An information system for masonry building monitoring

Abstract

The large-scale management and monitoring of ancient buildings, in particular of churches, is a complex issue for the heritage buildings holders. The scientific and technical communities study new methods to improve these operations through Information and Communication Technology tools. This paper proposes the first steps of an innovative methodological approach to develop an information system that allows the monitoring of many masonry churches using limited resources. The information system consists of a computer platform (named Quality Detection Platform — QDP) and a mobile device application dedicated to the acquisition of large-scale data through Internet of Things (IoT) support. This tool allows recording and reporting structural problems through photographic surveys and additional information provided by the smart devices positioned on the structure: a set of Bluetooth Smart sensors positioned on specific building components. The data collected are processed by the QDP that studies and classifies the critical issues. In order to assess the proposed methodology, the case study of the church “SS. Salvatore” in Bari (Italy) is developed.