Cadastral Systems
The guest editors of this special issue on Cadastral Systems' of Computers Environment and Urban Systems (CEUS) have been working on the re-engineering of cadastral systems in the Netherlands for several years. Driven by this involvement, and also because of personal interest, the guest editors became aware of a lack' in scientiยฎc publications on cadastral developments in the international peer-reviewed journals, especially in recent years. This is in remarkable contrast with the substantial eorts related to development and implementation of cadastral systems, which can be observed worldwide. For this reason a call for papers for a special issue of CEUS on this subject was made in the fall of 1999. The theme of this special issue includes the management and maintenance of both spatial data and land registration, as well as their integration, often referred to as land administration (covering the geometric and descriptive aspects). This resulted in 25 submissions of papers and a major review undertaking, where every paper was reviewed by three experts on the subject of cadastral systems.
In several countries cadastral systems have a long history and a broad range of use in taxation, land registration, land development, urban planning and design of infrastructure. In these countries we can see a complete re-engineering of existing systems, due to a more business-oriented approach, based on the requirements of the users of cadastral information. Recent technical developments in surveying instruments, databases, Internet and GIS technologies are related to and encapsulated in those re-engineered systems. In many countries without a traditional cadastre, developments have begun to establish a cadastral system. Often, these activities are strongly supported by international organisations such as the World Bank, the United Nations (Habitat), the European Union, and also by national governments. In these countries initial data collection, spatial and legal considerations, and the system implementations are in the focus of interest. Topics listed in the call for papers for the special issue on Cadastral Systems include.