2011 FEMA Lidar: Southern Virginia Cities

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This graphic shows the coverage of the 2011 USGS/FEMA Virginia Southern Cities lidar collection.

Date that the source FGDC record was last modified.

Converted from FGDC Content Standards for Digital Geospatial Metadata (version FGDC-STD-001-1998) using 'fgdc_to_inport_xml.pl' script. Contact Tyler Christensen (NOS) for details.

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Establishment of survey points to support the LiDAR data collection. Two existing published NGS stations (AI7609, HU2327) were observed in a GPS control network and used to establish four new points for the primary control for this site. 1110312 was observed and used to control all flight missions and static ground surveys. The following are the final coordinates of the control points used for this project: SurveyBlock, Station, Latitude(D M S Hem), Longitude(D M S Hem), H-Ell(m), H-MSL(m) Worcester, 1110312, N38 18 22.12367, W75 07 40.46389, -33.7921, 2.2581

Airborne GPS Kinematic processing Airborne GPS kinematic data was processed on-site using GrafNav kinematic On-The-Fly (OTF) software. Flights were flown with a minimum of 6 satellites in view (13o above the horizon) and with a PDOP of better than 4. Distances from base station to aircraft were kept to a maximum of 40 km, to ensure a strong OTF (On-The-Fly) solution. For all flights, the GPS data can be classified as excellent, with GPS residuals of 3cm average but no larger than 10 cm being recorded. The Geoid09 geoid model, published by the NGS, was used to transform all ellipsoidal heights to orthometric.

Mission to mission adjustments of Lidar data All missions are validated and adjusted against the adjoining missions for relative vertical biases and collected GPS static and kinematic ground truthing points for absolute vertical accuracy purposes

Deliverable Product Generation Raw Lidar point were reprojected from UTM zone 18 to the delivery projection State Plane Virginia, US Survey Feet. *Raw Calibrated LIDAR Point Cloud Raw LiDAR point cloud, was provided in the following formats/parameters: - LAS V1.2, point record format 1, Adjusted GPS time, georeferencing information populated in header - The following fields are included in the LAS file: 1. Adjusted GPS time reported to the nearest microsecond 2. Flight line ID 3. Easting (reported to the nearest 0.01m) 4. Northing (reported to the nearest 0.01m) 5. Elevation (reported to the nearest 0.01m) 6. intensity 7. Echo number 8. Classification 9. Scan angle 10. Edge of scan 11. Scan direction - Full swaths, all collected points delivered (except discarded flightline) - The Withheld bit flags the last 3 degrees of the swath - 1 file per swath, 1 swath per file (except when swath had to be divided in section for size or calibration).

Dewberry utilizes a variety of software suites for inventory management, classification, and data processing. All LiDAR related processes begin by importing the data into the GeoCue task management software. GeoCue allows the data to retain its delivered tiling scheme (5000 ft by 5000 ft). The tiled data is then opened in Terrascan where Dewberry uses proprietary ground classification routines to remove any non-ground points and generate an accurate ground surface. The ground routine consists of three main parameters (building size, iteration angle, and iteration distance); by adjusting these parameters and running several iterations of this routine an initial ground surface is developed. The building size parameter sets a roaming window size. Each tile is loaded with neighboring points from adjacent tiles and the routine classifies the data section by section based on this roaming window size. The second most important parameter is the maximum terrain angle, which sets the highest allowed terrain angle within the model. Once the ground routine has been completed a manual quality control routine is done using hillshades, cross-sections, and profiles within the Terrasolid software suite. After this QC step, a peer review and supervisor manual inspection is completed on a percentage of the classified tiles based on the project size and variability of the terrain. After the ground classification corrections were completed, the dataset was processed through a water classification routine that utilizes breaklines compiled by Dewberry to automatically classify hydrographic features. The water classification routine selects ground points within the breakline polygons and automatically classifies them as class 9, water. During this water classification routine, points which are in close proximity (1 m) to the hydrographic features are moved to class 10, an ignored ground. In addition to classes 1, 2, 8, 9, and 10, the project allows for a Class 7, noise points. This class was only used if needed when points could manually be identified as low/high points. Dewberry also used Class 11 - Withheld points.

The fully classified dataset is then processed through Dewberry's comprehensive quality control program.

The data was classified as follows:

Class 1 = Unclassified. This class includes vegetation, buildings, noise etc.

Class 2 = Ground

Class 7= Noise

Class 8= Model Key Points

Class 9 = Water

Class 10= Ignored Ground

Class 11= Withheld (later changed to class 15)

The LAS header information was verified to contain the following:

Class (Integer)

GPS Week Time (0.0001 seconds)

Easting (0.01 ft)

Northing (0.01 ft)

Elevation (0.01 ft)

Echo Number (Integer 1 to 4)

Echo (Integer 1 to 4)

Intensity (8 bit integer)

Flight Line (Integer)

Scan Angle (Integer degree)

The NOAA Office for Coastal Management (OCM) received the topographic lidar files in LAZ format. The files contained lidar easting, northing, elevation, intensity, return number, etc. The data was received in Virginia State Plane SOuth 4502 (US ft) and NAVD88 (US ft). OCM performed the following processing for data storage and Digital Coast provisioning purposes:

1. The files were reviewed and erroneous elevations were removed.

2. Class 11 points (Withheld) were reclassified to Class 15 to conform to the Data Access Viewer schema.

3. Data were reprojected to geographic coordinates and ellipsoid heights (the geoid model was removed).