Mapping Mountains – Significant Height Revisions – The Welsh P15s

 

Twyni Mawr (SN 606 938)

There has been a Significant Height Revision to a hill that was listed in The Welsh P15s, with the summit height, bwlch height and their locations, the drop and status of the hill derived from LIDAR analysis conducted by Myrddyn Phillips. 

Twyni Mawr (SN 606 938)

The criteria for the list that this height revision applies to are:

The Welsh P15s – Welsh hills with 15m minimum drop, irrespective of their height, with an accompanying sub list entitled the Welsh Sub-P15s, with the criteria for this sub category being all Welsh hills with 14m or more and below 15m of drop.  The list is authored by Myrddyn Phillips, with the Introduction to the list appearing on Mapping Mountains on the 10^th May 2019. 

The Welsh P15s by Myrddyn Phillips

The name the hill is listed by is Twyni Mawr, and it is adjoined to the Banc Llechwedd Mawr group of hills, which are situated in the north-western part of South Wales (Region B, Sub-Region B1), and it is positioned with the coast to its west, a minor road to its east and the B4353 road to its south-east, and has the village of Y Borth towards the south.

When the listing that became known as The Welsh P15s was being compiled, this hill was not included in either the main list or the accompanying sub list, as with no significant contours of note on the contemporary Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 map, it was hard to know whether any hill with qualifying prominence existed. 

Extract from the Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 Explorer map

Since the compilation of The Welsh P15s first started there have been a number of maps made available online.  Some of these are historic such as the series of Six-Inch maps on the National Library of Scotland website.  Whilst others were digitally updated such as the Ordnance Survey Vector Map Local hosted on the Geograph website and which was entitled the Interactive Coverage Map, whilst others are current and digitally updated such as the interactive mapping on the Magic Maps and WalkLakes websites. 

Extract from the interactive mapping hosted on the WalkLakes website

One of the mapping resources now available online is the WalkLakes website which hosts an interactive map originated from the Ordnance Survey Open Data programme.  This map has many spot heights not on other publicly available maps and for this hill a 20m uppermost contour is shown. 

Extract from the DataMapWales

Another resource now available online is the interactive mapping hosted on the Welsh Government website and entitled the DataMapWales.  This mapping has 5m contours and its detail matches that produced from the OS Terrain 5 product, which compliments much of that produced from LIDAR, and for this hill there are two 23m spot heights shown. 

LIDAR image of Twyni Mawr (SN 606 938)

However, it was not until LIDAR became available that the details for this hill could be accurately re-assessed.  The LIDAR (Light Detection & Ranging) technique produced highly accurate height data that is now freely available for much of England and Wales. 

LIDAR summit image of Twyni Mawr (SN 606 938)

The summit height produced by LIDAR analysis is 22.8m and when compared to the detail on the Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 Explprer map, this comes within the parameters of the Significant Height Revisions used within this page heading, and these parameters are:

The term Significant Height Revisions applies to any listed hill whose interpolated height and Ordnance Survey, Harvey or other interactive map summit spot height has a 2m or more discrepancy when compared to the survey result produced by the Trimble GeoXH 6000 or analysis of data produced via LIDAR.  Also included are hills whose summit map data is missing an uppermost ring contour when compared with the data produced by the Trimble or by LIDAR analysis.

Therefore, the new listed summit height of this hill is 22.8m and this was derived from LIDAR analysis.  This is 22.8m higher than the detail on the Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 Explorer map, but is complimentary to the detail on the interactive mapping hosted on the WalkLakes website and also that on the DataMapWales.

 

The full details for the hill are: 

Group:  Banc Llechwedd Mawr 

Name:  Twyni Mawr 

OS 1:50,000 map:  135

Summit Height (New Height):  22.8m (LIDAR)                                                           

Summit Grid Reference:  SN 60614 93828 (LIDAR)                                                  

Bwlch Height:  4.4m (LIDAR) 

Bwlch Grid Reference:  SN 60576 92484 (LIDAR) 

Drop:  18.4m (LIDAR) 

                                                           

Myrddyn Phillips (April 2026)