Time-Stamped LIDAR Terrain Models For England

LIDAR surveys across England have been conducted since 1998, with some coastal areas surveyed multiple times. The Environment Agency archives these Digital Terrain Model rasters, available at resolutions from 25cm to 2m. Data is provided in 5km tiles as GeoTIFF files with a vertical accuracy of +/-15cm RMSE.

Use Cases

• Analyze coastal erosion by comparing elevation values from DTM tiles surveyed in different years.
• Model flood water flow using the bare-earth terrain data from the 1m resolution rasters.
• Detect ground subsidence by identifying vertical changes in the LIDAR-derived surface over multiple survey dates.
• Create base maps for construction planning by extracting ground elevation from the 25cm or 50cm resolution DTM data.

Strengths

• Surveys span from 1998 to present, enabling multi-decadal time-series analysis.
• Data has a stated vertical accuracy of +/-15cm Root Mean Square Error.
• Available at four specific resolutions: 25cm, 50cm, 1m, and 2m.

Limitations

• Spatial coverage is limited to England, with no data for other UK nations.
• Specific row/column counts and total file size for the archive are unknown.
• Requires GIS software to process the GeoTIFF raster files and 5km ZIP archives.

Provenance

Source

Environment Agency (UK).

Collection Method

Airborne LIDAR surveys, with last-return signals processed using bespoke algorithms and manual editing to remove surface objects.

Time Range

1998 to present, with specific survey dates varying by location.

Freshness

Last platform update was 2026-04-07, but survey dates within the archive vary by location.

Geography

England, United Kingdom.