Integration of Remote Sensing and Ground-Based Non-Destructive Methods in Transport Infrastructure Monitoring: Advances, Challenges and Perspectives

High temporal frequency monitoring of transport infrastructures is crucial for implementing effective maintenance prioritisation strategies and prevent major failures. To this extent, ground-based non-destructive testing (NDT) methods have been successfully applied for decades, reaching very high standards of data quality and accuracy. However, routine and systematic campaigns are required over relatively long inspection times for data collection and implementation into reliable infrastructure management systems (IMSs). On the other hand, satellite remote sensing techniques, such as the Multi-Temporal Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (MT-InSAR) method, have proven effective in monitoring ground displacements of transport infrastructures (roads, railways and airfields), with a much higher temporal frequency of investigation and wider inspection catchment areas. Nevertheless, the integration of information from i) satellite remote sensing and ii) ground-based NDT methods is still a subject to be explored in civil engineering. Within this framework, this paper aims to review significant stand-alone applications in these two areas of technology for transport infrastructure monitoring. Furthermore, recent advances, main challenges and future perspectives arising from their integration are discussed. Contents of this paper are organised within the context of an invited keynote talk given at the 2021 IEEE Asia-Pacific Conference on Geoscience, Electronics and Remote Sensing (AGERS – 2021).