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Mapping data across Britain

Across the Roman Empire

Environment Agency LiDAR data now covers 93% of England at 2m resolution, 88% at 1m. Point cloud data is available for surveys back as far as 2006, however since the inception of the National Lidar Programme in 2016, which aimed to provide 100% coverage by the end of 2021, data is now mainly made available as 5km square tiles in geotiff format, available as either Digital Terrain Model (DTM), which removes vegetation and buildings, or Digital Surface Model (DSM), in resolutions of either 1m or 2m. To download any of the available LiDAR data from DEFRA for a particular area, use the selection map accessed via the button above.

LiDAR coverage in Wales is currently at about 70%, and is now freely available, available as a Historic LiDAR archive, or a LiDAR composite dataset, courtesy of Natural Resources Wales.

Without question the world’s leading Open source GIS software package - and it’s free! Processing lidar data from the sources above is straightforward, and by using virtual rasters can be done over large areas quickly and easily. QGIS will also process point cloud data . As noted in the previous entry, there is now an RVT plugin for QGIS which allows alternative processing and creates a much crisper image than standard QGIS hillshade.

FugroViewerTM is a robust, easy-to-use freeware designed to help users make the most of their geospatial data. We have developed it for use with various types of raster- and vector-based geospatial datasets, including data from photogrammetric, lidar, and IFSAR sources.

A highly unlikely source of processed LiDAR (DSM) data for England and Wales. The Environment Agency data has been used but not updated with latest surveys from the National LiDAR Programme, so coverage is only about 50%, and of course there’s a big hole where Scotland should be. The interface is easy to use, but there are better tools out there now.

This free software can be used to create 3D models from pre-built digital elevation models, such as can be built in RVT (below)

This very useful free software, developed by the Institute of Anthropological and Spatial Studies (IAPŠ) at the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts (ZRC SAZU), allows the creation of a mosaic from multiple data tiles, which can then be processed in a variety of ways, using processing such as multiple hill shade, sky view factor, and openness. The software does not have a viewer, so you can’t see the results as you go, however there is now a plugin for QGIS.

The Scottish Government has conducted four phases of LiDAR survey, and at long last the data is now being made freely available. Data has to be obtained separately for each phase, there is no Composite available. Coverage south of the Central Belt is fairly good, north of it less so.

A limited amount of lidar data in the Scottish borders is available from the Environment Agency. The link on the button above takes you to the overview page, alternatively you can download 1m resolution data as a 3.55 GB zip file here , or 2m resolution data here

LiDAR data from this project is available for all of Cornwall and some of Devon, taken in 2013. Unfortunately, surveying was carried out in summer which has resulted in some of the DTM modelling being poor in wooded areas. You will need to register to download data. Most of this data has arguably been superceded by recent Environment Agency survey.     DTM 1m data      DSM 1m data

This useful tool provides a split screen view of lidar and aerial imagery for England and Wales and provides 25cm, 50cm and 1m in both DSM and DTM, although at the time of writing (August 2021) the latest data has not been added. It is currently the only pre-processed viewer to provide 50cm and 25cm resolution. Data is supplied by the Environment Agency and Natural Resources Wales.

The most recent Composite LiDAR datasets (2020) are now being made available in a variety of pre-processed forms, far better than the coloured tiles which have been around for some time). The most useful for Roman roads studies are the hillshade models, available as a seamless image across the country in monochrome as DTM only at resolutions of 2m and 1m.  These can be viewed by an ArcGIS Online Map Viewer, or imported into Google Earth Pro as a KMZ file. There is currently no simple way of importing the pre-processed imagery into QGIS.

1m DTM ArcGIS Viewer     1m DTM Google Earth KMZ     2m DTM ArcGIS Viewer     2m DTM Google Earth KMZ

Please note that these links will probably become redundant when new data is released in 2022