QCT NZ Elevation & Imagery Importer
Streams LINZ nz-elevation LiDAR DEM/DSM tiles (via GDAL /vsicurl/) straight into the current project from a manageable dataset database. Part of the QCivilTools suite. No download required.
Registers under QCivilTools > NZ Elevation & Imagery Importer. Bundles THREE LINZ catalogs, switchable from a dropdown: NZ Elevation, NZ Coastal (84 coastal datasets including the nationwide Coastal 1m DEM/DSM and hillshades), and NZ Imagery (the aerial/satellite photo archive; its full dataset list is fetched on first use and saved). The elevation catalog: 218 datasets covering every region, survey year, DEM/DSM variant, hillshade, and the 8m contour-interpolated DEM. Catalog datasets ship with a lightweight entry; their tile list is fetched automatically from their STAC collection.json on first use and saved permanently. Opens a non-modal window -- the QGIS map stays fully usable while it's open -- listing every dataset in the plugin's database (title, path, CRS, tile count, whether a local tile index is bundled), with a Help/About panel alongside. The Northland LiDAR 1m DEM (2024) and nationwide New Zealand LiDAR 1m DEM additionally ship with prebuilt local tile indexes. A filter box makes the 218-dataset table quick to search. The nationwide New Zealand LiDAR 1m DEM heads the list. The plugin works with one dataset at a time: loading an index automatically unloads any other dataset's index layer. Defaults the project CRS to EPSG:2193 (NZTM2000), and every layer the plugin adds is kept in NZTM2000 so it displays in the right location. Features: Load Index (show and zoom to tile footprints; footprints fetched remotely for datasets without a bundled index are autosaved to a local GeoPackage so next time they load instantly), Click on Map to Load (click tile boundaries one at a time, with a continue/finish prompt after each tile), Load Tiles by Name (comma-separated tile IDs, or ALL for every tile), Export Raster (crop by a drawn polygon, a drawn crop box, any project layer's extent, or an existing polygon layer -- only the tiles and pixel blocks covering the crop area are read, then mosaicked and saved as GeoTIFF), Add Dataset from any LINZ STAC collection.json URL, and Remove Dataset (available only for datasets you added yourself -- the 218 default datasets cannot be removed; removal deletes the dataset from the database along with its local tile index, and it can be re-added any time from its collection URL). A progress bar with percent-complete backs every long-running action, and closing the window offers to unload every layer it added during the session. Rasters stream directly from LINZ open data over HTTPS via GDAL /vsicurl/ -- no download required.