wildfire" is a huge and out of control fire
which destroys human wealth and therefore, it is kind of
disaster. Forest fire happens from time to time and this
has given human a chance to observe and develop
different models for forest fire behavior. GIS as a
powerful tool for management of spatial information, has
also proved its potential in forest fire management. There
are different applications of GIS in forest fire
management out of which the most important ones are
hazard map production, forest fire simulation and
resource management. Simulation by itself has a main
role in the management of forest fire. GIS uses various
information layers such as Digital Elevation Model
(DEM) and index of flammability along with different
models for the purpose of forest fire management.
Models can be simple or complex. Simple models have
few parameters and can be implemented even without
GIS; however, because of their simplicity their results are
not so reliable. On the other hand, very complex models
which use detailed physical characteristics of fire are not
reliable either as there is not either enough or up to date
information on their parameters. So finding an optimum
model that takes advantage of sufficient number of
parameters while has an acceptable level of simplicity is
very important.
The very first strategy to defend the forests against
wildfire is to avoid it. So fire risk maps are produced and
even prescribed burning is done. Nevertheless, wildfire
happens and the only choice in this case is to control it.
Knowing the fire behavior, one can use forest fire
simulation to predict and control the wildfire. Velocity of
the wind plays a more serious role in fire spread, if its
direction matches with the aspect. A grid-based Digital
Terrain Model (DTM) is used to extract slope and aspect
of the terrain. Also raster maps showing the index of
flammability, velocity and direction of the wind are used.
All of these information are put in a Geographical
Information System (GIS) to simulate and visualize the
wildfire spread. It is shown that GIS is a very efficient
tool to predict and control the wildfire
2.3.2 Waste Water Management
Infrastructure is a Latin word meaning "the structure
underneath." The water, storm water, and wastewater
infrastructure is aging fast throughout the world.
American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) projects
$1.3 trillion in infrastructure needs in USA over the next
five years alone, of which approximately one third is
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needed for water and wastewater improvements.
Unfortunately, adequate federal funds are not available
for the massive fix. This problem can be partially blamed
on the "out of sight - out of mind" mentality of the some
decision makers. The lack of funding for the badly
needed infrastructure improvements is making the people
worried. This is being reflected in the recently conducted
public opinion polls. According to a recent survey, 31%
of Americans would rather swim in their toilet bowls
than the nearest river. A 1998 ASCE poll showed that
more than 75% of the United States voters were
concerned about the quality of roads, drinking water and
school buildings. In Boston, more voters were concerned
about roads, bridges and drinking water than Social
Security and taxes. In New York City, school buildings
and drinking water concerns out scored drug abuse
worries (ASCE, 1998). Many indicated that they will
vote for a candidate whose election campaign addresses
waste disposal (78%), drinking water (73%), and roads
and bridges (62%). These surveys indicate that water-
related infrastructure is particularly important because it
is so closely related to public health and safety.
Municipal wastewater collection systems comprise
of separate storm sewers, separate sanitary sewers, and
combined sewers that carry both the storm water and the
sanitary sewage. Wastewater systems are an important
part of the water related infrastructure. Over the past two
decades, local, regional, and national-scale research
programs have shown that pollutants discharged from
municipal separate storm systems are among the
principal causes of water quality problems in most urban
areas (Murillo, et. al, 1996). Improper storm water
systems can impact the operation of both the drinking
water and wastewater systems. Drinking water can be
impaired due to pollution of surface water supply sources
from polluted storm water outfall discharges. Wastewater
collection and treatment can be impacted by unwanted
inflow of storm water into the sanitary sewer systems.
The integration of digital mapping and database
capabilities is what sets GIS apart from other information
systems. In the past decade, powerful personal computers
and sophisticated software have combined to bring the
GIS capability to any desktop.
The Global Positioning System (GPS) technology
offers a promising solution to placing current data on
maps. A GPS represents a space-age revolution in GIS
data collection. GPS systems utilize a constellation of
satellites orbiting the earth twice daily transmitting
precise time and position signals. GPS receivers read
signals from orbiting satellites to calculate the exact spot
 International Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics
of the receiver on earth. The new line of GPS receivers
brings technology to wastewater system operators and
managers who can populate maps with precise location of
features such as manhole covers, catch basins, overflow
points, valves, pumps, flow meters, and rain gages.
The GPS/GIS applications that are of particular
importance to wastewater system managers are:
Mapping, Monitoring, Modeling, and Maintenance.
These four Ms define the four most important activities
which can be conducted efficiently using GIS/GPS
systems. GPS provides the following applications for
wastewater management
● Increase the accuracy of existing sewer system maps
by verifying and correcting locations of the sewer
system components. GPS data collection is no longer
limited to collecting coordinates of point features.
Now one can bike along a channel to map line
features or walk around a detention pond to map
polygon features.
● Create new sewer system maps if they do not exist. ●
● Collect sewer system attributes for populating the
GIS database.
In the past, people used traditional geodetic
surveying to locate and map sewer system components.
A transit survey requires traversing between a known
point to point of interest which may take half to one day
per point. GPS has been found to be up to 50% faster
than the traditional methods (Anderson, 1998). GPS
survey takes one hour to five seconds per point. For
example, up to 300 points can be surveyed in one day
using a GPS survey. A two-man crew with bicycle
mounted equipment can survey up to 500 points per day.
3. Integrated Transportation System
Transportation data is usually associated with spatial
data, like traffic counts from particular sites, the traffic
volumes along particular roads or links, etc. (Taylor et al,
2000). Geographical Information System (GIS) can be
used as a database for storing transportation data. The
primary advantage of using GIS as a database for
transportation data is the fact that GIS can integrate the
spatial data and display the attribute data in a user-chosen
format. The chief sources of spatial data are the existing
digitized files (e.g.: Topologically Integrated Geographic
Encoding and Referencing (TIGER) files in the US). The
Global Positioning System (GPS) is widely being used as
a tool for collecting the spatial data. Systems which
chiefly use GPS as a spatial data source for a GIS are
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called as GPS-GIS integrated systems. The use of GPS-
GIS integrated systems in transportation engineering are
described below.
Transportation data is usually associated with traffic
counts from particular sites, the traffic volumes along
particular roads or links, etc. Geographical Information
System (GIS) can be used as a database for storing
transportation data. The primary advantage of using GIS
as a database for transportation data is the fact that GIS
can integrate the spatial data and display the attribute
data in a user-chosen format. The chief sources of spatial
data are the existing digitized files (e.g.: Topologically
Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing
(TIGER) files). Systems which chiefly use GPS as a
spatial data source for a GIS are called as GPS-GIS
integrated systems.
4. Disaster Management
4.1 Natural disaster – Tsunami
Tsunamis are a threat to life and property to anyone
living near the oceanfront. The most affected are those
living along coastal areas whose livelihood entirely
depends on fishing. Many rehabilitation organizations
(relief agencies) have played their role well and even
now they are continuing their activities in slowly
improving the socio-economic condition of the affected
sector
An area along the Cuddalore coast for assessing the
pre- and post- tsunami conditions with respect to socio-
economical conditions of the affected population has
been studied. GIS proves to be an effective tool for this
assessment. The base maps of the place before and after
tsunami are obtained. The demographic information of
the area is obtained from the DHAN foundation. These
are incorporated using GIS. The present status of the
socio-economic condition of fishermen is studied. The
relative distribution of the effect of the input efforts
(shelter, health, education, alternate livelihoods etc.) are
found and analyzed for corrective administrative
decision.
4.2 Man Made disaster
4.2.1 Nuclear Disaster
Although construction and operation of nuclear power
plants are closely monitored and regulated by the nuclear
regulatory authorities, accidents, though unlikely, are
 International Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics
possible. The most immediate danger from an accident at
a nuclear power plant is the exposure to high level
radiation. Emergencies declared for nuclear power plant
are defined in terms of notification of unusual event,
alert, site area emergency and general emergency.
Notification of unusual event means a problem has
occurred at the plant, but no radiation leak is expected.
Alert means that small amounts of radiation could leak
inside the plant, but it will not affect the community. Site
area emergency describes a more serious problem. Small
amounts of radiation could leak from the plant. Area
sirens may sound. Citizens are requested to listen to
radio or television for instructions and be prepared to
evacuate or find shelter. For addressing the above issues
an emergency preparedness plan for nuclear power plant
is developed using the recent scientific web enabled GIS
technology.
The Nuclear Planner, a web GIS based application
tool, provides a web-based evacuation preparedness for
citizens living close to nuclear power plant, within the 10
mile radius. This is an important tool for strengthening
relations with the community by reaching out to citizens
with updated information and proactive planning tools.
This delivers personalized response information to
identify appropriate evacuation routes and response
measures. Citizens living in risk area can identify their
emergency reception centers, driving directions, and
emergency exits. The system can also be integrated with
weather, demographic data and real-time highway
database and could help planners to evacuate peoples
during the crucial time of natural disasters. Its major
components includes end to end web-based solution,
feature query, proximity analysis, emergency response
plan module, evacuation routing module for public
emergency, property query module, theme add in and
on/off module, buffer analysis etc.
4.2.2 Chemical Disaster
Hazardous material is chemical substances, which if
released or misused, can pose threat to the environment.
These chemicals are used in industry, agriculture,
medicine, research, and consumer goods. As many as 5,
00,000 products pose physical or health hazards and can
be defined as “hazardous chemicals. Each year, over
1,000 new synthetic chemicals are introduced.
Hazardous materials come in the form of explosives,
flammable and combustible substances, poisons, and
radioactive materials. These substances are most often
released as a result of transportation accidents or because
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of chemical accidents in manufacturing plants. The main
use of GIS application here is that it helps in evacuating
people from the affected areas.
5. Conclusion
In this paper, some of the applications of GIS and GPS in
Civil Engineering were discussed.In Surveying, it helps
in preventing data communication errors, eliminating the
need for multiple flat files in desperate systems. In
Construction, using GIS, all the data can be stored in a
central location and it gives us the ability to make any
necessary changes quickly and easily. In the field of
Environmental Affairs like forest fire, one can use the
forest fire simulation to predict and control the wildfire.
Similarly in the case of Tsunami, GIS is used for
overlaying of satellite images incorporating natural
resource data for effective analysis. With the help of
GPS, accuracy of existing sewer system maps can be
increased. Suitable areas for sewage disposals can be
found and this prevents the contamination of fresh water,
thereby providing health and safety for the environment.
In Integrated Transportation, GIS-GPS plays a vital role
in tracking out vehicles. It also helps in providing easier
routes. In case of a Disaster, the most appropriate
emergency response personnel such as rescue, fire,
police, ambulance personnel to allow much quicker and
more accurate response efforts and further reduce disaster
impacts.
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