Workflow Narrative

Field Trafficability and Operation Planning

Problem It Solves

Where can equipment operate safely now, and which areas should be delayed or rerouted?

Who It Is For

Machinery planning teams, farm managers, and field operations coordinators.

Primary User

Farm operations teams and precision agriculture service providers.

What It Does

Scores field trafficability and operation timing risk from terrain and saturation context.
Produces operation classes for go/hold/reroute-style field execution decisions.

How It Works

Derives slope from DEM and harmonizes moisture/rainfall context to the same grid.
Blends terrain, soil saturation, and rainfall-risk penalties into trafficability scores.
Converts continuous scores into operation classes for practical planning use.
QA acceptance guidance:
`status=pass` indicates low-trafficability burden stayed within baseline tolerance.
`diagnostics.acceptance_thresholds.low_trafficability_fraction_review` defines review escalation threshold.
High `summary.low_trafficability_fraction` should trigger cautious equipment scheduling and field confirmation.
MVP hardening assets:
Benchmark scaffold: `tests/fixtures/precision_ag_ops_benchmark/`
Promotion guide: `docs/internal/development/TERRAIN_PRECISION_AG_BENCHMARK_PROMOTION_GUIDE_2026_04_14.md`

Inputs

Parameter	Optional	Description
dem	no	DEM raster for terrain slope context.
soil_moisture	no	Soil saturation/moisture raster normalized to [0,1].
rainfall_forecast	yes	Optional rainfall-risk raster normalized to [0,1].

Outputs

Parameter	Type	Description
trafficability_score	GeoTIFF	Continuous trafficability score [0,1] (higher is better).
operation_class	GeoTIFF	Discrete operation class raster (1 favorable to 4 poor).
summary	JSON	Machine-readable summary report containing run metadata, QA diagnostics, and key metrics.
html_report	HTML	Human-readable customer-facing report generated from the summary contract for stakeholder review and QA traceability.

Python Example

import whitebox_workflows as wbw

wbe = wbw.WbEnvironment(include_pro=True, tier="pro")

traffic, op_class, summary = wbe.field_trafficability_and_operation_planning(
    dem="data/dem.tif",
    soil_moisture="data/soil_saturation.tif",
    rainfall_forecast="data/rain_risk.tif",
    output_prefix="output/field_trafficability",
)

print(traffic)
print(op_class)
print(summary)

License Notice

Use of this function requires a license for Whitebox Workflows Professional (WbW-Pro). Please visit www.whiteboxgeo.com to purchase a license.

Project Links

WbW Homepage User Manual Learn More