An integrated SAR/GIS approach for investigating urban deformation phenomena: a case study of the city of Naples, Italy

Differential Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (DIFSAR) data have been integrated in a Geographic Information System (GIS) for investigating deformations occurring in urban areas. The proposed approach is based on an extension of the Small Baseline Subset (SBAS) method that allows a proper combination of a large number of DIFSAR data. The obtained deformation measurements are accurately geocoded to achieve an easy merging of DIFSAR products relative to different acquisition geometries and the integration of such products into a GIS. This allows the detection and analysis of displacements of single structures and buildings in the investigated zone. The effectiveness of the approach has been tested on the SAR data acquired by the European Remote Sensing (ERS) satellites relative to the Vomero hill, a district of the city of Naples, Italy.