GIS MAPPING OF LANGSTONE-HARBOR FOR AN INTEGRATED ECOLOGICAL AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL STUDY

The work discussed in this paper aims to develop a Geographic Informat ion System (GIS) to hold and display environmental and archeological d ata for the analysis of an inter-tidal zone. Langstone Harbour on the south coast of Hampshire, England, forms the study area. The work is b eing carried out with the support of The Royal Society for the Protect ion of Birds (RSPB) and Hampshire County Council. As it was found that existing topographic mapping would not provide a suitable topographic base for such an inter-tidal area, metric aerial photography and anal ytical photogrammetry were employed to create a detailed topographic b ase. The photogrammetric models were fitted within a control network e stablished using a high precision differential Global Positioning Syst em (GPS). Recorded three dimensional coordinates of archaeological fin ds and structures will allow the comparison between environmental and locational contexts of coastal archaeological structures. This will gr eatly enlarge the available archaeological data set, adding value to t he data, as well as assisting the study of sea level change and wider coastal processes. Conversion and integration of other environmental d ata is adding further data layers of the GIS.