Application of LIDAR in New Site Discoveries, Susitna Valley, Alaska

Summary

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) have long been a standard tool for mapping or depicting archaeological features and sites in the circumpolar north. Recently, remote sensing techniques including Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) have provided extremely high resolution datasets for landscape level survey and site detection from the GIS platform. Initial applications have proven useful for identifying temple complexes and other large scale archaeological sites in the Central American rainforest where dense vegetation hinders traditional survey techniques. This paper highlights similar approaches in the subarctic boreal forest environment of Southcentral Alaska where the technique has successfully identified more subtle archaeological signatures. In collaboration with the Knik Tribal Council and Matanuska-Susitna Borough, LIDAR data were analyzed and compared to field survey data for the identification of semi-subterranean storage and dwelling features. It has been a reliable methodology with few false positives at Montana Creek and Cottonwood Creek sites in Southcentral Alaska where short summers and dense boreal forest vegetation make ground survey challenging.

SAA 2015 abstracts made available in tDAR courtesy of the Society for American Archaeology and Center for Digital Antiquity Collaborative Program to improve digital data in archaeology. If you are the author of this presentation you may upload your paper, poster, presentation, or associated data (up to 3 files/30MB) for free. Please visit http://www.tdar.org/SAA2015 for instructions and more information.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)   •
• Current Problems in Arctic Research

Keywords

Spatial Coverage