In the state of Wisconsin the issue of access to the state’s LiDAR database has been heating up. This has resulted in a public/private consortia working together to deliver the first datasets online in early 2013.
The group developed a plan to use WisconsinView as a portal for public access to the data. WisconsinView already hosts a variety of aerial photography (such as WROC and NAIP) and is a logical fit for LiDAR data. The plan is to begin with derived elevation products (DEMs) and eventually serve all collected data.
Kudos to all involved.
I am very interested in getting some public hyperspectral data and LiDAR data for testing new algorithms.