Tuesday, 14 August 2018

Mapping Mountains – Hill Reclassifications – Y Trechol – The Dominant Hills of Wales


Pen Twmp (SM 988 329) – Lesser Dominant reclassified to Dominant

There has been a reclassification to the listing of Y Trechol – The Dominant Hills of Wales due to LIDAR analysis conducted by Myrddyn Phillips, with the criteria for this list being:

Y Trechol – The Dominant Hills of Wales - Welsh P30 hills whose prominence equal or exceed half that of their absolute height.  With an accompanying sub list entitled Y Trechol - The Lesser Dominant Hills of Wales, with the criteria for this sub category being those additional Welsh P30 hills whose prominence is 33% or more and below 50% of their absolute height.

This hill was initially listed as a Dominant hill based on interpolation of bwlch contours and later reclassified to Lesser Dominant status based on the 109m spot height that appears on the area of this hill’s bwlch on the Ordnance Survey Interactive Coverage Map hosted on the Geograph website.

Extract from the Ordnance Survey Interactive Coverage Map hosted on the Geograph website

A locally known name of the hill is Pen Twmp and it is adjoined to the Mynydd Preseli group of hills, which are situated in the south-western part of Mid and West Wales (Region B, Sub-Region B4).  The hill is positioned with the A 40 road to its west and the B 4313 road to its north and has the Nant y Bugail to its south-west and the River Aer to its north-north-east, and has the town of Abergwaun (Fishguard) towards the north-west.

If wanting to visit the hill permission to do so should be sought as it is not a part of designated open access land, for those wishing to do so a public footpath passes to the west of the summit and can be accessed from either the north or south-west.

The reclassification of Pen Twmp to Dominant status is due to LIDAR bwlch analysis conducted by Myrddyn Phillips.  The LIDAR (Light Detection & Ranging) technique produced highly accurate height data that is now freely available for much of England and Wales.


The 2m DTM LIDAR analysis gives the hill the following details:

Name:  Pen Twmp

Summit Height:  217m

Summit Grid Reference:  SM 98820 32984

Bwlch Height:  108.3m

Bwlch Grid Reference:  SM 99284 32968

Drop:  109m

Dominance:  50.09%


LIDAR image of Pen Twmp

LIDAR image of the bwlch of Pen Twmp

Therefore, the 217m summit spot height and the 108.3m LIDAR analysis for the bwlch position at SM 99284 32968 gives this hill 109m of drop and 50.09% Dominance, which is sufficient for it to be reclassified to a Dominant hill.


The full details for the hill are:

Group:  Mynydd Preseli

Name:  Pen Twmp

Dominance:  50.09%

OS 1:50,000 map:  157

Summit Grid Reference:  SM 98820 32984

Summit Height:  217m

Drop Summit to Bwlch:  109m

Drop Bwlch to ODN:  108.3m


Myrddyn Phillips (August 2018)





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