How the Kinnick Stadium seat and sun data is measured

Every number comes from a USGS lidar survey of the stadium, NOAA solar equations, the official Iowa seating map and published row lists. Nothing is estimated from photos.

Sources

Stadium shape: USGS 3D Elevation Program lidar, Eastern Iowa 2019 collection, flown 17 March 2020, 2 tiles. First-return points gridded to 1 m, noise removed.
Section directions: the section order round the stadium from a ticket map, lined up with the field in the lidar. The ticket map fans the south end zone corners wider than the real stand, so the south sections are spaced across it as a fan.
Row lists and the Iowa and visitors' sides: rateyourseats.com section notes. The student, band and recruiting sections and the compass: the hawkeyesports.com seating map.
Capacity, gates, bag policy, re-entry, cashless, alcohol and prohibited items: the hawkeyesports.com game day guide. Parking: the hawkeyesports.com football parking page.
Sun: NOAA solar position equations. Weather: ERA5 reanalysis and forecasts via Open-Meteo.

How shade is computed

Each section is sampled on 3 lines (left, centre, right) at every row, 7668 seat points in total. For each point the surrounding stadium surface is scanned in every direction the sun can come from to give a horizon profile. A seat is in direct sun when the sun is higher than that horizon. Games are sampled every 10 minutes for 3.5 hours. Kickoffs not yet announced are modelled at each likely Big Ten window (11 am, 2:30 pm, 6:30 pm Central).

How rows are placed

A line is walked out from the field edge through each section and takes the first climbing rake. Rows spread over the visible rake (0.66 m per row on the open east sideline). In the south end zone the 100s and the 200s share one rake, so the 100s take the front rows and the 200s the rows behind; in the north end zone the 300s sit on their own raised rake above the 100s. On the west side the press box stands over the back rows: rows past the visible rake keep the east side depth and count as covered. Row numbers a corner section does not sell (it starts at Row 5, 14 or 21) keep their place.

How the seat views are made

Each view is drawn from a 3D model built from the lidar, from 1.15 m above the seat (seated eye height), facing the field. Only rows open to the sky get a view.

Limits

The lidar was flown in March 2020, after the Kinnick Edge north end zone opened for the 2019 season. hawkeyesports.com lists no seating change since.
The ticket map is not drawn to scale, so section directions come from it but section edges can be off by a few seats.
The official seating map does not mark the team benches; the Iowa and visitors' sides come from rateyourseats.com.
Not modelled: the press box, the suites and the indoor Kinnick Edge club.
Light poles and video boards thinner than the 1 m grid may be missed.

Downloads (CC BY 4.0)

sun-by-section.csv: game, kickoff, section, minutes of sun, shade arrival
sections.json: section geometry and row-by-row sightlines