ABSTRACT: The City of New York has realized the importance of developing accurate and current elevation and land cover data in support of resiliency and green infrastructure initiatives. In 2010, the City acquired high accuracy, bare-earth processed Topographic LiDAR data for the full extent of New York City. This data was used to support a variety of projects such as coastal storm and sea level rise inundation, flood risk assessment, and mitigation, green infrastructure and tree canopy planning.
In 2017, the City began to collect new Bathymetric and updated Topographic LiDAR data. This new data will support City operations with data analysis, policymaking, resiliency and environmental planning. In addition, the use of the 2010 and 2017 data will be used to analyze how Hurricane Sandy and human interventions have recently altered the City’s landscape. Since 2010 the evolution of Aerial Bathymetric LiDAR (TopoBathy) has allowed for elevation data below certain depth of water in and around the City. In the Spring and Summer two aerial missions were set out onto the City to collect both the Topographic and TopoBathy LiDAR data. Collection was captured from 2 different planes. Coordination with the City, FAA, media, the weather and contractors required well organized procedures and systems between all involved. This abstract will look into these tasks during the scope development, coordination and acquisition stages.
Direct and derived products - land cover, tree canopy change, and Digital Elevation Models - will provide an unprecedented opportunity to analyze change and to support future resiliency planning.
