SoilEye: An Interactive Web App Prototype for Soil Sealing Monitoring

Climate change problems are intensifying rapidly, making it essential to monitor environmental and geospatial issues in real time. With the advent of cloud computing, researchers and experts can develop more sustainable solutions in a shorter timeframe. In the geospatial field, the introduction of Google Earth Engine has been a game changer. As a powerful cloud computing platform, Google Earth Engine enables large-scale geospatial analysis by leveraging extensive public data and open-source geospatial datasets. One of the most impactful features introduced by such a tool is creating a web-based application, known as Google Earth Engine Apps. These Apps allow users to visualize, modify, share, and interact with their analysis, results, and outputs in real time. This paper focuses on the creation of “SoilEye”, an innovative Google Earth Engine App designed to observe soil sealing patterns over the metropolitan area of Bari. It provides a detailed, step-by-step methodology for developing the app, highlighting its potential and functionality. This app tracks land use changes over approximately six years, from 2018 to 2024, by combining satellite images collected by the Sentinel 2 mission with other geospatial data. It identifies places that have been impacted by soil sealing and evaluates its trend over time. As a result, this App will serve as a valuable tool for policymakers, offering an interactive platform to monitor soil sealing dynamics continuously. This will aid the sustainable urban environment management and help planners make more informed decisions.