On May and June this year, Researcher of LSFRI 'Silava' Santa Kalēja expanded her knowledge and practical experience through short-term mobility visits to the Swedish private forest owners' cooperative 'Norra Skog' in Umeå (May 24–30, 2026), and the Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke) in Joensuu (June 1–6, 2026).
The visits were carried out as part of the postdoctoral research project Development of a prototype system for detecting and characterizing deformations in gravel forest roads, which aims to develop a sensor system prototype for detecting forest road deformations using short-range sensors, GNSS data and data processing methods.
During the mobility visit in Sweden Santa Kalēja explored forest road planning and maintenance practices in the context of a private forest owners' cooperative, with particular attention to the role of gravel roads in timber logistics, their seasonal accessibility and load-bearing capacity, as well as the organization of maintenance through cooperation between forest owners, the cooperative and contractors.
In Finland, Santa examined approaches to forest road monitoring and trafficability forecasting, including the use of road weather stations, LWD measurements, drone-based LiDAR, and the development of dynamic trafficability models based on the integration of weather, soil and road condition data.
The experience gained during both visits makes a significant contribution to the further development of the RoadScanner prototype, strengthening the understanding of the practical needs of forest infrastructure management and highlighting the need for objective, regular and data-driven solutions for assessing forest road deformations and planning maintenance.
