Lemhi Watershed Idaho Lidar Data Released
OpenTopography is pleased to announce the release of an 80 km2 lidar point cloud dataset for the Lemhi River watershed in east-central Idaho. The 1.1 billion point dataset was collected September 24-26, 2010 by Watershed Sciences Incorporated, for Trout Unlimited and Utah State University's Ecogeomorphology and Topographic Analysis Lab. The data collection was paid for by Trout Unlimited's US Bureau of Reclamation project partner. The surveyed was designed to support conservation and restoration efforts by Trout Unlimited and others working in the Lemhi Watershed.
Bare earth terrain model for a portion of the Lemhi Watershed - US Bureau of Reclamation dataset along Big Timber Creek
Background:
The 2010 Lemhi River data were integrated with overlapping portions of the 2009 data (Amonson) to provide seamless models. Additionally, two mainstem areas of interest (AOI) along the Lemhi River and five additional 'satellite' AOIs were added to the acquisition by Utah State University to support a study intercomparing different topographic survey and aerial photography acquisition methods. In addition to airborne LiDAR, Bangen et al. (2011) used total station, rtkGPS, ground-based LiDAR, spectral-based depth correlation and single-beam SONAR to collect topography at all of these AOI's. Aerial orthophotos were collected concurrently with the Watershed Sciences survey, whereas Utah State University acquired comparable imagery by both tethered blimp and unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) surveys. The study is part of a larger effort by Eco Logical Research, Inc. and NOAA's ISEMP (Integrated Status and Effectiveness Monitoring Program).