Accuracy Assessment of the Building Height Copernicus Data Layer: A Case Study of Bratislava, Slovakia

Abstract

High buildings have generally changed the morphology of cities in recent decades, and they have a significant impact on multiple processes in the urban area. Building height is one of the criteria for urban land cover classification in local climate zone delineation and urban heat island modeling. The European Union’s Earth observation program Copernicus aims to achieve a global, continuous, autonomous, high-quality, wide-range Earth observation capacity. One of the most recent Urban Atlas layers is the Building Height 2012 (BH2012) layer released in 2018, which consists of a 10 m resolution raster layer containing height information generated for core urban areas of the capitals of the EEA38 countries and the United Kingdom. This contribution aims to present the accuracy validation of the BH2012 data in Bratislava using the Slovak Basic Database for the Geographic Information System (ZBGIS). To compare the two datasets, four different tests were performed for the following group of landmark buildings: (i) with area > 100 m2, (ii) in Urban Atlas classes with soil sealing > 10%, (iii) with height > 50 m, (iv) with area > 1 ha. The results demonstrate the effect of the building’s area and compactness on the vertical accuracy of the BH2012 Copernicus data. The greater the building’s area and compactness, the smaller the difference between its height value in BH2012 and ZBGIS. The Urban Atlas class 11100 Continuous Urban Fabric (soil sealing: >80%) recorded the lowest vertical accuracy. The BH2012 database provides sufficiently accurate data for primary planning analyses of public administration bodies and various stakeholders who need to obtain information on the nature of a locality for development activities and small-scale environmental analyses. However, for detailed studies focusing on the quality of life in cities at the local level, more precise identification of the building height is recommended.