A geological model for the management of subsurface data in the urban environment of Barcelona and surrounding area

Abstract

Abstract. The overdevelopment of cities since the industrial revolution has shown the need to incorporate a sound geological knowledge in the management of required subsurface infrastructures and in the assessment of increasingly needed groundwater resources. Additionally, the scarcity of outcrops and the technical difficulty to conduct underground exploration in urban areas highlights the importance of implementing efficient management plans that deal with the legacy of heterogeneous subsurface information. To deal with these difficulties, a methodology has been proposed to integrate all the available spatio-temporal data into a comprehensive spatial database and a set of tools that facilitates the analysis and processing of the existing and newly added data for the city of Barcelona (NE Spain). Here we present the resulting actual subsurface 3-D geological model that incorporates and articulates all the information stored in the database. The methodology applied to Barcelona benefited from a good collaboration between administrative bodies and researchers that enabled the realization of a comprehensive geological database despite logistic difficulties. Currently, the public administration and also private sectors both benefit from the geological understanding acquired in the city of Barcelona, for example, when preparing the hydrogeological models used in groundwater assessment plans. The methodology further facilitates the continuous incorporation of new data in the implementation and sustainable management of urban groundwater, and also contributes to significantly reducing the costs of new infrastructures.

D-InSAR monitoring of ground deformation related to the dewatering of construction sites. A case study of Glòries Square, Barcelona

“…Two main fault families oriented northwest-southeast and southwest-northeast divide and compartmentalise these formations; between them, the northwest-southeast faults are more important. For a more detailed geological description, see Vàzquez-Suñé et al, 2016. Glòries Square immediately overlies two important (hydro)geological features (Fig. 2): the boundary between the Besòs River delta and the Quaternary colluvial units; and a major northwest-southeasttrending fault truncating the underlying Pliocene strata, which also represents a change in the lithology from marls in the southwest to sandstones in the northeast.…”

“…In the analysis of the results, other data were used: geological data, hydraulic parameters of the terrain, piezometric data and levelling measurements. Velasco et al, 2012 andVàzquez-Suñé et al, 2016 performed a local revision of the geology and built a numerical hydrogeological model of the Besòs River delta and its surroundings. From this information, from data obtained through new boreholes drilled for the works in Glòries Square, and from pumping tests on some of the drainage wells, a refined local hydrogeological model was established (IDAEA-CSIC, 2015; IDAEA-CSIC, 2016).…”

Geology for society in 2058: some down-to-earth perspectives

“…More than two generations ago John T. Marker 2009;Vãzquez-Suñé et al, 2016;Gogu et al 2017). In addition to their traditional maps of the bedrock and surficial deposits, groundwater and building stones, many…”

A 3D Geodatabase for Urban Underground Infrastructures: Implementation and Application to Groundwater Management in Milan Metropolitan Area

“…The implementation of a geodatabase (GDB), including 3D locations and uses of the underground structures, could help to manage this issue [22]. In this way, part of the large amount of data generally available in urban areas [33], but not stored in a systematic way [34], could be gathered in a unique structure. The GDB will contribute to process data to be used for groundwater management, thus enabling the definition of an urban conceptual model, a necessary step for 3D numerical groundwater flow modelling.…”

“…The city of Milan experienced a strong groundwater table rise in the last few decades [40]. As numerical groundwater flow modelling is the primary tool for evaluating the interactions between groundwater and underground infrastructures [34], different 3D models have been realized for the urban area of Milan [41][42][43]. Among the underground infrastructures listed above, all these numerical models focused only on the subway lines: interactions between groundwater and car parks were not evaluated.…”