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I have a shp file with some rectangles and I want to extract statistics within these areas from a raster image. I prefer ArcMap 9.3.

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4 Answers

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Your task could be done easily by using Zonal Statistics tool of Spatial Analyst extension.

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+1. This assumes the rectangles do not overlap, though. If they do overlap, you need to loop over the rectangles (or over subsets of disjoint rectangles). – whuber♦ Jan 20 '11 at 16:58
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For versions of ArcGIS prior to 10, Hawth's tools has Zonal Statistics ++ which deals with overlapping polygons, give it a shot. spatialecology.com/htools/zonalstats.php – Dan Patterson Jan 20 '11 at 19:49
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If you need more complex statistics or a free alternative (compared to spatial analyst), you can use raster package in R. From which you can extract pretty much any statistic you can imagine.

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You can also use GRASS for zonal statistics. From doc page:

r.statistics is a tool to analyse exploratory statistics of a "cover layer" according to how it intersects with objects in a "base layer". A variety of standard statistical measures are possible (called "zonal statistics" in some GIS).

The available methods are the following:

  • distribution
  • average
  • mode
  • median
  • average deviation
  • standard deviation
  • variance
  • skewness
  • kurtosis
  • minimum
  • maximum
  • sum
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up vote 4 down vote

As a free alternative, SAGA GIS contains a module that may do what you want (Grid Statistics for Polygons). http://www.saga-gis.org/saga_modules_doc/shapes_grid/index.html

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+1. "Grid statistics for polygons" appears only to obtain a limited set of quantiles (5%, 10%, ..., 95%). However, the ability to obtain any quantile (apart from the median) does not exist in ArcGIS, so it's good to know about this capability. – whuber♦ Jan 20 '11 at 17:01

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