Evaluation of temporal changes of the landscape of Kolchicos basin of lake Koronia with the use of Geographical Information Systems (GIS)

Semi-mountainous landscapes of Greece have been significantly changed over the last 50 years. These changes have the form of structural and diversity modification of land cover/use patterns. The area of Kolchicos basin, north of Lake Koronia, was chosen as a study area. The landscape of the study area supports several agricultural and pastoral activities and represents a typical semimountainous landscape of Greece. Demographic and socioeconomic changes as long as the changes in the traditional management practices modify the landscape of the study area. The general trend of landscape change together with the temporal transformation of the landscape were evaluated by the mean of Geographical Information Systems and the digital process of two sets of Aerial photographs (1960 and 1993). Digital processing of the aerial photographs resulted in the creation of a diagram of temporal transformation of the landscape. Demographic and socioeconomic inventory data was collected from diachronic census reports of the National Statistical Service of Greece and were correlated with the results derived from the diagrammatic model.