Bare sand, wind speed, aspect and slope at four English and Welsh coastal sand dunes, 2014-2016

This data contains values of bare sand area, modelled wind speed, aspect and slope at a 2.5 m spatial resolution for four UK coastal dune fields, Abberfraw (Wales), Ainsdale (England), Morfa Dyffryn (Wales), Penhale (England). Data is stored as a .csv file. Data is available for 620,756.25 m2 of dune at Abberfraw, 550,962.5 m2 of dune at Ainsdale, 1,797,756.25 m2 of dune at Morfa Dyffryn and 2,275,056.25 m2 of dune at Penhale. All values were calculated from aerial imagery and digital terrain models collected between 2014 and 2016.

For each location, areas of bare sand were mapped in QGIS using the semi-automatic classification plugin (SCP) and the minimum distance algorithm on true-colour RGB images. The slope and aspect of the dune surface at each site was calculated in QGIS from digital terrain models. Wind speed at 0.4 m above the surface of the digital terrain model at each site was calculated using a steady state computational fluid dynamics (CFD).

Data was collected to statistically test the relationship between bare sand and three abiotic physical factors on coastal dunes (wind speed, dune slope and dune slope aspect). Vertical aerial imagery was sourced from EDINA Aerial Digimap Service and digital terrain models from EDINA LIDAR Digimap Service. Wind speed data was generated and interpreted by Dr Thomas Smyth (University of Huddersfield).