Glacier National Park N P And Flathead National Forest N F Avalanche Hazard Reduction By Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway

Snow avalanches are a significant natural hazard that impact roads, structures and threaten human lives in mountainous terrain. Snow avalanche hazard mapping has the potential to reduce this risk by modeling, mapping and visualizing hazardous terrain using Geographic Information Systems (GIS). The Rogers Pass area in Glacier National Park, British Columbia, Canada provides an ideal location for studying well documented avalanche paths that impact the Trans-Canada Highway. Modeling of terrain in a GIS is typically done by utilizing a digital elevation model (DEM). DEM resolution has traditionally been a limiting factor in the evaluation of terrain at a slope scale. The best available DEM data for this area has a resolution of 25 m. Using a procedure of digital stereo photogrammetry, an improved DEM of higher resolution was generated for this research. This technology allows a GIS operator wearing stereo goggles to digitally resample surface heights using stereo-photo pairs. Topographic parameters such as slope, aspect, curvature and distance from ridges were derived from the DEM.

Reproduction of the original.