Abstract: Airborne LIDAR technology has a capability to capture the ground information quickly,and has special advantages in many application fields.Filtering is one of the key processes in the processing of airborne LIDAR data.Firstly,an adaptive filtering methodology based on hierarchy model is initiated.Employing the fundament of weighted iteration and combining with the adaptive hierarchy process in the practice,the algorithm can perform the filtering of the cloud points data in the city zone.Then the result of it's practical experiment is given.Finally the qualitative filtering assessment in allusion to the algorithm proposed is discussed in detail.