Spatial Data Science for Forest Mobility and Accessibility
A Special Issue of Forests (ISSN 1999-4907) belonging to the section "Forest Operations and Engineering".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 September 2026 | Viewed by 293
Editors
Interests: terrain trafficability analysis; geostatistics; machine learning in military GIS applications
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Spatial data science is reshaping how we understand and optimize movement within forest environments. Forest mobility and accessibility—whether for timber extraction, emergency response, military operations, recreation, or autonomous systems—depend on accurate knowledge of terrain conditions, vegetation structure, and natural or human-made obstacles. Advances in geospatial technologies, including RGB and multispectral imagery, LiDAR, GNSS, UAVs, and inertial navigation systems, now enable detailed characterization of forest stands, microrelief, and route networks with high precision.
This Special Issue, Spatial Data Science for Forest Mobility and Accessibility, welcomes contributions that use these technologies to advance mobility modeling, accessibility assessment, and decision-support in complex forest landscapes. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Modeling movement and routing in forest stands.
- Remote sensing-based mobility assessment.
- Modeling terrain trafficability in forested areas.
- Maneuverability modeling around trees and natural obstacles.
- Influence of microrelief on mobility.
- Impacts of heavy vehicles on soils, roots, and forest health.
- GNSS and multisensor navigation under canopy.
- Autonomous and robotic systems for forest mobility.
- Meteorological influences on mobility and accessibility.
By integrating spatial analytics, remote sensing, and mobility modeling, this Special Issue seeks to advance scientific understanding and practical strategies for safe, efficient, and sustainable movement in forested terrain.
Dr. Krzysztof Pokonieczny
Guest Editor
Dr. Wojciech Dawid
Guest Editor Assistant
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Forests is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- forest mobility
- accessibility modeling
- spatial data science
- remote sensing
- terrain trafficability
- GNNS navigation
- autonomous systems
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