Landsat Remote Sensing Application to Urban Waterfront Classification Comparing Thematic Mapper and Multispectral Scanner

The use of satellite data for the analysis of coastal and nearshore marine application in general, and urban waterfront land in particular, has been very limited due in most part to the lack of sufficient surface resolution. This project uses the new Landsat sensor the Thematic Mapper whose surface resolution is 30 meters, and also records three new bands of electromagnetic radiation. For the same area of coverage of Newport, RI, the TM classification identified twenty-one classes including both land and nearshore features and Multispectral Scanner classification identified eight classes. Use of the Thematic Mapper for urban waterfront classification shows significant improvement over the Multispectral Scanner.