Krajobraz doliny Karpnickiego Potoku. Zastosowanie systemów GIS w analizach historycznych krajobrazu

The river and brook valleys of the Sudeten Mountains have played an important role in developing the area. Along the rivers there has formed a characteristic settlement landscape inextricably linked to the hydrographic network. Recent years have seen further transformations of the riverine areas, which has led to the disappearance of many historical landscape components. This raises questions about the nature of the present changes. The article is an attempt to present the dynamism of transformations of the Karpnicki Brook Valley landscape. A comparison of conditions from 1938,1994 and 2004, has enabled the authors to determine the landscape development trends and to establish goals for the protection of the historical architectural-and-landscape composition. The analysis has been conducted using aerial photographs as the source material; thanks to this, it has been possible to obtain a comprehensive picture of changes to spatial relationships. The photos were used to make digital orthophotos, which then constituted the basis for developing maps in GIS. The maps made it possible to compare the condition of the landscape at various points in time.