Developing rehabilitation design for the abandoned mine excavations in Central Sardinia, Italy.

In central Sardinia, several talc-chlorite-feldspar bodies have long been mined by open-pit operations. The mining activity has deeply modified the original landscape of the Lasasai-Bonucoro area in the district of Orani. Thus, the rehabilitation of this area, in particular the open-pit works that are now occupied by pools filled with ground water from aquifers, should be considered as an overall project of landscape restoration. Particular conditions, such as the constant outflow of good-quality water and the scenic nature of the surrounding countryside, are favourable to the accomplishment of the recovery plan. On the basis of the naturalistic and geographical contexts of the mining area and its surroundings, a few proposals concerning the re-utilisation of these excavations are presented in this article. The preparatory work included the characterisation of the study area with a topographic survey, the establishment of a geodetic control network with global positioning system to describe the morphologic features of the landscape and the representation of the study area using three dimensional analysis and geoprocessing by commercial geographical information system GIS/CAD software. The final step involved the use of a digital scenery generator, capable of integrating graphical data layers with geological and morphological maps, to create virtual 3D environments thereby giving a rendering of a present, past and future landscape development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]