ETG_CostPath

Cost Path

Determines the least cost path from a source to destinations based on a cost raster. The result consists of polylines connecting a destination to the nearest source in terms of cost. The input sources and destinations can be Points, Polylines or Polygons. The cost raster defines the cost to move through each cell.

Inputs:

Input source feature dataset - Points, Polylines or Polygons
Input destination feature dataset - Points, Polylines or Polygons
Input cost raster dataset.
Full name of the output Polyline feature dataset.
Source ID field. The values from this field will be allocated to resulting cost paths.
Destination ID field. The values from this field will be allocated to resulting cost paths.
Cut-off cost - defines the threshold that the accumulative cost values cannot exceed.

Outputs:

A Polyline dataset - each polyline represents the least cost path from a source to a destination.
The following fields will be added to the attribute table of the output
- ET_Source - the ID of the source for the path.
- ET_Dest - the ID of the destination for the path.
- ET_Cost - the calculated cost for the path.

Example:

Cost Path result - polygon sources, point destinations, slope raster is used as Cost raster.

Notes:

The output cost paths will have the spatial reference of the input source dataset.
The cost will be calculated based on the units of the cost raster spatial reference. Note that a Geographic coordinate system is not appropriate for such calculations.
If two or more destinations have the same ID, then only one output cost path will be determined - the one with the least cost from any of them to any of the sources.
The Cost raster can not have cells with negative or zero values - the cost can not be 0 or negative.
Cell locations with NoData in the Cost raster act as barriers - no cost path can pass through them.
The input raster format accepted are file based rasters - ERDAS IMAGINE or Tagged Image File Format (TIFF).
The .NET ToolBox for ArcGIS Desktop accepts also FileGDB Raster inputs.

Running Programmatically

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Parameters

Expression	Explanation
Function Name	CostPath
<source features>	A String - the full path to the input source feature dataset.
<destination features>	A String - the full path to the input destination feature dataset.
<cost raster>	A String - the full name of the input cost raster.
<output paths>	A String - the full path to the output polyline path dataset.
<source ID field>	A String representing the name of the field in the input source dataset to be used as source ID.
<destination ID field>	A String representing the name of the field in the input destination dataset to be used as destination ID.
<cut-off cost>	A Double representing the cut-off cost - (distance x weight). A path exceeding this cost will not be recorded in the output.

Running the function

ETSPath used in the table below is the full path to ETSRun.exe (E.G. "C:\Program Files\ETSpatial Techniques\ETSurface\ETSRun.exe")

CostRaster

Language	Syntax
Python	subprocess.call([ETSPath, "CostPath", "source features", "destination features", "cost raster", "output paths", "source ID field", "destination ID field", "cut-off cost"])
.NET using ETSRun.exe	StartInfo.FileName = ETSPath StartInfo.Arguments = "CostPath" "source features" "destination features" "cost raster" "output paths" "source ID field" "destination ID field" "cut-off cost"
.NET using ETSOutX.dll	CostPath(source features, destination features, cost raster, output paths, source ID field, destination ID field, cut-off cost)
ArcPy	arcpy.CostPath("source features", "destination features", "cost raster", "output paths", "source ID field", "destination ID field", "cut-off cost")

Notes:

<> - required parameter
{} - optional parameter
See examples for Python , .NET or ArcPy
The argument separator for StartInfo.Arguments is space. If a string might contain a space, you need to double quote it.

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