topic Re: Cost Path Tool Usage Help in ArcGIS Spatial Analyst Questions

Cost Path Tool Usage Help

--7 — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 12:33:50 GMT

I'm have the following data:

Raster layer, cells have 1 of 2 values that represent either an obstacle or non-obstacle

Layer with single point feature (source)

Layer with single point feature (destination)

I'm trying to find the shortest path between the source and destination points while avoiding obstacles. I tried creating a cost distance and cost backlink using the raster and the source point feature in ArcMap but the rasters I got had cells with 0 values only.

Am I doing something wrong? Should I be using the cost path tool for this?

Re: Cost Path Tool Usage Help

JohnPorter — Fri, 01 Feb 2013 20:33:10 GMT

Two items that might cause the problem you encountered.
1) make sure that even your impassable elements have a valid (but very, very, high) impedance/cost value, not NODATA
2) your cost-raster should be in GRID format. I've had many problems with other raster formats (e.g., TIFF) not working properly in analyses.

Hope that helps!

Re: Cost Path Tool Usage Help

HelenGoodchild — Tue, 24 Feb 2015 17:35:04 GMT

Thanks very much for this - I was having the exact same problem, then you made me realise I had an impossible path as there were too many areas of NoData in my friction map.

Many thanks!