Possibilities of optimal land use as a consequence of lessons learned from land consolidation projects (Slovakia)

•A support system for land consolidations to aid in design, control, management.•Methodical procedures for designing functional organization of an area.•A multi-layered approach to optimal land use while preventing (local) problems.•“Players” can combine registers and apply criteria to obtain a “view” as needed.•An overview of fundamentals behind Slovak approach towards land consolidation.

This paper acquaints readers with outputs produced from thematic maps and analytical testing in a land consolidation project which is being conducted in Slovakia at the Žitava River basin (1.628-square-kilometres total watershed). New options and strategies are presented for the use of a land consolidation database for projects in any planning, optimizing and development activity to be performed by any expert who enters the model area with her/his own opinions. We highlight problems currently limiting rural development (the area's low ecological stability, frequent floods, ever greater soil erosion, etc.) and also describe measures which could protect the area against natural disasters (e.g. ongoing water erosion, silt accumulating and choking streams and water expanses). The paper introduces methodical procedures that enable a functional organization of the area to be designed (calculating ecological stability, determining critical points and a methodology for determining the degree of erosion in endangered areas, etc.). It also analyses conditions in relation to protecting and developing the rural region, highlighting the chief problems in water management, access to roads and environmental protection, while graphically presenting basic thematic layers crucial for assessment. Based on this data set, a broad portfolio of combinations can be utilized for evaluating the quality of the proposed measures. We suggest a new combination of methods to let system users determine what measures should be recommended for cadastral plots. Examples are presented of changes affecting the structure of the landscape, the threat of erosion, elimination of flood conditions and the quality of life in the model area.