Selection and Analysis of Potential Ski Resort Sites in Camas County, Idaho Charlotte Cain GIS 205 May 2009.

Selection and Analysis of Potential Ski Resort Sites in Camas County, Idaho

Charlotte Cain GIS 205 May 2009

Study Criteria

•Areas with slopes of Beginning, Intermediate, Advance and Expert

•Slopes in a large contiguous area

•Area with high annual precipitation

•Areas of low sun exposure during ski

•Areas within 1 mile of a major road

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DATA GATHERED

•10 meter NED elevation raster for area surrounding Camas County, Idaho in 5 sections

•GCS North American 1983

•Isohyet shapefile - Precipitation for Idaho; Mean Annual (1961-1990) •GCS North American 1983•IDTM83 (projected)

•County Boundaries 2000 for Camas County, Idaho - TIGER/Line file shapefile•GCS North American 1983

•Roads for Camas County, Idaho 2000 TIGER/Line shapefile•GCS North American 1983

•Sun Azimuth and Altitude data for November through April for Ketchum, Idaho

•Idaho Cities •GCS North American 1927

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The elevation rasters were combined using mosaic tool and projected into NAD 1983 UTM zone 11N

Raster data was extracted by mask to county environs

Idaho Cities Required datum transformation from NAD 1927 into NAD1983 before projecting

All other spatial data was projected into NAD 1983 UTM zone 11N and clipped to county environs

PROJECTION

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WORKING MODEL USED FOR ANALYSIS

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•Use Sun Azimuth and Altitude data for November – April to calculate hill shade raster

•Perform hillshade for each month•Use cell statistics to construct mean exposure raster•Select areas with exposure value of 100 and less

•Convert precipitation contour shapefile into raster

•Perform Single Output Map Algebra function to construct a raster of sun exposure under 100 and precipitation over 35cm annually

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Workflow

•Select areas that intersect a buffer of 1 mile around major roads

•Select areas greater than 4 sq km (988 sq acres)

•Convert Elevation raster into a slope raster and reclassify into four slope values

•Beginner slope 3-15 %•Intermediate Slope 15 – 25% •Advanced Slope 25 – 35 %•Expert Slope 35 – 45 %

•Perform Single Output Map Algebra to select areas with desired slopes

Workflow

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Results

• Four sites have similar proportions of slopes

• Sites 1,3 and 5 are near each other at Two Point Mountain-have existing hiking trails

• Site 4 is near Paradise Peak-has enough area to be two resorts- may be good for combining facilities and offering variety

to skiers

• Site 6 has no expert slopes-May be desirable if other tourist attractions are nearby-is only one near a city and having access to local staff

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Site 5

Site 3

Site 4 east

Site 4 west

•Obtain more recent precipitation data preferably annual snow fall

•Perform a nearby watershed analysis to aid in manufacturing snow

•Analyze individual slope areas within a site to see if runs are continuous

•Field trip to ground proof selection criteria

Suggestions for Improvement

Websites of Interest

http://ned.usgs.gov/

http://data.insideidaho.org/data/ICS/archive/ppt_id)ics.tgz

http://data.insideidaho.org/data/uscb/TIGER2000/archive/camas/roads_camas_uscb.tgz

http://www.usno.navy.mil/USNO/astronomical-applications/data-services/alt-az/page-1?searchterm=azimuth

http://www.wrcc.dri.edu/summary/climsmid.html

http://www.hixoxih.com/skiing/SkiSlopeRatingSystem.htm

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Slope Analysis for Each Site