Dataset Card for HabitAlp2.0

HabitAlp2.0 is an ecological habitat mapping dataset for the Gesäuse National Park and Natura 2000 area in Austria, covering approx. 154 km². It includes 30,241 polygons annotated via aerial photo stereo-interpretation for the years 1954, 2003, and 2013. Remote sensing layers are included to support AI-driven habitat classification and change-detection tasks.

Dataset Details

Dataset Sources

• Pre-Print: Habitat and Land Cover Change Detection in Alpine Protected Areas: A Comparison of AI Architectures
• CC-HabitAlp Project CC-HABITALP: Change-Check of the Habitats of the Alps
• Remote Sensing Data: © GIS-Steiermark, 2025

Dataset Structure

Ground truth labels are provided in raster format as GeoTIFF file for each year. Additionally, they can be found in vector format, with one GeoPackage for all years.

Each polygon is annotated with a class ID and description (see class table below).

Habitat polygon records are organized by acquisition year, with column labels named using a prefix letter:

• A_Class, A_Class_ID for 1954
• B_Class, B_Class_ID for 2003
• C_Class, C_Class_ID for 2013

Remote sensing sources include orthophotos and LiDAR elevation data.

ID	Class Name (CC = canopy cover in %)	Area 2013 (ha)	Total area share 2013 (%)
1	Waterbody	95.3	0.62
2	Gravel bank, shoal, fluviatile	17.2	0.11
3	Erosion area, gully	447.3	2.90
4	Debris-covered areas	594.7	3.86
5	Rock	2632.8	17.10
6	Young coniferous (growth, thicket)	439.8	2.86
7	Young broad-leaved (growth, thicket)	206.1	1.34
8	Coniferous pole timber CC<80	340.4	2.21
9	Coniferous pole timber CC>=80	686.1	4.46
10	Broad-leaved pole timber	161.3	1.05
11	Coniferous mature forest CC<80	1394.3	9.06
12	Coniferous mature forest CC>=80	1283.5	8.34
13	Broad-leaved mature forest CC<80	244.0	1.58
14	Broad-leaved mature forest CC>=80	392.4	2.55
15	Old coniferous forest, multilayered CC<80	1070.5	6.95
16	Old coniferous forest, multilayered CC>=80	594.3	3.86
17	Old broad-leaved forest, multilayered CC<80	158.7	1.03
18	Old broad-leaved forest, multilayered CC>=80	359.0	2.33
19	Clearcut areas	365.7	2.38
20	Mountain dwarf forest ('Krummholz' belt)	2225.5	14.45
21	Grassland, buffer strip between forest/open land	462.7	3.01
22	Alpine grassland, heath	1095.7	7.12
23	All other classes/areas of low importance and/or small extent	130.3	0.85

Dataset Creation

• Annotation via manual stereo-interpretation using historic aerial imagery for three years by Gesäuse National Park.
• Remote sensing layers provided by GIS Steiermark (high-res RGB/CIR imagery, LiDAR).
• Class schema adapted for local alpine habitats and forest structures (see pre-print for details).
• Dataset curated by Gesäuse National Park, Joanneum Research, and University Graz.

Considerations for Using the Data

• Classes and training are optimized for alpine, central European habitats; accuracy may be lower in other regions.
• Certain natural phenomena (seasonal changes, disturbance events) are temporally variable.
• Methodology aligns with high-quality ecological standards, but contains mapping uncertainties typical of historical remote-sensing datasets.

Funding

The curation of the original Habitalp Dataset by Gesäuse National Park was funded by the Austrian Program for Rural Development 2014-2020 (LE): Projekt 761A/2015/51 „Natura 2000 Management & Monitorings“