How the Neyland Stadium seat and sun data is measured

Every number comes from a USGS lidar survey of the stadium, NOAA solar equations, the official Tennessee Athletics stadium map and published row lists. Nothing is estimated from photos or copied from ticket sites.

Sources

Stadium shape: USGS 3D Elevation Program lidar, TN Eastern 2016 collection (tiles 2570589NE and 2570597SE). First-return points gridded to 1 m, noise removed.
Section shapes and positions: the official 2025 Neyland Stadium gate and sections map, lined up with the field and stands in the lidar.
Row lists, walkways, chairback rows, covered rows and visitor rows: rateyourseats.com section notes.
Student sections, gates, bag rules, food and parking: utsports.com, UT Big Orange Tix and KAT.
Sun: NOAA solar position equations. Weather: ERA5 reanalysis via Open-Meteo.

How shade is computed

Each section is sampled on 3 lines (left, centre, right) at every row, 9822 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. Rows under the upper deck are treated as covered. Games are sampled every 10 minutes for 3.5 hours.

How rows are placed

Row depth is set so each section's published first covered row falls where the lidar shows the deck above begins: 0.658 m per row in the lower bowl, 0.7 m in the upper deck and 0.735 m in the Terrace. Under the deck, where the lidar can't see, the rake of the open rows is carried on.

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. Views are only drawn for rows with open sky above, because the lidar can't see under the upper deck.

Limits

The lidar is from 2016. Anything built or changed since is not in the shadow model.
Kickoff times are TV picks. Each possible window is modelled until the time is announced, then pages update automatically.
Suites and the press box are not modelled as seats.

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