# Park Lidar Acquisition Matrix

This is the first pass at a practical acquisition plan for park-centric
SignalReach studies. The goal is not to find one mythical "parks lidar bucket."
The goal is to use:

- the best **authoritative boundary source** for clipping
- the best **authoritative lidar source** for the geography
- the simplest **fallback path** if the primary source is incomplete

## Shared Source Rules

### Boundary Sources
- **National Park Service units:** use the official NPS Lands / Park Boundaries
  path referenced from [NPMap](https://www.nps.gov/subjects/gisandmapping/npmap.htm)
  and the NPS GIS program pages.
- **Non-NPS parks:** use the park operator's official map/boundary source first,
  then state/local GIS where available.

### Lidar Sources
- **Default inland source:** [USGS LidarExplorer](https://www.usgs.gov/tools/lidarexplorer)
- **Default coastal source:** [NOAA Data Access Viewer](https://coast.noaa.gov/dataviewer/index.html)
  and [NOAA Coastal Lidar Archive](https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/products/coastal-lidar-archive)
- **Convenience/discovery fallback:** OpenTopography only as a search aid, not
  the preferred production source
- **Calibration supplement:** [NSF NEON Spatial Data Layers & Maps](https://www.neonscience.org/data-samples/data/spatial-data-maps)
  and [NEON lidar / AOP products](https://www.neonscience.org/data-collection/lidar)

## Pilot Matrix

| Area | Boundary Source | Primary Lidar Source | Secondary Source | Recommendation |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Great Smoky Mountains National Park | NPS official park boundary | USGS 3DEP / LidarExplorer | State portals if newer than 3DEP | Start with USGS only |
| Shenandoah National Park | NPS official park boundary | USGS 3DEP / LidarExplorer | Virginia state lidar if more current | Start with USGS only |
| Yellowstone National Park | NPS official park boundary | USGS 3DEP / LidarExplorer | State portals around WY/MT/ID if needed | Start with USGS only |
| Grand Canyon National Park | NPS official park boundary | USGS 3DEP / LidarExplorer | Arizona state lidar if needed | Start with USGS only |
| Zion National Park | NPS official park boundary | USGS 3DEP / LidarExplorer | Utah state lidar if newer | Start with USGS only |
| Olympic National Park | NPS official park boundary | USGS 3DEP / LidarExplorer | NOAA for coastal fringe / shoreline work | Use USGS for park interior, NOAA if coastal edge matters |
| Acadia National Park | NPS official park boundary | NOAA Digital Coast / Coastal Lidar Archive | USGS 3DEP / LidarExplorer | Start with NOAA first because the park is strongly coastal |
| Everglades National Park | NPS official park boundary | NOAA Digital Coast / Coastal Lidar Archive | USGS 3DEP / LidarExplorer | Start with NOAA first because coastal/wetland coverage matters |
| Bays Mountain Park (Kingsport) | Official park map / Avenza trail map from Bays Mountain Park; corroborate with City of Kingsport sources | USGS 3DEP / LidarExplorer | Tennessee state lidar / natural areas references | Start with USGS; boundary capture may need manual polygonization from official map if no clean GIS polygon is published |
| Breaks Interstate Park (VA/KY) | Official Breaks Interstate Park map / park operator sources | USGS 3DEP / LidarExplorer | Virginia/Kentucky state lidar if newer | Start with USGS; use official park map until a cleaner GIS boundary is identified |

## Why These Picks

### Inland Mountain Parks
For:
- Great Smoky Mountains
- Shenandoah
- Yellowstone
- Grand Canyon
- Zion
- Breaks
- Bays Mountain

USGS 3DEP is the cleanest first stop because it is:
- official
- broad-coverage
- aligned with inland topographic work
- likely to give us the best first-pass path to LAZ / EPT / derived DEM assets

### Coastal / Shoreline-Influenced Parks
For:
- Acadia
- Everglades
- coastal fringe of Olympic

NOAA is the better first stop because:
- coastal lidar coverage is the core mission
- archive/discovery are better tuned to coastal collections
- topobathy/coastal datasets often matter more in these areas than inland-only assumptions

## Acquisition Priorities

When choosing among products, prioritize in this order:

1. point cloud (`LAZ`, `LAS`, `EPT`)
2. building footprints / structure vectors
3. DSM / canopy or surface products
4. bare-earth DEM only

For the vegetation/structure roadmap, bare-earth DEM alone is not enough.

## NEON Supplement

NEON should be treated as a **calibration and validation supplement**, not the
main park acquisition backbone.

Best use cases:
- canopy-height-informed vegetation tuning
- classified point-cloud comparison against our sampled clutter heuristics
- park-adjacent benchmark areas where NEON has direct AOP coverage

Current read for this park list:

| Area | NEON Value | Notes |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Great Smoky Mountains | High | Direct NEON terrestrial field site overlap makes this the best first calibration park |
| Everglades | Medium | Use nearby/related Florida ecosystem coverage as an analog, not a strict park substitute |
| Acadia | Low / unconfirmed | No current direct-priority use unless NEON flight boundaries prove useful overlap |
| Olympic | Low / unconfirmed | Check only if a specific coastal subarea ends up near a NEON AOP footprint |
| Bays Mountain | Low | Not a current NEON-priority target |
| Breaks | Low | Not a current NEON-priority target |

Operational rule:
- use **USGS / NOAA** to build the park data library
- use **NEON** to tune vegetation/clutter behavior where overlap exists

## Recommended Next Collection Pass

### Phase 1
Pull and catalog:
- Great Smoky Mountains
- Acadia
- Everglades
- Bays Mountain

These four give us:
- inland mountains
- coastal island
- coastal wetland
- local test park near current operational area

### Phase 2
Add:
- Shenandoah
- Olympic
- Breaks

### Phase 3
Add:
- Yellowstone
- Grand Canyon
- Zion

## Open Questions

- For Bays Mountain and Breaks, we still need the best machine-readable boundary
  source rather than relying on park maps alone.
- For Olympic, we need to decide whether we care about the full legislated park
  or only specific operational subareas.
- For Everglades, we should expect water / wetland edge cases that may require
  careful product selection beyond a simple "download lidar" workflow.
