Environmental problems of the development of transport in the transboundary region as exemplified by the Baikal basin and its cartographic study

Geoinformation support in the form of large cartographic atlases of complex content is intended to decide the issue of the Baikal region development, as the Lake Baikal catchment basin has a special nature management regime. Therefore transport maps among other industry maps are important for the analysis of regional development of the region. The compilation of transport maps requires presentation of all objects, processes, phenomena and interactions of the transport complex. In order to streamline the structure of thematic layer formation and the system of cartographic signs for displaying transport, a semantic classification of cartographic signs of transport systems was developed. Initially, we analyzed a large number of maps from various geographic atlases of various territorial levels. Then we generated a semantic database of transport maps. The developed classification streamlined the structure of the thematic layers of transport maps and, generally, the system of cartographic signs for transport layer. In the event of compiling a map of transport impact on the environment, we selected several semantic parameters that characterize the transport complex and individual indicators of transport impact on the environment. Consequently we created a map of transport impact on the environment in the Baikal basin. Then we analyzed the transport impact within the Lake Baikal catchment area on the basis of the created maps, as well as other literature and statistical sources. This analysis enabled conclusion about the fact that the greatest pollution of the Lake Baikal catchment area comes from automobile and water transport.