DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.10048371
title: High-resolution, Decadal to Weekly Geomorphic Change Analysis of the Elbow River in Calgary, using Multi-temporal Lidar and Repeat Terrestrial Laser Scanning

description: This directory contains files related to the scientific research project of Luc van Dijk at the Department of Earth, Energy, and Environment, University of Calgary. The project title is "High-resolution, Decadal to Weekly Geomorphic Change Analysis of the Elbow River in Calgary, using Multi-temporal Lidar and Repeat Terrestrial Laser Scanning". This project in the field of geomorphology was a collaboration between the University of Calgary and Utrecht University in the Netherlands. The project was completed on October 27, 2023. Below is a description of the files in this directory.
 
DisplacementVolumeDistributions_TLS.xlsx
Excel file containing tabular data of the normalized sediment displacement volumes that were obtained using TLS. Each tab in the Excel file represents a period of interest in 2023. The data in this file were used to generate the 'histogram-like' figures in the report.
 
DoD_rasters.zip
Folder containing the aerial lidar DEMs of Difference (DoDs) for each period of interest. The DoDs are 'waterless', i.e. the water surface is masked. The suffix of the file name before the file extension (e.g., ..._10cm.tif) indicates the maximum REM value that was used for the automated masking of the water surface extent (see report section 3.1.2). If the file name contains "large", it refers to the upstream greater area (see report section 3.1.3).
Within this folder is another folder called 'Clipped2AOIs'. This folder contains the same DoDs, but covering only the extents of the sites of interest ('AOIs' = Areas Of Interest).
 
FilteredPointClouds_TLS.zip
Folder containing the processed and filtered point clouds that were acquired throughout the summer of 2023 using TLS. These point clouds have been pre-processed and filtered to remove vegetation (see report section 3.2). They are grouped in sub-folders per acquisition date. The filenames are numbered to location, i.e. 'elbow1', 'elbow2', 'elbow3' and 'elbow4'. These correspond to the sites of interest: Glenmore Dam, golf club, Sandy Beach and Riverdale, respectively.
 
PythonScripts_Discharge_Rainfall.zip
Folder containing the Python scripts that were made to process the discharge and rainfall data that were sourced from Environment Canada and The City of Calgary (see report section 3.3). The scripts themselves contain descriptions of their purpose.
 
PythonScripts_DisplacementVolumeAnalysis.zip
Folder containing the Python scripts that were made to process and analyze the aerial lidar DoDs and the TLS rasterized difference point clouds (M3C2 output). The 'convert2pickle' scripts converted the sizable rasters to smaller pickle files, which were easier and faster to work with. The 'chart' scripts load the data from the pickle files, analyze them and produce the 'histogram-like' figures in the report. The scripts themselves contain descriptions of their purpose.
 
RainfallDischargeData.xlsx
Excel file containing the discharge and rainfall data from Environment Canada and The City of Calgary. The data came from different sources in different formats and were combined into this single table.
 
RasterizedDifferencedPointClouds_M3C2.zip
Folder containing the rasterized results of the differenced TLS point clouds (M3C2 output) (see report section 3.2.4). The filenames are numbered to location, i.e. 'Elbow1', 'Elbow2', 'Elbow3' and 'Elbow4'. These correspond to the sites of interest: Glenmore Dam, golf club, Sandy Beach and Riverdale, respectively. The numeric sequence in the file name indicates the start and end date of the change analysis in a 'mm-dd' format. The suffixes '_dist', '_unc' and '_sig' refer to the three output layers of the M3C2 algorithm: distance, uncertainty and significance of change. The main files of interest are the '.tif' files. Files sharing the same name, but with different extensions (.tfw, .tif.aux.xml, .tif.xml) are supplementary/auxiliary files for the '.tif' file, generated by ArcGIS Pro.
 
ScarpsOfInterest_shapefile.zip
Folder containing a polygon shapefile describing the extents and locations of the sites of interest. The main file of interest is the '.shp' file. The other files with the same name, but different extensions (.cpg, .dbf, .prj, .sbn, .sbx, .shp.xml, .shx) are supplementary/auxiliary files for the '.shp' file, generated by ArcGIS Pro.