BefahrGut

The project „BefahrGut“ aims at a sustainable forest management, through predictions of susceptibility of forest soils to machine traffic. It is intended to create cartographic maps, which provide actual and accurate risk assessments. Such maps can support day-to-day forest operations by guiding machine operators, and supporting the planning of forestry managers. In fact, sensor networks were installed on two sites near Arnsberg, NRW, to continuously capture soil moisture – a vital parameter for soils trafficability. Moreover, we survey the utilization of openly available in-situ measurements, made available by weather agencies, weather forecast and satellite data. Different modelling approaches are applied to simulate changing conditions of trafficability, resulting raster predictions are validated by terramechanical test procedures and actual machine traffic.