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Addressing the Issues: One Scotland Gazetteer


Description

Customer
Stirling Council
Challenge
Introduce a new web-based solution for managing the OneScotland Gazetteer.
Solution
Development and implementation of web-based solution.
Benefits
National land and property gazetteer which is well managed, consistent and cost effective.

Customer

Improvement Service (Scottish Government)

Challenge

To manage the One Scotland Gazetteer more effectively and improve its accessibility to custodians and customers.

Solution

Project management of national dataset development and delivery of new
gazetteer services.

Benefits

A well-managed, consistent and continuously improving national address gazetteer.

Services

Consultancy: project management, data management and technical assurance.

The One Scotland Gazetteer is a national land and property register for Scotland. It was created by merging the 32 local authority Corporate Address Gazetteers (CAGs) and is a key part of the Improvement Service Customer First programme. The Gazetteer is fully complient with nationally agreed data conventions, ISO and BSi standards for addressing.

TESTIMONIAL

" Forth Valley GIS played a pivotal role in ensuring the One Scotland Gazetteer solution was a success. They led the initiative from initial procurement through to successful delivery and rollout across a wide landscape of user organisations.

We were impressed by their excellent project management skills and how they handled complex challenges along the way.

Forth Valley GIS continue to manage and support the One Scotland Gazetteer, and assist us in realising valuable public sector efficiencies and budget savings through expanding customer access."

Iain McKay
Gazetteer Business Manager
Improvement Servce - Scottish Government

Challenge

Starting with pilot projects in 2003, the project set out to create standardised address datasets for each of Scotland’s 32 local authorities. Locally, this would reduce the multitude of address datasets used in business systems and generate significant improvements in efficiency as well as cost savings. Nationally, the objective was to then create a consolidated One Scotland Gazetteer from the 32 local gazetteers. The national gazetteer would become the single definitive source of addressing for all public organisations in Scotland, again generating significant efficiencies and savings as well as improving the opportunities for data sharing.

Forth Valley GIS was selected to take on the challenging role of project management and national custodianship for the creation and improvement of the One Scotland Gazetteer.
The OneScotland Gazetteer is a national land and property register for Scotland created by merging the 32 local authority Corporate Address Gazetteers (CAGs) and is a key part of The Improvement Service Customer First programme. The Gazetteer is in line with a set of nationally agreed data practices. The information held includes a unique identifier for each property as well as a geographical reference.

Forth Valley GIS were selected to take on the role of National Custodian for the OneScotland Gazetteer on behalf of Stirling Council - the project’s lead council. We were also contracted to project manage the procurement and implementation of a new web-based solution for managing the gazetteer.
The One Scotland Gazetteer is a national land and property register for Scotland created by merging the 32 local authority Corporate Address Gazetteers (CAGs) and is a key part of the Improvement Service Customer First programme. The Gazetteer has been created in line with a set of nationally agreed data conventions and full compliance with ISO and BSi data standards for addressing. The One Scotland Gazetteer also forms the INSPIRE Annex 1 theme for addresses.

Solution

As National Custodian
This challenging role involves working with all local authorities in Scotland to ensure that:
Local addresses are updated to a consistent quality and standard.
Updates and improvements are carried out quickly.
Well-managed relationships are built and maintained with the wide range of system and service suppliers involved in the project.
Effective support framework for customers using the Gazetteer.
Considerable effort was also put into creating the Scottish Gazetteer Conventions and a format for transferring data.  This helps to ensure consistency in the way data is held, maintained and transferred.
Web Based Solution
Early work drew heavily on our strong skills in procurement, project management, requirements gathering and system design. Forth Valley GIS coordinated significant User Acceptance Testing - working closely with local authorities and interested parties nationally to make sure that the system and the data met users’ expectations and that benefits were achieved.

The project  involved Forth Valley GIS working with all 32 Scottish Local Authorities and many other public sector organisations as well as various IT and system suppliers. To ensure consistency in the way address gazetteer data is held, maintained and transferred, considerable effort was also put into creating the Scottish Gazetteer Conventions and a data transfer format for data exchange.

Business processes to improve workflow between local and national gazetteers were established. A strong focus was applied to data quality assurance through the development of a national data management plan and key data quality indicators that were monitored and reviewed on a regular basis.

osg3croppedWork began in 2007 to progress with procurement, design, build and deployment of a new application solution to improve the maintenance, update, publication and distribution of national address gazetteer data. A key driver was to bring the gazetteer data in line with an updated version of BS7666, the standard for addresses, and to provide the means to achieve future compliance with the INSPIRE directive.

Forth Valley GIS managed the various workstreams involved and coordinating the activities between local authorities, the Improvement Service and the various IT and system suppliers. A strong focus was put on User Acceptance Testing to make sure that the system and the data met users’ expectations and achieved objectives.

Results

CasestudyKey Benefits
For the user
• Consistent addressing by numerous local and national organisations used by the public.
• Increased efficiencies and reduced costs by having a single source of addresses for national customers.
• Reduced costs for licensing alternative address datasets.
• Reduced replication of address datasets across public bodies.
• Controlled data management
• Unique property and geographical references allowing analysis of service provision etc. using the data.
• The ability to feed back to local authorities changes in information held.
Benefits of the web based solution
• Improvements in the way data is managed means that CAG custodians can update it more quickly.
• Immediately after a data update CAG custodians have access to easily understood data quality reports.
• Further reports are available to customers and other interested parties.
• System is easy to customise, reducing the costs of implementing revised data standards etc. in the future.
• Web services provide fast access to the data and reduce the need for it to be replicated by customers at local, regional and national levels.
• Data is available in various formats to make it easier to update many local and national systems.
• Customers have access to the definitive address information for Scotland
• One Scotland Gazetteer is continuously updated and improved giving customers confidence in its quality, currency and accuracy.
As well as serving individual local authority needs, the OneScotland Gazetteer is being used by a number of organisations and programmes including the Scottish Citizen’s Account, ePlanning Online Applications and Appeals, ePlanning Online Local Development Plans and in the production of Energy Performance Certificates for home buyer packs.

The One Scotland Gazetteer was successfully launched on a phased roll out with immediate benefits arising from the improved automation in data management processes and sharing access to the national address dataset with key customers including ePlanning Scotland, the Energy Savings Trust and the Customer First Entitlement Card initiative.

The project has successfully delivered:osgwebsitecropped

  • A robust business framework for local and national address gazetteer data management.
  • A centralised national address gazetteer for Scotland that is compliant with key data standards.
  • An automated interface for local data custodians to upload their address data and access online quality reports.
  • A targeted programme of continuous data quality improvements and ongoing development of data validation tools.
  • Gazetteer web services for various customers including ePlanning Scotland and Energy Savings Trust.  
  • Data download services that enable gazetteer exports to be produced in various formats and at varying geographic levels in line with INSPIRE requirements.
  • Self-service data export facilities that enable other national development projects to integrate with the gazetteer, including SEPA's flood risk management system and SPSA's National Police Gazetteer.  
  • Automated Change Request processes to allow customers to feedback issues relating to address data quality.
  • INSPIRE compliant metadata and web services.
  • A public-facing website to promote awareness and access to the One Scotland Gazetteer.

 For more information about the One Scotland Gazetteer, please call us now on 01786 476060 or visit www.onescotlandgazetteer.org.uk.

Related Documents

Addressing the Issues: One Scotland Gazetteer