QGIS "ERROR 6: No translation for Lambert_Conformal_Conic to PROJ.4 format is known."

Question

I am trying to clip a county DEM file using the PLSS Section shape files as mask layers... that is, I want it clipped to sections so that I can load my DEM into QGIS one section at a time, without having to load the whole 4GB raster for any little project I want to work on.

I have tried to do this by going to Raster > Extraction > Clipper ... however it returns an error:

ERROR 6: No translation for Lambert_Conformal_Conic to PROJ.4 format is known. ERROR 6: No translation for Lambert_Conformal_Conic to PROJ.4 format is known.

I have found a way to rasterize the shape files and use the raster calculator, however this is more of a pain and I want to understand why this is not working for me.

I assume it has something to do with the fact that I'm using a custom CRS for my county? CRS databases don't recognize it.

+proj=lcc +lat_1=43.57503293972223 +lat_0=43.57503293972223 +lon_0=-90.78333333333333 +k_0=1.0000408158 +x_0=222504.44500889 +y_0=47532.0603505207 +ellps=GRS80 +towgs84=0,0,0,0,0,0,0 +units=us-ft +no_defs

Running QGIS 2.0.1 on Macbook Air using Mavericks 10.9

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I ran gdalsrsinfo on the raster file and the command line returned the same error, plus the WKT:

ERROR 6: No translation for Lambert_Conformal_Conic to PROJ.4 format is known.
PROJ.4 : ''

OGC WKT :
PROJCS["NAD_1983_HARN_WISCRS_Vernon_County_Feet",
    GEOGCS["GCS_North_American_1983_HARN",
        DATUM["D_North_American_1983_HARN",
            SPHEROID["GRS_1980",6378137.0,298.257222101]],
        PRIMEM["Greenwich",0.0],
        UNIT["Degree",0.017453292519943295]],
    PROJECTION["Lambert_Conformal_Conic"],
    PARAMETER["False_Easting",730000.0],
    PARAMETER["False_Northing",155944.768],
    PARAMETER["Central_Meridian",-90.78333333333333],
    PARAMETER["Standard_Parallel_1",43.57503293972223],
    PARAMETER["Scale_Factor",1.0000408158],
    PARAMETER["Latitude_Of_Origin",43.57503293972223],
    UNIT["Foot_US",0.30480060960121924],
    VERTCS["NAVD_1988",
        VDATUM["North_American_Vertical_Datum_1988"],
        PARAMETER["Vertical_Shift",0.0],
        PARAMETER["Direction",1.0],
        UNIT["Foot_US",0.3048006096012192]]]

Answer 1

This seems to be a known bug in GDAL working in the background of QGIS about different ways of definition for LCC 1-SP and 2-SP projections:

See

• https://github.com/mapbox/node-srs/issues/1
• http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/gdal-dev/2011-May/028728.html
• http://trac.osgeo.org/gdal/ticket/2072

Adding ESRI:: in a gdalwarp command line as described should solve the problem. Or change the shapefiles .prj to

PROJCS["NAD_1983_HARN_WISCRS_Vernon_County_Feet",
GEOGCS["GCS_North_American_1983_HARN",
    DATUM["D_North_American_1983_HARN",
            SPHEROID["GRS80",6378137,298.257222101],
            TOWGS84[0,0,0,0,0,0,0]],
        PRIMEM["Greenwich",0],
        UNIT["degree",0.0174532925199433]],
    PROJECTION["Lambert_Conformal_Conic_1SP"],
    PARAMETER["latitude_of_origin",43.57503293972223],
    PARAMETER["central_meridian",-90.78333333333333],
    PARAMETER["scale_factor",1.0000408158],
    PARAMETER["false_easting",730000],
    PARAMETER["false_northing",155944.768],
    UNIT["Foot_US",0.3048006096012192]]

and run gdal_translate -a_srs new.prj src_dataset dst_dataset on the raster file.

Note that false Easting and Northing are in feet for the .prj file, and always in meters for the +proj string.

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UPDATE

I found the DEM at http://relief.ersc.wisc.edu/wisconsinview/form.php and PLSS data at http://www.geocommunicator.gov/GeoComm/lsis_home/home/PLSS_download_WIcounty.htm (in NAD 83)

The PLSS is also imprinted on USGS Topo maps. So I took one township (T13N R02W), and reprojected the shapefile to Vernon WCCS with the parameters given above. The DEM comes in adf format, so I translated that to Vernon WCCS as well:

gdal_translate -a_srs "+proj=lcc +lat_1=43.57503293972223 +lat_0=43.57503293972223 +lon_0=-90.78333333333333 +k_0=1.0000408158 +x_0=222504.44500889 +y_0=47532.0603505207 +ellps=GRS80 +towgs84=0,0,0,0,0,0,0 +units=us-ft +no_defs" -of GTiff D:/Karten/shp/Laender/USA/vernon/w001000.adf D:/Karten/shp/Laender/USA/Vernon-DEM.tif

gdalwarp -q -cutline D:/Karten/shp/Laender/USA/T13NR02W.shp -crop_to_cutline -of GTiff D:/Karten/shp/Laender/USA/Vernon-DEM.tif D:/Karten/shp/Laender/USA/Vernon-DEM-clipped.tif

These are actually the command lines generated by QGIS. The result fits to the township extent:

Background is the La Farge Topo from 1965.