Geo-Eye
Department of Geography & GIS
Department of Geography & GIS
Geo-Eye
DOI: 10.53989/bu.ge.v15.i1.26.2
Year: 2026, Volume: 15, Issue: 1, Pages: 9-17
Original Article
Tharayil Irshad1, Mahalingam Bose2*, Mohsin Ali1
1Research Scholar, Department of Geography, Central University of Karnataka, Kalaburagi, 585367, Karnataka, India.
2Assistant Professor, Department of Geography, Central University of Karnataka, Kalaburagi, 585367, Karnataka, India
*Corresponding author
Email: [email protected]
Received Date:20 January 2026, Accepted Date:20 February 2026
Rapid urbanisation and the increasing waste generation put significant pressure on Solid Waste Management (SWM) systems in medium-sized Indian cities, such as Kalaburagi. This research will undertake a GIS-based assessment of the present state of the SWM in Kalaburagi city with a focus on the spatial performance. Field data collected using Global Positioning System (GPS) and imagery from Google Earth will provide data that can be used to map the spatial distribution of community bin locations, identify unauthorised dumping sites, analyse the route taken by vehicles transporting waste and assess the suitability of the current landfill site. Spatial data analysis has shown that there are unequal distributions of community bins across the city with a concentration of community bins along road networks in commercial areas of the city and nearly no community bins located in residential areas of the city. There have been over 1432 identified unauthorised dumpsite locations, primarily along roads and vacant plots of land in high-density residential areas of the city, indicating inefficient door-to-door (D2D) collections and a lack of awareness among residents as to the location of authorised waste disposal facilities. Analysis of the route taken by vehicles collecting waste indicates unplanned movements of these vehicles resulting in overlapping operations and increased operating costs. Spatial assessments indicate that the current landfill site is environmentally unsuitable due to its proximity to water bodies and lacks sufficient space to expand the site's capacity in the future. Overall, this study demonstrates spatial shortcomings in the SWM system currently in operation within the city and serves as a baseline for future GIS-based planning and optimisation of the SWM system.
Keywords: Geographical Information System (GIS); Global Positioning System (GPS); Landfill Analysis; Solid Waste Management (SWM); Spatial Assessment; Unauthorised Dumpsites
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© 2026 Irshad et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Published By Bangalore University, Bengaluru, Karnataka
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