Lighting up the enterprise at QEII › ... › gis-professional-june-2016.pdf · 2019-02-01 ·...

Mapping Shakespeare’s plays

Internet of (disruptive) Things

GeoPlace: cost benefits and a new champion

Lord Chorley remembered

Change at AGI: we talk to Council members

Springtime for OS’s Geovation Hub

News | People | Products & Services | GiSPro’s columnists

sponsored by

issue 70 : June 2016

sponsored by

. . . joining the geography jigsaw

Lighting up the enterprise at QEII

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reliable and timely medium for news,information and comment.

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Adena SchutzbergDr Suchith Anand

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or turn to page 09

FRONT COVER: This year’s Esri Userconference attracted a record number of

delegates and many fascinating sessions. Thispic shows the end-of-day reception withbarely enough room for a glass betweenthem! Turn to page 18 for the report.

Next Issue: August 2016Copy dates Editorial: 11 July

Advertising: 22 July

p.05 Editorialp.06 Newsp.29 GiSPro Products & Services

p.30 GIS Calendar p.31 GiSPro Classified

> GISPro’s STANDFASTS

> GISPro’s COLUMNS

p.09 Adena Schutzberg – GIS, Automation and your Future

to subscribe to GiSPro, go towww.pvpubs.com/GISProfessional/Home

contentsIssue No 70 June 2016

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The disruptive Internet of ThingsRichard Groom reports from a seminar on this hot-button topicpredicted to be disruptive rather than evolutionary.

Painted map celebrates the BardCartographic artist Jane Tomlinson from Shakespeare’s home town hascreated a brilliant map depictng his plays, characters and quotes.

Something for everyone in IslingtonQuite a buzz at the Business Design Centre for GEO Business, was theverdict on the industry’s top event, with more visitors and more exhibitors.

‘I will be your champion’ says ministerThe GeoPlace conference and Awards Day for council gazetteer custodiansattracted a government minister who knows all about addressing.

Lighting up the enterpriseA very busy day at Esri’s annual user conference attracted over 3000registrations. With so much choice it left your reporter tired but satiated!

Lord Chorley rememberedA man with a ‘large hinterland’ whose report triggered the GIS sector inthe UK is recalled by friends and members of his committee.

All change at AGI - Council talks to GiSProRecent changes in staffing and direction at the Association see it seton a new course. So what’s behind it? We talk to Council members.

Springtime for GeovationOrdnance Survey’s Geovation Hub was the venue to debut a number ofGI entrepreneurial projects from late night safety to transport networks.

p. 28

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Much ado about quite a lot actually

I MUST APOLOGISE TO READERS for the lateness of this issue. April and May were busy months withseveral stand-out GI events to cover and a week’s holiday in Lyon and Nice could not be missed. Inaddition, as you can read on page 6 (News), there were changes afoot that had to be carefullyconsidered for this magazine and its publishers.

In addition to reporting events I have been talking to key members of the AGI’s Council following thedeparture of two fulltime staff and far-reaching changes to the management and administration of theorganisation. Council members stress very strongly that AGI is in good financial shape and the changescome about following a very careful appraisal of where the organisation is going, against a backdropof a rapidly changing geospatial sector. There have nevertheless been tough decisions, but ones whichwill help develop a very different AGI, one more tightly focused on members’ needs. You can read thefull Q&A session I had with them from page 24 onwards.

Back in 1987 I remember reading all about a report into the benefits of geographical information.What was it all about? Of course I knew all about maps and their benefits. I come from a constructionbackground and particularly the laying of high pressure cross-country pipelines over considerable distances.OS maps were an essential tool to locate features on the terrain like, rivers, roads and other obstaclesto be traversed. Maps from British Geological Survey too were an essential to gain understanding ofwhether we would be excavating in clay or hard rock. But it hadn’t really clicked how in the computerage this information could all be linked and interrogated within one system. A technical trip at thesame time as the Chorley Report to my local water company demonstrated what was already possiblefrom an early system that was struggling with raster maps; it was another seven years before OS com-pleted their map digitisation programme.

Lord Chorley died earlier this year and we pay tribute to him and his eponymous report through therecollections of those who knew him and worked with him on the committee that produced theground-breaking report that gave rise to the AGI and a multi-billion pound industry.

Two things have imposed more influence on the English language than anything else. Phrases from theKing James Bible and Shakespeare permeate our daily speech, with few realising it. In this celebratory yearof Britain’s great bard, Jane Tomlinson has produced a beautiful painted map that brings to life hismany plays and famous quotations from them. You can see the map on page 13 but better still whynot buy a copy for closer study?

In his closing address to the Esri User conference Royal Geographical Society President Nick Cranetalked of “a great age of geography” that began five hundred years ago with the European voyagesof discovery (mainly looking for spices and treasure) and the arrival of cartographers and surveyors likeMercator and Frisius. Meanwhile in a separate talk Esri UK chief technology officer Charles Kennellybelieves that we’re living through a “Golden age of GIS”, a statement which I think many readers ofthis magazine would concur with. You can read a report of the conference from page 18 onwards.

Well, there’s lots to read in this issue. I hope there’s something to whet every appetite. Our next issueis August, copy date for editorial submissions is 11 July. Is there an interesting project or aspect of yourwork you’d like to share with readers?

welcome. . .to the June 2016 issue of GIS Professional. . .

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. . . the committeethat producedthe ground-

breaking reportthat gave rise to

the AGI and amulti-billion

pound industry.

“

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joining the geography jigsaw

from the editorIssue No 70 June 2016

GiSPro is still keen to recruit a part-time editor. You will need to be within easy reach of ourStevenage offices. This is a great opportunity to attend many significant events in the industryas well as expanding your knowledge of all things geospatial. There is a reasonable honorariumand travel expenses. Call 07970 900126 for more details or email [email protected]

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GIS publishers team upPV Publications Ltd, publishersof GIS Professional, Maplinesand other titles are to join withGeomares, publishers of GIM,the website Geo-matching.comand other international titles.The two companies willestablish a new business in theUK to manage and publishtitles addressing both the UKand international English-speaking readership in GIS andother aspects of geospatialpractice and technology.Welcoming the move,

Stephen Booth, managingdirector of PV Publications Ltdsaid, “This is an exciting movefor our readers. Demand forinformation about all thingsgeospatial has never been higher.By combining with Geomares wewill be able to move forward andimprove services to our readersworldwide”.Geomares will be

establishing a new company inthe UK to continue publishingand servicing readers of GISProfessional, Geomatics World,Maplines and other titles of PVPublications. It is understoodthat the new company willcommence trading from 1 July2016. Stephen Booth willcontinue in his editorial role forthe titles for the present time.Commenting on the move,

Durk Haarsma of Geomaressaid: ‘We are very happy toannounce this step, convincedthat readers of all ourpublications – print and online– published from TheNetherlands and the UnitedKingdom will benefit from thesynergy between theestablished brands of ourrespective companies.’

£4 return for every £1spent on council addressand street informationA GeoPlace commissioned studyprojects net benefits of up to£202 million by 2020 from betteruse of the address and street

data that councils create andmaintain. Based on the currentrates of adoption, this representsa Return on Investment, afterdiscounting, of 4:1.The research provides a

cost/benefit evaluation of theimpact of address and street datathat GeoPlace collates, acrossEngland and Wales. The studywas launched at the GeoPlaceannual conference at the end ofApril 2016 by Andrew Coote,director of ConsultingWhere,who was responsible for theresearch. The research outlinesthe benefits afforded to localauthorities in a number of areasincluding: reduced dataduplication and integration,improved tax revenues, channelshift and route optimisation inwaste management.While emphasising existing

benefits and savings from thedata enjoyed by councils,Coote warns that the returnscould be significantly higher ifbarriers to adoption,particularly around access tofunds, staff retention andimproved national collaborationare addressed. He argues for a“Sustained marketingcampaign based on the resultsof the study - maintainingcurrent staff levels; ‘speakingthe language’ of the chiefexecutive and piggybacking onto existing national initiativessuch as the DCLG’s TroubledFamilies programme.” For moreon Coote’s study and theGeoPlace annual conferenceturn to page 16.

Safety and the Dark WebTor (The Onion Router) networkis also called a dark web as itprovides access to completelyuncensored unregulated onlinecontent. There are currently anestimated 2.5+ million usersdaily, with over 1 million permonth using it to accessFacebook alone. Users includeactivists reporting from abroadon bad labour practices or to

Issue No 70 June 2016

news

Normally grapes need to be tested throughout the growing seasonby people walking through the fields using hand-held spectrometers.The data collected is used to determine when nutrients, pesticidesand additional water should be applied to optimize grape growth.But gathering this way is a slow process, expensive and it is hard toanalyse the whole field at once.

In a recent case study multispectral VHR imagery has been usedby the Remote Sensing Laboratory at the National TechnicalUniversity of Athens, Greece. They tested the data informationquality in four vineyards in northern Greece comparing data gatheredon the ground with the information collected via the satellite sensorat the same time on the same day with the aim of understanding ifthere is a benefit using Earth observation data.

The University worked with TotalView, a European Space Imagingreseller in Greece, to coordinate the collection of the satellite imageryconcurrent to the collection of the field measurements. For them thiswas the best way to be able to obtain two comparable two datasets.The study proved that information from satellite imagery is of equalquality to the ground-based measurements but can cover a greaterarea of the vineyard in a shorter period of time. This means thatviticulturists who decide to include satellite information in their cropmanagement planning could benefit from improved harvests. The aimis to develop a commercially viable service involving the creation ofhigh-resolution vegetation index maps for winemakers.

Satellite imagery helps improve the wine quality


Canopy greenness map over Naoussa in 2015 derived fromWorldView-2 data for the grape variety: Ksinomavro. © RemoteSensing Laboratory © European Space Imaging. Inset showsresearchers in the vineyards collecting data with hand-heldspectrometers. © Remote Sensing Laboratory.


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share sensitive information. Ithelps journalists write fromcountries where content isblocked, such as Iran whereFacebook is blocked.Although many government

leaders have expressed theirdisdain over Tor’s existence,some acknowledge that it istechnically impossible to shutdown. It is the ultimateexpression of Internet freedom,and besides a small percentageof people using it for illegalactivity, the Tor Network iswidely used by whistleblowers,activists, human rights fightersand journalists, and is easilyaccessible by simplydownloading the Onion browser.Developers NordVPN point

out that when people accessOnion websites, they should becareful not to fall victim toattractive offers found there, asthey can never be sure who ison the other side of the line.The same rules apply to TorNetwork safety as any otherInternet marketplace /network:for example, not volunteeringpersonal information, andavoiding deals that look toogood to be true. Users shouldalways have VPN (virtual privatenetwork) turned on whensurfing the dark net in order toprotect their information, andshould delete/ disable cookiesafter each session. To find outmore, visit www.nordvpn.com.

Surveyors use imagery forfeasibility studyAzimuth Land Surveys is usingaerial survey data from Blueskyto complete a feasibility studyfor a proposed new villagedevelopment in the South Westof England. Comprising morethan 2,000 dwellings, accessroads and village amenities, theinitial requirement was for aproof of concept project toevaluate how existing datacould be used to inform moredetailed studies. UsingBluesky’s high-resolution aerial


photography, 3D laser models,National Tree Map data as wellas Ordnance Survey mapping,Azimuth completed both thetrial and the wider project,saving the client – aconsortium of local landowners – the cost of atraditional topographicalsurvey.The 3D topographical map

outputs produced by Azimuthusing the data will be used toestablish if the proposed villagedevelopment is viable, helpidentify feasible options and beused in the development of otherproject documentation, such asbusiness case, project executionplan and strategic brief. As theproject develops, the maps mayalso be used to inform planning,assessment of environmentalimpact, budget and procurementoptions for example, inconjunction with data from a fulltopographic survey.

25-year celebration forUNIGISUNIGIS, the worldwide networkof universities cooperating since1992 in the design, developmentand delivery in GIS, is celebrating25 years of online and distancelearning. To mark the event joinUNIGIS UK for an afternoon ofactivities to celebrate on Friday24th June 2016, 1pm (for a1.30pm start) – 5pm at Universityof Salford, Digital PerformanceLab, Salford Quays, M50 2HE.The occasion will include:

- a discussion panel withguest speakers fromacademia and industry,including Professor Bob Barr(OBE), Dr Richard Armitage(University of Salford), andRob Sharpe (Esri UK);

- a poster session showcasingthe work of UNIGISstudents and staff; and anetworking event offeringattendees the opportunityto connect with peopleworking in the GIS sector

and discuss the key issuesfor those wishing tobecome GIS professionals.

If you are interested in whatGIS can do and would like tofind out more, then comealong to this free event, whereyou can meet industry and

university researchers who willbe showcasing the kind ofwork that they do. Attendanceat the event is free but pleasereserve your ticket athttps://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/celebrating-25-years-of-educating-gis-professionals-unigisuk-tickets-24803976

There is more news of companies and organisations on our website at www.location-source.com To get your company featured on these pages call Sharon Robson on +44 (0)1438 352617


news

Caption: image shows the Ricoh Arena, home of the Sky Blues,Coventry City FC.

Coventry City Council has taken delivery of the latest ultra-highresolution aerial photography from Bluesky. The 5 cm imageryprovides an unrivalled level of detail with road markings and streetfurniture all visible. The latest imagery, commissioned by the Counciland captured by Bluesky in 2015, offers the most up-to-date view ofrecent development in the historic West Midlands city, which hasseen significant changes in the last few years. Users of the imageryacross the council are already realising benefits, with a dramaticreduction in site visits and reduced costs.

“The Bluesky aerial photomaps give us an easy to interpret, easyto use, up to date and detailed view of the city,” comments MartinBoyle, systems data officer at the council. “By making the datawidely accessible. . . we are reducing the need for site visits across anumber of departments. This allows officers to use their time moreefficiently and intelligently and reduce operational costs.”

Coventry City Council is deploying the data to users across theorganisation using MapInfo Pro and the recently adopted Spectrum,both from Pitney Bowes. The combination of desktop GIS and web-based location intelligence software currently gives access, via acorporate file-sharing server, to the Bluesky aerial data to around 400users across the Council; however, this figure is expected to increase.

Primary users are within planning, highways, environment,property and green space departments. Applications within theplanning service include review of building works againstpermissions granted, identification of possible developmentencroachment, and the visualisation and contextual analysis ofproposed developments. Users within the highways department areidentifying ground features such as road markings and street signagein order to maintain the highway asset database where it is helpinginform and manage a new gulley cleaning programme.

Coventry gets ultra hi-res imagery

IN BRIEF

A call for speakers has come forTrimble Dimensions 2016International User Conferencebeing held at a new location inLas Vegas, Nevada, The Venetian,November 7-9, 2016. Sessionsaddress some of the hottesttopics and ground-breakingtrends in Agriculture, BuildingDesign, Construction andOperation, Civil Engineering andConstruction, Drilling and Piling,Earthworks, Forestry, Mappingand GIS, Marine Construction,Mobile Mapping, Monitoring,Paving, Photogrammetry andRemote Sensing, PublicAdministration, Quarry andAggregates, Rail, Scanning,Surveying, Transportation andLogistics, and Utilities. Potentialspeakers are encouraged to visit(www.trimbledimensions.com) tolearn more about the applicationprocess and to submit theirabstract. Proposals will beaccepted until June 20, 2016.

Aligned Assets are introducing“what3words” into theirgazetteer products as a simpleway to communicate a preciselocation based on a global gridof 57 trillion 3 metre × 3 metresquares. Each square has a pre-

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allocated fixed and unique 3-word address. For example, the3-word address for the frontdoor of the what3words officein West London isindex.home.raft. Aligned Assetsoffice in Woking is atfresh.parent.apple.

The Open Geospatial Consortiumhas approved the WaterML2.0Part 2 - Ratings, Gaugings andSections Standard as an officialOGC standard. WaterML2.0represents an initiative within thejoint World MeteorologicalOrganization (WMO) / OGCHydrology Domain WorkingGroup to address standardsdevelopment and interoperabilityof hydrological informationsystems at an international level.WaterML2.0 Part 2 -

Ratings, Gaugings and SectionsStandard describes aninformation model forexchanging rating tables,gauging observations, and riversections used in dailyoperations, including reporting,analysis, modelling andforecasting. The standard canbe viewed by following the linkunder the ‘Documents andDownloads’ section at:www.opengeospatial.org/standards/waterml.


news

Caption: from left to right; John Kerrigan (Leica Geosystems), PaulSynnott (Esri Ireland), Dermot O’Kane (Esri Ireland), Mike Cooper(LGS) and Alexander Macdonald (Leica Geosystems).

Leica Geosystems and Esri Ireland have announced a strategicpartnership to offer easier access to critical information for betterinformed decision making. The move sees Leica introducing themarket to the ZenoCollector, the world’s first handheld device thatcombines Esri’s Collector for ArcGIS app with the accuracy of aprofessional GIS handheld data collector, enabling data collection andediting in a simple, user-friendly interface on an ultra-rugged devicerunning Android.

Commenting on the move, Paul Synnott, country manager at EsriIreland said “Location-based analytics depend upon accurate andreliable data, and more of our customers are demanding betterlocation information to support their enterprise decision supportprocesses. The partnership with Leica Geosystems, and in particulartheir ZenoCollector, enables us to respond effectively to thesedemands.”

Strategic partnership for Leica and Esri

C a l l u s w i t h y o u r L iDAR s u r v e y r e q u i r e m e n t s

T h e h i g h l y a c c u r a t e a n d c o s t -e f f e c t i v e s u r v e y s o l u t i o n

www.bluesky-world.com

01530 518 518

[email protected]

T h e U K ’s l a r g e s t L i D A R d a t a b a s e a v a i l a b l e f o r i n s t a n t d o w n l o a d

www.b l ue sky -wo r l d . com

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I FINISHED SCHOOL AT AGE 22 with two degrees andfew skills. As one senior consultant put it when I wasan intern at a consulting firm, I knew “how to read,write and think.” And, that was a good thingbecause it meant I could read hundreds of pages, pickout the key details, and compile them into a 20 slidepresentation for a corporate client. Of significantimportance to that same senior consultant, I could dothat far less expensively than he could. I did just thatand everyone, including the client, was happy.

At that same job I made myself invaluable, forbetter or worse, by learning AutoCAD. I coulddigitize the rough sketches of the engineers andbiologists relatively inexpensively. I did quite a lot ofthat and everyone, including the client, was happy.

I learned a lot at that internship, which later turnedinto a job. The big business concept I took away was thefact that consulting the client could have the deliverables,with just two of three properties: fast, cheap, accurate.Moreover, I teased out, in most situations, consulting doesnot scale since to do more you need more people, andpeople are expensive! The firm I worked for declaredbankruptcy ten years after I left.

Technology welcome! I left consulting and I wentinto GIS. It was still early days for the technology in the1990s and there was significant demand for individualsto help towns, cities, businesses and utilities automatetheir map data. Even then the writing was on the wall,suggesting that in time, many of these dataautomators were putting themselves out of jobs.

I saw evidence of GIS users leading the charge inputting themselves out of jobs right in my office! Oneof my colleagues “wrote the code that wrote thecode.” Jump forward 20 years and more towns, cities,businesses and utilities can select and, to some extent,implement GIS on their own. They can test out a cloudservice without installing anything. They can take freeonline courses to learn the software. They still lay outsome money for consulting, but I don’t believe it’s at

the same order of magnitude as in the past.The fact that government employees and

industry leaders know they need geographic tools,and can select and begin using them withouthandholding, suggests GIS vendors and consultants,from the 1990s up to today, have been successful. Italso means more students coming out of school arenot getting jobs, despite regular indications thatthere are not enough geospatial practitioners. I sawan article just this week noting Namibia needs moretechnologists with spatial skills!

What’s happening, as I see it, is that more and moreof the tasks geospatial analysts and technicians did backin the 1990s and 2000s are automated. There are somepeople “doing GIS” for sure, but others are puttingthem out of work by “writing the code that writes thecode” and “writing the code that makes the maps.”Nearly every discussion I read about preparing studentsfor the GIS workforce ends with “learn to code.”

Humans still welcome! Where are the new GISjobs? I’m not sure the government and industry aremaking many new ones these days. Some existing

GIS positions, including those that involve coding,will provide temporary job security. Others, thatinvolve combinations of technical, people andindustry skills, are likely to stick around for the longhaul. I’m thinking of managers, for example, whocan create order out of a team of people in partbecause they understand the technical problem theyare trying to solve but also because they canmotivate and manage people. I’m thinking ofindustry specialists who can code with GIS tools, butalso have industry knowledge in a discipline likeforestry or business.

Those seeking jobs in GIS in the twenty-teens(2013-2019) can expect coding to be part of theirskill set, but it won’t be the only thing that keepsthem employed until retirement.

GIS, Automation and your FutureAdena Schutzberg gives her view on whether people are still welcome in the world of GIS

and can more be done in getting people where they are needed.

Adena Schutzberg hasworked in geospatial

technologies for 25 yearsand is principal of ABS

Consulting Group,www.abs-cg.com.

[email protected]


columnist adena schutzberg

• virtual cities • open geo standards• big data and location• address management• INSPIRE and more

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. . . marketgrowth is

reported to be20 – 30% year

on year.

“

“ACCORDING TO THE BLURB, the Westminster eForumprovides ‘the premier environment for policymakersin Parliament, Whitehall and regulatory agencies toengage with stakeholders in timely discussion onpublic policy relating to technology’. To this end, theforum offers numerous seminars on a wide range oftopics (www.westminsterforumprojects.co.uk).On March 15th the subject was the Internet of

Things. As it turned out the only parliamentarians presentwere an MP – Matt Warman and the Earl of Erroll fromthe House of Lords, who also happened to be chairs ofthe two sessions. There were a number of representativesfrom government departments, including a contingent ofeight from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport,some academics and the rest from the private sector. Theevent only lasted the morning, but it was a full morningof short talks and question and answer sessions.

Rapid growth Emerging technologies always seem toattract large numbers when it comes to predicting theeventual size of the market. The revenue from IoT is stillconsidered small, at £2bn last year, but market growth

is claimed to be 20 – 30% year on year, reported TomRebbeck, research director, Digital Economy at AnalysisMason. He observed that the technology is currently atthe stage of solving existing problems more efficiently,thus saving money. Development is being held back bythe lack of standards. For example there are fourstandards for low power wide area networks. Goingwith the wrong standard could be costly.

The challenges Gary Barnett, chief analyst,software at Ovum set out five challenges, or as hetermed them – mountains to climb: the things(sensors), communications, security, integration andthe fact that the IoT is pointless if it doesn’t provokeaction. Developers have been tending to use silothinking to focus on the mountain with which they aremost familiar, rather than taking a holistic view. Hestressed, for example, the importance of embeddingsecurity into devices early in the design process, ratherthan trying to retrofit as an afterthought. No-one, hesuggested, wants their oven to be under the controlof a hacker. The IoT is being fuelled by dramaticallyfalling prices of sensors, following the patterns thatwe have seen elsewhere. Barnett said that today thereare sensors costing just £1 that can do the same job asa sensor which cost £5,000 a few years ago.

Financing So the technology is there – what about

the money? Roger Bickerstaff is a partner at Bird & Birdand offered some insight. He drew parallels betweenthe stage of development of the IoT with that of‘cleantech’ seven to eight years ago. For those of uswho have never heard the term cleantech, it refers tothe renewable energy industry. Currently, in Britain, thefunding for IoT projects comes from corporate equity,whilst in other countries, such as South Korea, there ispublic sector money involvement. For investors, theissues are security of the revenue stream – cleantech inBritain was boosted by feed-in tariffs, regulatorycompulsion and standards. Standards, or lack of them,was a common theme throughout the morning.In the question and answer session following these

talks, the importance of energy harvesting was stressed,and likewise the need to minimise sensor powerconsumption. There was also concern that governmentregulation is needed but that it has to be proportionate.

Enabling the Smart Home The second batch of talkscame under the heading “Enabling IoT: connectivity,infrastructure and utilising commercial networks”. Howard

Benn from Samsung R&D pointed out that not only is therea multiplicity of standards, but there’s also a multiplicity ofstandards bodies! Samsung manufactures white goods andso is focusing on the ‘smart home’. Their solution to thestandards problem was to invent a new one via the OpenConnectivity Forum, a body with 200 members. They arecurrently writing standards for 5G communications.

Enabling IoT in cities Paul Wilson is managingdirector of ‘Bristol is Open’ (www.bristolisopen.com/)– a joint venture between the University of Bristol andBristol City Council. He described how the city istaking a leading role in providing the infrastructure forthe IoT, to develop a “super connected city”. He hasbeen fortunate because Bristol was able to purchaseexisting conduit to install its own fibre within the city,which they have supplemented with a mesh bouncingbetween lampposts. There are few cities in a similarposition of being able to install their own network.

Bringing services and sensors togetherFollowing a much-needed break, the seminar resumedwith sessions on standards. The chairman, the Earl ofErroll, noted that standards help innovators avoid gettinglocked-in to proprietary systems. Nick Chrissos, head ofinnovation technology at Cisco UK and Ireland is workingon bringing sensors and services together. One examplewas flood prediction, where Cisco is working with

The challenge of the Internet of ThingsGiS Pro takes a look at a hot button topic which is predicted to be disruptive rather than evolutionary. Backed by corporate equity the IoT is held back by standards but developers

are urged to think holistically.

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IoT standards


© Fainastock02 |Dreamstime.com


Scottish Water, the Met Office and Glasgow City Council.On the subject of security, he mentioned the difficulty ofincorporating security on a sensor costing $2, which mayremain operational for twenty years.

Smart power Perhaps the most interesting talk of theday came from Lucy Symons, policy manager at OpenEnergi. Her company is looking at the potential for theinternet of things in the electricity supply industry. Theindustry requires real-time action to match supply anddemand, and to make use of the increasing potentialfor storage. Not only is the IoT the missing piece in therenewables industry, with its changeable patterns ofsupply, but it also has the potential to reduce the needfor power stations which are currently needed to supplypeak demand. Smart Power exploits the flexibility thatthe IoT brings and the savings are obvious.

Legal issues Emma Wright, a partner in lawyers BondDickinson mentioned spectrum but concentrated ondata. There was an assumption that much of the datafor the IoT would be open and so could be affected byprivacy issues. Also, whilst it is easy to persuadegovernment to make its data open (having overcomethe data protection thing), private companies tend tobe more reluctant, and like to be paid. There is also thequestion about who owns the data and one way toavoid the problem is not to store it, apparently.

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Disruptive tech In an excellent talk, Dan Byles, chair ofSmarterUK and vice president, corporate development atLiving PlanIT contributed to a session on policy, regulationand business practice. He believes that development willbe disruptive rather than evolutionary because the IoT ispredicated on dramatic changes in costs to make newprocesses and systems viable, very quickly. For example, hetook the Uber business model: the company is now theworld’s largest taxi company but it does not own a singletaxi. As other speakers had suggested, the technology willmove from solving existing needs more efficiently towardsdealing with emergent needs.

Telemedicine Chris Francis, director, governmentrelations at SAP, reckoned the origin of the IoT was1874 with an ‘app’ for predicting avalanches. Thiswas taking things a bit too far! Back down to Earthand he mentioned telemedicine. This subject hadarisen earlier in the context that apps that seem trivialcan end up being world-changers. Imagine, forexample, the potential impact on the NHS if everyonewore monitors for bodily functions.This was a useful seminar in pleasant

surroundings at Glazier’s Hall near London Bridge.For map lovers there was the bonus of an historicalmap of London on the wall which was well worthperusal. Visit: www.westminsterforumprojects.co.uk/forums/index.php?fid=westminster_eforum

IoT standards

. . . developmentwill be

disruptiverather than

evolutionary. . .

“

“



. . . painting hasbeen a

fascinating wayof examiningeach play todiscover itsessence and

themes.

“

“

Why I painted the map William Shakespeare is atowering figure in my life. I too was born and bred inStratford-upon-Avon and his influence permeatedmy childhood. At primary school we got a day off onShakespeare’s birthday to take part in the town’scelebrations. As a small child, he was as important to

me as Father Christmas! Decades on, and now witha much deeper understanding of his genius, itseemed only right that I, a girl from Stratford, loverof the English language, and painter of maps, shouldattempt to depict all his plays on a single sheet ofpaper.

It’s a very simple idea: put the plays in theirapproximate geographic position. In the norththere’s Macbeth in Scotland and Hamlet in Denmark.In the south, The Tempest in the Mediterranean andAntony and Cleopatra in Egypt.

Which ones to include? There were manyquestions to be answered before I could even get mybrushes wet. I have seen maybe 50% of his playsover the years, and I thought I knew a fair bit aboutShakespeare. It turns out I knew very little. So thispainting has been a fascinating way of examiningeach play to discover its essence and themes. Butwhich plays should I include? In the end, I went forall those featured in the First Folio, plus Pericles.Shakespeare aficionados may argue about the lack ofTwo Noble Kinsmen or no referencing of the ‘lostplays’.

Each play’s title is shown alongside a quotationand an illustration to give something of the itsflavour. The bulk of the plays take place in the BritishIsles or in Italy, and to squeeze so many in to such asmall space on the paper would be impossible. I hadto distort the underlying drawing of Europe

considerably, and abandon any notion of ‘to scale’entirely. Think of it as a visual pantomime. Luckily,many plays have more than one location, soShakespeare built in a bit of wiggle room for me.Henry V, for example; on my map he’s over innorthern France, a nod to Agincourt.

I tried not always to use the ‘obvious’ or mostfamous quote, but to find something else that gavea flavour of the main themes of the play or aparticularly dramatic moment. For example, in JuliusCaesar, it would have been so easy to go for ‘Et tu,Brute’, or ‘Friends, Romans, Countrymen. . .’. But theirony and pathos of ‘Brutus is an honourable man’ is,I think, way more powerful.

Shakespeare purists might wonder why Sir JohnFalstaff is the only character depicted in his ownright. He appears in three plays and was a hugelypopular character among Elizabethan audiences. The

only reason he’s sitting in the Netherlands is thatthere was a convenient space in my composition toput him there!

Another point of controversy might be putting AsYou Like It in the heart of England. Some suggestthat Shakespeare was referring to the ArdennesForest in Belgium. I think it is more likely thatShakespeare is referring to the Arden Forest – his andmy home turf – which in the 17th century stretchednorth from Stratford.

A Bard for all time I wasn’t commissioned to makethis painting, it was just a bit of fun for me and away of learning more about my fellow Stratfordian.Including research time, it took me six weeks of myso-called spare time to complete.

Ben Jonson said of Shakespeare “He is not for anage but for all time”. That a boy from aninsignificant market town in leafy Warwickshire wasable to observe such deep universal human traits,and convey them with such creativity is remarkable.That’s precisely why I painted this map.

• Prints of the Map of the Plays of Shakespeareare available atjanetomlinson.com/artworks/shakespeare-map/

This article first appeared in the Spring 2016 issueof Maplines, the newsletter of the BritishCartographical Society.

A hand-painted map of the plays of William Shakespeare

To mark the 400th anniversary of the death of William Shakespeare on 23rd April 2016,artist Jane Tomlinson painted a schematic map in his honour, showing all The Bard’s plays

in their approximate locations.

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GiSPro’s Big Map Feature




Buy a signed copy of the mapTo commemorate 400 years since the Bard’s death, readers of GiSPro can buy a largesigned print of Jane Tomlinson’s magnificent map painting of all of the plays in their

approximate setting.

The original painting is not for sale, but prints are available, size A2 (420 x 594mm) onarchival quality paper, signed by the artist, and come to you rolled in a sturdy postal

tube. Price £30 including P&P to UK addresses. To buy go to:janetomlinson.com/artworks/shakespeare-map/

Not in the UK? Please [email protected] for a price to include international postage

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GiSPro’s Big Map Feature



INEVITABLY, DELEGATESHAD TO MAKE CHOICESbetween concurrentconference sessions andworkshops, whilst alsocatching up with friendsand colleagues. This year itwas made a little easier asthe conference wasconcentrated into a singlestream and the workshopsbecame five streams.

Robots and ‘us’ The first session of the first daystarted with inspiration in spades. Tom Cheesewright,an ‘Applied Futurist’ gave the audience his vision of thegeospatial future. The future is, according to

Cheesewright, a mix of human and machine, wherethe machine does more thinking than it does today. Itwas interesting, but perhaps somehow obvious andperhaps a little spooky, that he predicts that machineswill have the same sense organs as humans. They willbe able to see and hear and react according to theirsenses as well as analyse what they see to determinewhat to do next. The future, Cheesewright says, is asynthesis of the physical and digital organic living builtenvironment which can develop and evolve, populatedby autonomous organisms... and ‘us’. Unfortunatelyevery ‘autonomous organism’ in sci-fi world is of thecompetitive rather than the collaborative kind. Clearlythey will need to get on board with BIM!

Setting aside concerns about world peace, this bravenew world is good news for ‘geospatial’, because, as we

know, everything happenssomewhere, so the autonomousorganisms... and us, will needmap data to find our way around.

Clumsy cars, toothbrushesand hats The euphoria broughtby this thought was howevershort-lived, as Ed Parsons, fromGoogle, said that navigating isactually the easy bit. The biggerconcern for the Google car isbumping into objects that havenot been mapped, such as otherroad users. He introduced us to

the ‘toothbrush test’. The toothbrush is a necessary partof our lives and we buy one regularly. The aim of Googleis to deliver products that pass the toothbrush test. Hesuggested that Google Maps, with a billion users haspassed the test. Arguably, Google Glasses did not passbut Cheesewright suggested that augmented reality isyet to have its day, so perhaps the glasses will eventuallypass the ‘old toothbrush test’.

Parsons structured his talk around hats. Westarted off with a construction hard hat – nostereotyping there then. This is worn by ‘traditional’geospatial people with a reverence for precision andcare, and a reputation (deserved or otherwise) forprotectionism. Then along comes the ‘hipster hat’,worn by people who hide complexity behind APIsand make our precious geospatial data available toeveryone. They give access, just as Uber gives access

to taxis, without owning any vehicles and withoutthe user having to master the intricacies of GIS.

Clever tractors Professor Gianvito Lanzolla fromthe Cass Business School asked ‘what triggers digitaltransformation’? His answer was convergingtechnologies. He gave two examples. The connectedtractor is a tractor with technology to ensure that itdelivers fertiliser in the right quantity to the right partof fields, so it is using GNSS, remote sensing andcommunications. Similarly, Rolls Royce monitors itsaero engines throughout their working life so that thecompany can target maintenance – reducing aircraftturnaround times and reducing risk of failure.

Addressing the world Gary Gale from what3wordssaid that maps on their own are not enough and thatthe distribution of geospatial data is not uniform aroundthe globe: London is bathed in it whilst in other placesis it sparse. He claimed that 75% of the world has aninadequate, poor or no addressing system. Even inBritain he was able to quote negative house numbers,the same house number and street name four milesapart amongst a dozen similar examples. His company’ssolution is to divide the world into three metre triangulartiles and assign three words to each one. Three wordsare easier to communicate than latitude and longitude.

Technology and society Parsons, Lanzolla andGale then joined chairman Andy Coote on stage for apanel discussion on the subject “Emerging technology

Something for everyone – GeoBusiness buzzes GeoBusiness returned to the Islington Business Design Centre for its third year with a larger exhibition, more visitors and, ifanything, an even buzzier atmosphere. The industry’s biggest players seemed to have

bigger stands and more new suppliers were displaying their wares, reports Richard Groom.

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Geo Business 2016A sandwich manawaited visitorsarriving by tubeat Angel station.

Riegl showed off theROBIN scanner pack ontheir stand.


and applications – how to examine the societalbenefits of what we do”. Like the opening pages of ‘ATale of Two Cities’, discussion centred aroundopposites and contradictions: freedom v. regulation,privacy v. accessibility, society v. technology.

Regulation, the panel pleaded should beinformed and should not stifle. Privacy is vieweddifferently by different cultures and indeed agegroups, with younger people more willing to beopen. The problem is not so much the handing overthe data as ensuring that it is used for the purpose itwas intended and nothing else. Rigor and freedomwere also debated, with a consensus that it is theproduct that is important and should be subject toappropriate standards and regulation, not processesand certainly not process for process sake. Otherdiscussion points concerned the ‘democratisation’ ofdata and the pros and cons of large monopoliesagainst SMEs. In Silicon Valley monopolies are seenas ‘good’ because they are able to sustaininnovation, whilst in Europe we put greater value onthe competitiveness generated by SMEs. But are wehappy, said Lanzalla, to see the monopolies take all,whilst everyone else fights over the scraps?

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Meanwhile in the exhibition... Outside theconference and workshop sessions there was plentyof activity on the exhibition floor. Indeed the level ofinterest even held up well on Day 2, which bodeswell for the future.

Viewing GeoBusiness a few days after the event, itwas certainly a success as the exhibition grows andorganisers Diversified Communications discover whatdoes and what does not work. For this reviewer thehighlight was the panel discussion on the first day. Theexhibition had a friendly atmosphere and nothing seemedto be missing: whoever you needed to see was there.

Overall, the conference is perhaps not quite thereyet. There is value in independent technicalpresentations but delegates could choose onlybetween high-level talks in the conference orworkshops from suppliers that would inevitably bebiased towards their wares. Also, over a hundredpeople submitted abstracts to the organisers andconsequently many will surely have beendisappointed. Hopefully they will not be put off fromoffering their contributions next year.

With every year this event gains confidence andmomentum. And that must be good for us all.


In the workshopsBig data Externix Ltd showed off their new server solution for big data– Blaze Hub. The server handles big-data with ease which means onceyou’ve captured the data, you can instantly view a 3D model using theirBlaze Terra software. It does this by storing the data in a simple way toallow quick and easy access. You can then back up the data onto theirservers and access it anywhere you need it. This saves time both on-siteand back at the office as you can get a rough idea of the data you’vecaptured and know there and then whether you have what you need.

Vexcel After giving a brief overview of their existing cameras(UltraCam Eagle Prime and UltraCam Osprey Prime II), VexcelImaging unveiled the UltraCam Condor due for release autumn2016. The camera is designed for high-altitude mapping and canboast being able to capture large regions in record time thanks to itsfast frame rate and being able to operate at high aircraft speeds. Italso captures hi-res RGB, panchromatic and NIR data in a single pass,saving valuable time and keeping costs down.

We then got introduced to their fully integrated UltraMapworkflow solution which can support unlimited project sizes and has

an automatic colour-balance and de-haze feature when merging 3Dmodels together. To show the power of UltraMap, we had a quickdemonstration of different datasets, taken by different methods,being merged into one. They took us from the sky to ground level,then moved along the ground and finally went inside a structure inone fluid movement with a 3D model.

Drones With the hustle and bustle of Geo Business in thebackground, Aerial Tronics talked about their new sleek UAV, theAltura Zenith. It comes in two models, the ATX4 which is the morebasic version, and their flagship model the ATX8, which naturallywas the one they focused on. It’s made of carbon fibre, has amaximum payload of 2.9 kg, a flight time of 35 minutes, can travelin wind speeds of 14 m/s and can operate in light rain and snowfall.

The ground-based pilot uses a GPS assisted control system to fly thedrone. Pre-installed is ‘sense and avoid’ technology meaning the dronewill keep a safe distance from any objects to prevent it crashing. Thedefault safe distance is 15 metres, but this can be adjusted. It also comeswith a neat ‘return to home’ safety feature where with a click of abutton, the drone can be told to land at the exact point it took off fromin case something happens to the pilot. But as they pointed out, if ittakes off from a moving ship, you may have to fish it out of the water!

It was two very busydays but with plenty of

time for networking.


Geo Business 2016


IT SEEMS INCREDIBLE BUT GEOPLACE is already fiveyears old. Formed out of the former NLPG and OSaddressbase products, Geoplace brings together datafrom Ordnance Survey, the Valuation Office, other

government departments and Royal Mail to create acomprehensive address file listing thousands ofindividual address points.

Opening Geoplace’s 2016 conference in the plushsurroundings of Westminster’s QEII conference centre,CEO Richard Mason paid tribute to the localauthorities which are the organisation’s foundation.‘Today we are much better recognised by CEOs andpoliticians”, he believes. Intriguingly there’s even beenmention in the Budget of a £5m sum to set up an“Authoritative Address Register”. Watch this space.

Mason reported that OS MasterMap’s HighwaysNetwork now includes Geoplace’s data. On updateshe reported that data from the Royal Mail’s PAF file isnow available on a daily basis and the eventual aimis for real-time updates. A further development is aUPRN (unique property reference number) for health

facilities. Subject to personaldata protection it couldeventually be down topatient level.

Serious interest The eventattracted serious interest fromgovernment in the form of ashort address by Rt HonMatthew Hancock, currentlyMinister for the CabinetOffice and Paymaster General.He also attends Cabinetmeetings. He reflected on the

role addresses have played from the time of Edward IIwhen it was necessary to write notes on the front of aletter describing its delivery point to Charles I when theRoyal Mail service was first made available to thepublic, to today when the Geoplace file now containsover 40 million addresses. Hancock’s first job was inthe family computer software firm where he struggledwith magnetic tape and a PAF file without postcodes.

Today addresses are the bedrock of a moderndigital economy, he argued – high quality anddefinitive; and we’ve barely scratched the surface forpotential apps. The mission is to improve the lives ofcitizens. While letterboxes don’t need to be preciselylocated, postcodes in rural areas can land you in themiddle of a field. With a UPRN a definite position ispossible and is the jewel in the heart of theaddressing system and ready for a world of driverlesscars and delivery drones.

Hancock spoke on open data and how the UKwas first in the world to go down this path, removing

licences and paywalls. By opening up data herevealed that it is estimated to contribute an extra0.5% to GDP each year. The £5m mentioned in theBudget for a new open address database could openup a huge potential, he thought. In Denmark, asimilar initiative has been estimated to have hadbenefit factor of 20 times its cost.

Taking a few moments for questions, he was toldthat too often the work of the address custodian isnot understood: it’s not a ‘Noddy job!’ he was told.‘Too right it’s not said Hancock, I will be yourchampion. I feel your pain and make a commitmentto champion your cause’.

Best in the world Nigel Clifford, CEO of OrdnanceSurvey spoke about how place and UPRNs matter,‘they map our lives’. He is determined that OS willhelp GB use place to become smarter. In the US BigData had helped New York Mayor Michael Bloombergto create a database of dangerous buildings, whilenearer home in Manchester there is now a scheme forpeople to report vacant sites with potential forhousing. Clifford reported that there are now 4200public sector customers using the PSMA (public sectormapping agreement). ‘You have the best open data inthe world’ he was told by a Silicon Valley giant.

Next up was Geoplace’s Steve Brandwood, head ofengagement, with case studies of how address data was‘a platform for interoperability reducing fragmentation’.Using UPRNs in Barnsley the local authority had beenable to link eight disparate databases. Moves like this

‘I will be your champion’ The annual Geoplace event celebrates achievements by local authorities in using addressing to make savings and efficiencies. It was also an opportunity to hear several opinion and thought leaders,

including a government minister.

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GeoPlace Conference

Below: MatthewHancock, currentlyMinister for theCabinet Office andPaymaster General.


deliver real savings to councils not only in Barnsley butHarrow, Salford, Leeds and Huntingdon. Typical savingscan come from previously missed properties whichshould have been paying council tax.

Savings account Calculating the return oninvestment in these practices is a rather dry subject,conceded Andy Coote. His company,ConsultingWhere had been retained by Geoplace toresearch savings. Using a combination of literature,questionnaires, training courses, a workshop and a‘peer economist review’ his firm had used the PESTLEapproach – political, economical, social,technological, legislative and environmental, underTreasury Guidelines for cost benefit analysis.

The area of maximum benefit revealed by the studywas around data sharing and integration. Savings intotal of £23m with revenue and transport routeoptimisation contributing £17m and £2.5m respectively.

Meanwhile the barriers to adoption included lackof funds, insufficient management awareness andsoftware limitations. Coote is an evangelist for thebenefits of addressing but danger lurks he says in notmaintaining a good database. He urged greatercollaboration with national bodies like SOCITEM andNESTA and advised looking at EU research and thesmall cities initiative.

The day-to-day users of Geoplace data are thelocal authority custodians. ‘There were one and a halfmillion changes last year, explained Cathy Coelho,principal chair of the Regional Address Group.

This fascinating day which explored in detail howaddressing can save substantial sums for the publicsector included several break out sessions, a paneldiscussion and the Exemplar Awards hosted by JulietWhitworth of the Local Government Association.

Winners The Exemplar Award is awarded to thebest example or demonstration of local addressand/or street datasets providing quantifiable benefitto the citizen/authority/region/nation.

This year’s winner was Leeds City Council for itsproject to use local address data to verify populationestimates. By using accurate data on the number ofresidential units, where they are located, and whichones are vacant, a far more accurate populationestimate is able to be calculated at any period of time.

Using the address data to provide a moreaccurate population estimate has ensured that thecouncil has access to the most geographicallyaccurate data available reflecting localised changes,to enable them to account more efficiently forcurrent and future service provision such as schoolplaces, social service provision and housing needs;and could be used more widely in government topredict localised demand for health services such asGPs and Dentists.

The winner of the Peer Award was David Lloydfrom Huntingdonshire District Council. Nominated by

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their fellow Authority Address and/orStreet colleagues in England and Wales,this Award aims to reward contribution tothe community, and/or achievement withinan authority.

David is an expert on addresses andhas been at the forefront of addressinnovation and integration atHuntingdonshire for many years. He hasguided the work of technical workinggroups, been vice chair and now chair ofthe East of England regional group foraddresses. He has always been veryaccessible to Custodians, providingadvice and guidance to those who arenew to the challenges of addressmanagement. David regularly runs specialist eventssuch as demonstrations of software modules, forother authority colleagues.

David has been a tireless advocate for theintegration of the LLPG into other council systems.The number of awards of winner, runner up andhighly commended show just how much effort heand his small team have put into making their LLPGa key part of their council’s processes. David is anoutstanding example of best practice and is a veryworthy winner of the Peer Award.

A key focus of the 2016 Exemplar Awards is onthose Custodians who have invested time in creatingand continually improving their processes and whohave made and achieved a real commitment toimproving both the accuracy and quality of the datasubmitted to the GeoPlace hubs. These authoritiesare recognised within the Data Quality andImprovement Awards.

South Ribble Borough Council and BarnsleyMetropolitan Borough Council were announced aswinners of the Most Improved Address Data and MostImproved Street Data respectively.

Awards were also presented forBest Address Data in Region and BestStreet Data in Region together withAwards for those at ‘Gold’ Standard –those who have achieved andconsistently maintained the higheststandard.

Winner of the Gold AchievementAward for Address Data was Telford &Wrekin Council while winners of theGold Performance Award for AddressData were:

Wychavon District Council•Wyre Forest District Council•Herefordshire Council•Rugby Borough Council•Stratford on Avon District Council•Shropshire Council•Cannock Chase District Council•Lichfield District Council•



GeoPlace Conference

Above: Andy Coote -analysing cost benefits

of addressing.

Below: Prize winnersfrom Monmouthshire

County Council.

MAY SAW ESRI UK’S biggest yet user conference.Held in the QEII conference centre in Westminster,the event attracted over 3,000 pre-registrationsdrawn by the opportunity to attend a choice of 60individual sessions spread over seven tracks fromkeynote presentations, special interest groups andworkshops.

Launching the event under the banner “Lightingup the Enterprise”, Esri UK MD Stuart Bonthrone spokeon change driven by the technology of GIS. Robustwebsites, rich libraries of content are all helping topersonalise information for users. We are seeing theconsumerisation of IT. The challenge, said Bonthrone,is to spatially enable the rest of the enterprise. He citedthe National Grid where connecting the workforce isreported to save £35m a year.

Sustainable design and GIS There followed aseries of keynotes before we broke out intoindividual sessions. Bruno Moser and Theo Malzieu ofthe design practice Foster & Partners, whichspecialises in tailored and sustainable designsolutions for anything from a great bridge to a tablelamp. They have even worked with NASA on

inflatable pods and 3D printing robots to sustain lifeon Mars (fortunately for Foster a map is on hand tolocate it, as we shall see).

Foster ‘thinks big’ on urban design throughinterdisciplinary cooperation on projects which putspeople at the heart: projects like the Reichstag,British Museum and Swiss Re (aka the Gerkin). Moserspoke about their roles as “urban designers”. Theyfirst map the topography and environmental patternsto analyse land use. As an urban designer he focuseson the space between buildings, the public realm. Atypical example is Trafalgar Square in London wherethe solution was to close the traffic lane in front ofthe National Gallery. To do all this Foster use GIS tocreate a spatial representation of the design. InLondon, 3D spatial analysis is essential in a citywhere a third live within a ten minute walking timeof a tube station.

His colleague Malzieu contrasted London withthe Saudi port city of Jeddah, which has grownsubstantially since the 1970s to the point where itnow spans 50 kms from north to southencompassing 3.5m people. Although the densecentral area of alleyways in the old city of Al Baladremains mainly unchanged, the rest is large blockswith wide sprawling roads. Foster analysed the metronetwork and found that only 12% of the populationlived within 10 minutes walk of a metro station.Their solution is to attract people away from the

Esri lights up the enterprise A busy day at Esri UK’s

annual conference left your reporter exhausted but satiated with geography and GIS.

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ESRI Conference 2016


Below: StuartBonthrone kickstarting the day.


roads (96% of all journeys are by car) by extendingthe stations into the road space to create shadedareas where commerce and other activities, aboveand below ground, can flourish. Jeddah does nothave identifiable street names or building numbersso mapping of local land use and the road networkwas essential ahead of development around themetro stations, which could be at higher density thanhitherto in the city.

Mapping everywhere A keynote from the event’sPlatinum sponsor heard Ordnance Survey CEO NigelClifford talk about “the changing face ofgeospatial”. The nation’s mapmaker is launching aseries of APIs and is involved in autonomous vehicles,smart cities, 5g, asset management as well asinitiatives like “Innovate UK” which is behindManchester’s City verve, a project looking at how itcan be made smarter. OS has even been mappingMars. . !

Esri UK chief technology officer Charles Kennellythen took the stage and began by showing us arather depressing map of mass shootings in NorthAmerica. The map, of course, really just tells youwhere people are. But by overlaying demographicdata it is possible to reveal shootings per head ofpopulation or the relationship between access toguns and mass shootings. The map went on theInternet and generated 530k hits within a few days.For Kennelly it was an interesting moment becauseas they created the map they were talking about GIS,mapping and spatial relationships rather thantechnology, which is what they normally talk about.Indeed Esri are now looking to employ GIS peoplerather than IT people.

Kennelly believes we’re living through a “Goldenage of GIS”, a change from systems of record to oneof engagement. During the last year, activity forArcGIS Online saw year-on-year subscription growthof 31% (from 24,000 to 31,000) and activated usersgrow by 71% (from 250,000 to 367,000).Background base maps have grown from 22 to 34billion.

Drone app Next we moved to the rapidly emergingworld of drones. Carmel Connolly introduced us toDrone2Map, an Esri app which exploits theopportunity of cheap data capture by converting

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aerial imagery from a UAV to 2D and 3D products inthe ArcGIS environment. Following a striking videocaptured by a drone of Waddesdon Manor and itssurroundings, Esri staffers Sarah Lewin and RichardMumford demoed the capabilities of the app using ahandheld iPhone as the image capture device; andthe scene. . . ? A doll’s house! Mumford wanderedaround the model capturing images with his phonethen downloaded them to Drone2Map whichmosaiced them into a georeferenced TIF file. The appruns under Windows and has three modes: rapid forquick, low-res output; a high-res professionalmapping mode; and an inspection mode.

More seriously Esri has cooperated with theNational Trust and the Animal Health & Plant Agency.Both organisations see potential for using drones tocapture data of their assets and for inspections.

Choice, choice, choice. . . but where to go? Asthe day moved on choice loomed large and yourreporter settled for sessions in the “Gain Insight”and “Lighting up the Enterprise” tracks. SituationalAwareness is essential today to any active service,security or military organisation. The UKHydrographic Office has adopted what older readersmight call the Martini approach – anytime, anywhereit’s. . . situational awareness on the high seas.

Simon Hampshire of UKHO introduced FutureMaritime Geospatial Concepts (FMGC), a systemwith eight layers of imagery, charts showing seabedfeatures, underwater features, land mapping etc thatincludes activities as diverse as volcanic, hurricanesto piracy. This is a serious Big Data application. It alsorecords the traffic density of shipping around theworld in near real time including keeping an eye onsuspicious vessels and navigational warnings.

Rondalyn Northam is GloucestershireConstabulary’s GIS manager. She is responsible forsomething called the “Local Policing Dashboard”


. . . a “Goldenage of GIS”, achange fromsystems of

record to one ofengagement.

“

“


Left: NigelCliffordtalkingeverythingfrom smartcities tomappingMars!

Below: Which track tochoose? It was a hard

choice for manydelegates.


. . . a rule-basedGIS approachwas used for aGerman fooddiscount retailerkeen to mitigaterisk in hisinvestment.

“

“

which maps vulnerable communities. The dashboardcan call up geographical datasets like incomedeprivation, burglary, employment levels amongst16-24 year olds, the location of recent crimes andeducational attainment demographics. They usemethodologies prescribed by the Jill Dando Institutesuch as VLI, the Vulnerable Localities Index.

Retail GIS analysis The use of GIS in locationplanning for the retail and business sector has beenused by a few brave pioneers for years. But today,can any large retail chain seriously operate withoutit? James Nolan of Knight Frank explained his role asa survey analyst in seeking prime locations for hotels,offices, retail parks and supermarkets. Drive timesare mapped, existing (and likely competing) facilitieslocated and linked to open data from the census andother sources. Demand for this data will varybetween clients. A premium coffee shop operatorwill want to know nearby places of work and staffingopportunities while a furniture retailer will want toknow the postal geography for typical market spend,geo-demographics of target customers, etc.

Nolan explained how a rule-based GIS approachwas used for a German food discount retailer keen tomitigate risk in his investment. They needed apopulation of at least 10k within 1 mile radius of theproposed location but also travel times in the area.The final analysis comes down to street level. All ofthis can be done from Nolan’s desk in Baker Street,London!

Scary stuff in the hills It’s always surprising justhow many diverse and odd applications GIS can beused for. The Ministry of Defence retains a unitwithin the Royal Air Force Police to look intocomplaints from the public about noise from lowflying aircraft. Retired geography teacher Derek Allenis part of the unit; he showed us an awesome videoof low flying through hilly terrain from the cockpitviewpoint; scary stuff indeed.

Our military pilots have to train for flying downto 500 feet and they do this in areas like the LakeDistrict and other wild and mountainous places,which may not be very densely inhabited but

nevertheless do attract plenty of visitors ready tohave the pants scared off them by low-flying jets.The unit’s 2000 or so complaints a year areassiduously investigated by Derek and his team andin some cases compensation is paid. A new camerapurchased for a walker who was so frightened hedropped his in a lake; a koi carp that jumped out ofa tank was also compensated for, though not a tripto Japan which the owner claimed was necessary tosource the replacement!

Crime and forensic analysis Another unusualapplication came from Durham Constabulary whereDetective Superintendent Adrian Green was headingup an inquiry into a spate of thefts from museums ofrhino horn, jade and other Asian valuables. Aninternational crime gang was at work hiring localvillains to break into the museums to steal to order.Eighteen pieces lost from Cambridge’s FitzwilliamMuseum are believed to have been worth as much as£57 million.

Green set to work with his intelligence analystDavid Worsnop and his ArcGIS system under whatwas titled Operation Griffin. Some 200 phonenumbers were carefully tracked along with dataabout 20,000 vehicle movements connected to 30incident locations across the UK - some 360,000 mappoints. Eventually 24 arrests were made and 14people convicted and are now serving a total of 72years in gaol. Result, as they say.

Another crime related use of GIS heard fromAlastair Vannan of Cellmark Forensics Services. Hispresentation had the catchy title of “Forensic remoteresearch: GIS, UAVs and the search for the missingpresumed dead” – in fact this turned out to bepresumed murdered. Vannan is a specialist in forensicarchaeology so he is familiar with technologies likelidar, hyperspectral analysis of soil and vegetation andimportantly: integrated data analysis using GIS. Theproject was to locate what was believed to be thegrave of a missing person believed to have beenmurdered. A UAV survey and a micro topographic

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Above: Just oneseat left.

Below: Alastair Vannan of CellmarkForensics Services


analysis and anomaly interpretation were all appliedin this fascinating account.

Survey by tablet Developing an integratedapproach to asset management was the title of apresentation from Paul Hart, GIS manager Europe forBlack & Veatch. This was all about locating andcreating an asset management system of London’snumerous cable pits; 47,000 approximately at the lastcount. These innocuous features covered byreinforced concrete or steel covers may seemperfectly safe and inert but there have been a numberexplosions caused by gas building up within them.

The first task for Hart’s surveyors was to visit thepits, inspect and categorise them from medium, lowto high risk as well as judging their condition. It wasa huge undertaking as every one required a permit toaccess. The first task was a simple risk prioritisationexercise from the desktop. Three-man inspectionteams spread out across the capital equipped withold maps and drawings and tasked with capturingthe data within six weeks. A tall order. They foundthat 20% of the pits no longer existed or wereburied beneath pavements and tarmac andpresumably redundant. A lot of time was wasted insending teams to these locations.

A traditional data capture approach was usedinitially based on GIS maps as printed paper PDFs.This method is very labour intensive – two peoplewere needed to sort and allocate the maps beforethey were couriered to site. Once they were used onsite and information updated they had to be passedback to the office for interpreting and data entry. Inall, 23 people were involved in capturing the data.‘We were paid on a per pit basis’

The next move that Hart took was to become Esrilicensed partners enabling them to have access to allEsri’s software so they could trial applications. Next,a tablet was purchased, trialled and then inspectionbegun of the low risk pits using data that publishedto the cloud. As there were only 23 people on theproject and time was of the essence a subcontractorwas engaged. But they didn’t have the Esri softwareso Esri for Excel was used, which gave the user’stablet a map and a database of pits for updating.

Hart explained that they also used Esri Dashboardand tracker enabling them to see where surveyorswere at any given moment as well as showing pieand bar charts of the survey’s overall progress. Using

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this approach reduced the manpower to just threeroles and 10 people compared to 10 roles and 23people. After a few days of using this method theproject manager said ‘we’re never going back!’ Weno longer do paper surveys within Black & Veatch,concluded Hart.

Getting round London The London Marathon hasbeen run since 1981 and is one of the capital’ssignature events. But it does cause considerabledisruption to the lives of Londoners and those whostill want to get around the city. Adem Besim, a keensportsman and road user, is a GIS officer for Transportfor London and had an idea to helppeople get around the capital whenmajor events are on. He presented hisidea – a simple data stream to a satnav– to a “Dragon’s Den” type event runby TfL’s management to hear proposalsfor ideas from employees that couldhelp manage the road closures andlessen their impact.

Besim’s TfL Events to Satnav Projectaimed to integrate GIS data capturedfrom road closures during major eventsin London and transfer this knowledgeto satnavs and smartphones to alertLondoners of the closures. Workingwith TomTom, the data was distributedand helped lower the impact of the2016 Marathon by 2%.

Mapman’s great age of geography The dayconcluded with a series of awards for customersuccess and a great presentation from TV’s“Mapman” Nick Crane, currently president of theRoyal Geographical Society. Crane has done somespectacular walks: from Santiago de Compostela inSpain to Istanbul and the line of Ordnance Survey’scartographic meridian for Britain. He argues that thegreat age of geography began 500 years ago withEuropean explorers visiting Asia, the Americas andAntarctica. It was also an age of young techies likeFrisius who first used triangulation for mapmakingand Mercator, who he described as “the prince ofmodern geographers” for inventing the atlas and theubiquitous projection still in use today.

‘Today, geography has maps hanging from everybranch and is even on the National Curriculum. Theworld has been revealed as never before”.Nevertheless, he had encountered naysayers in histravels. His travels and TV programmes caused TheDaily Mail to call him a “prat” while the DailyTelegraph praised him as a “genius”.

The final address came from Kennelly whoupdated delegates on Esri’s product roadmap andthe changes expected. They vary from moving abutton on the display to better analytics for Big Dataand Smart mapping in 3D. Watch this space.


After a fewdays of usingthis method theproject managersaid ‘we’renever goingback!’

“

“Issue No 70 June 2016


Below: Adem Besimtalking all things

transport.

Left: PaulHart - theanswer wastablets.



His democraticstyle

encouraged allmembers of the

committee tocontribute to

each discussion.

“

“

THE CHORLEY REPORT was launched inlate 1987 at the Royal GeographicalSociety. Commissioned two yearspreviously with the remit “to advise theSecretary of State on the future ofhandling of geographic information inthe UK, taking account of modern

develop ments, information technology and ofmarket need” it was a ground-breaking report thatled to the founding of the AGI (although that wasnot Chorley’s recommendation).

Below we publish the personal recollections ofsome of those who knew and worked with him onthe report.

Ian Gilfoyle A member of the Chorley Committeeof Enquiry from 1985 to 1987 Ian Gilfoyle recalls askilfull chairman with great wisdom and a love ofsmoked salmon! “As a chief officer in localgovernment as well as being involved in severalregional and national organizations, I spent a greatmany hours in committee meetings. Against thisbackground I found Lord Chorley to be anexceptionally good chairman – both wise andperceptive. His democratic style encouraged allmembers of the committee to contribute to eachdiscussion. In fact, he looked for, and knew how touse, the varied abilities and experiences of allmembers. He did not need to dominate theproceedings but knew how to pull things togetherwhen critical decisions had to be reached.”

“Roger Chorley used his wisdom andconsiderable experience to impart direction andpurpose to the committee’s deliberations. Forexample, there were occasions when many on thecommittee favoured a more forceful or controversialrecommendation, but he cautioned that if any one ofthe recommendations in the report could be“rubbished” by the government, especially by the

Treasury, then the whole report would losecredibility.”

“Our 30 committee visits took us around Britainfrom Aberdeen to Southampton. Word soon gotround that Lord Chorley liked smoked salmon. So,without exception, we had smoked salmon in someform or other for our lunch at every venue. Thirtyyears later I can’t eat smoked salmon withoutremembering Roger.”

Ian Masser Ian Masser recalls first meeting RogerChorley at the Royal Geographical Society soon afterthe report of his influential Committee of Enquiryinto Handling Geographic Information wassubmitted to the British Government. “Over the nextfew years I was closely involved with the events thatfollowed its publication in my capacity as thenational coordinator of the Economic and SocialResearch Council’s Regional Research Laboratory(RRL) Initiative. These included the establishment ofthe Association for Geographic Information in 1989and the US National Science Foundation’s NationalCentre for Geographic Information and Analysis in1988. Although the Government missed theopportunity to implement one of its key

recommendations to set up a national centre forGeographic Information in the UK, the report itselfplayed an important role in raising public awarenessthroughout the world of the enormous potentialopened up by the emerging field of GIS.”

“From the outset I liked Roger Chorley as aperson and found him a good listener who wasreceptive to new ideas. As a lifelong environmentalistwith a longstanding interest in things geographicalhe was the ideal choice to chair the Committee ofEnquiry. In 1991 I was delighted when he agreed tocontribute a foreword to a book on the methodologyand potential range of applications of GIS arising outof the research projects conducted within the RRLinitiative which I edited together with my technicaladvisor, Mike Blakemore.”

David Rhind Recalling a quietly spoken, urbaneand calm man of great judgement and analyticalexpertise, David Rhind found him someone who wasa brilliant committee man and chairman (in the bestsense). He was able to achieve agreement within themost obstreperous of groups. The following is anextract from David Rhind’s obituary of Roger Chorley

Lord Chorley and the emergence of GIS The recentdeath of Lord (Roger Richard Edward) Chorley, born 14 August 1930, died 21 February2016, provides a critical moment for reflection on the beginnings of GIS in the UK. TheChorley Report, he was much more than a geographer, indeed he was as David Rhind in

an obituary recounts, he was ‘a man with a large hinterland’.

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REMEMBERING Lord Chorley


The Chorley Report of 1987 wasthe trigger for the founding of theAssociation for GeographicalInformation, the AGI.



The Reportproved

revolutionary,anticipating theexpanded roleof the privatesector plus the

added valuefrom bringing

togetherdifferent

datasets for thesame area.

“

“written for the Royal Geographical Society’s Journal.

Contributions Here my aim is to describe LordChorley’s very substantial contributions toenvironmental causes (he was Chairman of theNational Trust), Geographical Information Scienceand Systems and the Royal Geographical Society(RGS with IBG).

Roger was quintessentially a ‘man of the hills’. Inhis twenties he was a keen and highly successfulmountaineer climbing in the Alps, the Karakoramand elsewhere. One of his colleagues was GeorgeBand, the youngest man on the successful Everestexpedition; he and Roger made some significant firstascents and the latter was also destined formountaineering stardom until he contracted polio.That restricted his climbing but he maintained a life-long love of the hills (especially in his beloved LakeDistrict) plus the natural environment in general andwas much involved in the Alpine Club (as President),the Mount Everest Foundation and related bodies,notably the RGS (where he met his wife Ann).

Concluding a decade of being on RGS Council,Roger was the Society’s President from 1987 to1990. Unsurprisingly, his strategic and analyticalskills and enthusiasm for geography played a majorrole in re-shaping our Society. He initiated and ledthe Forward Look strategic review – arguably the firstof its kind. This led to the creation of successfulregional arms, fund-raising and the early stages ofwhat became the merger between the RGS and theIBG. His Presidential Address of 1990, entitled‘Blueprint for the Future’, argued that the Societyshould promote a greater understanding of theenvironment and the interactions of human factorswith it – in short to become a Chatham House forGeography In the subsequent 16 years this is exactlywhat was achieved.

Nowhere did Roger’s interests, passions and skillscome together more appositely than in theembryonic stages of what became known asGeographical Information Science and Systems (GISfor short). From little more than a dream in the1960s this has become a multi-billion pound globalindustry which now touches all our lives. Driven bynew technologies and commercial opportunities, thefield expanded rapidly. ‘Brits’ played a key role. DavidBickmore was a charismatic innovator in automatedcartography, Terry Coppock a pioneering academic inexploiting the new tools and Roger Tomlinson wasthe founder of the first major operational GIS. ButRoger Chorley was the visionary who steered thedevelopment of public institutions, governmentaland public attitudes towards GIS, creating anenvironment which enabled those in the field toflourish, encouraging Ordnance Survey to embark onthe world’s first creation of a national digital mapframework and, in the process, re-shaping the verynature of Geography as it is now taught in the USA

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and elsewhere as well as the UK.Three interlinked triggers, all involving Roger,

shaped this revolution. The first was government’sOrdnance Survey Review Committee of 1978/79 ofwhich Roger was an influential and forensic member.It reviewed the performance of OS and options forthe future, including one section (of 10) on thepotential benefits of converting all the quartermillion of OS topographic maps into computer form.Fired by this and the rapid developments in satellite-based earth observation, the House of Lords SelectCommittee on Science and Technology held anenquiry into satellite remote sensing and digitalmapping. Chaired by Lord Shackleton (another RGSPresident), Roger and its other members recognisedthe potential benefits of integrating data from manysources to reduce duplication of effort and extendthe range of applications of geographic information.In 1984 they proposed that government should setup an official committee under Roger’s chairmanship“to advise the Secretary of State for theEnvironment…on the future handling of geographicinformation in the UK, taking account of moderndevelopments in IT and of market needs”.Government accepted the recommendation.

The Chorley Report was submitted in March 1987.Roger ensured that Committee members came from awide range of backgrounds – business, including theSME community, professions, local authorities andacademia. It received evidence from 400 organisationsor individuals. The Report proved revolutionary,anticipating the expanded role of the private sectorplus the added value from bringing together differentdatasets for the same area. It recognised the difficultyof knowing which bodies held which data, theproblems from data ‘locked up in paper maps’ and theneed for more education courses. Sixty five actionswere proposed and many were enacted to address theissues. One tangible result was the creation of the UKAssociation for Geographic Information: in 1997 itdescribed Roger’s report as “inspiring, visionary,accurate… and timeless”.

Roger Chorley was a wonderful colleague, friendand mentor. As described above, he helped shapemany worlds. The Geography and environmentalcommunities in particular have much cause to thankhim.”

David Rhind, April 2016

REMEMBERING Lord Chorley


Roger Chorley,mountaineer,environmentalist,geographer. . . andGIS pioneer.



. . . too muchvaluable

resource hasbeen spent onadministeringmembership. . .AGI was notable to put

resource behindthose activitieswhich add valueto membership.

“

“

GiSPRO EDITOR STEPHEN BOOTH met with DavidHenderson (chair), Graham Wallace (vice-chair),Abigail Page (honorary secretary) and input fromAndy Wells (honorary treasurer) ahead of this year’sESRI UK conference to better understand thechanges, the difficult decisions behind them and thefuture for AGI. Council Chair David Hendersonregards the changes as a progressive repurposing ofthe core functions of the organisation rather than acost-cutting exercise. We are in an age when the

mission remains relevant but the audience haschanged, says Graham Wallace. It is a necessarytransition at a time when the market has evolved andthe organisation needs to evolve with it. Formembers, they should be reassured that the Councilbelieve these difficult decisions are the best chanceof preserving a strong AGI. So what’s behind thechanges and what are the plans for the future?

Q: At last year’s AGM, Council shared a relativelypositive financial position with the membership yethas chosen to close the AGI office in London. Can youshed greater light on the need to do this?

David Henderson: “Just as the digital industries inwhich we are immersed are changing how theydeliver to customers, AGI is looking at smarter waysto support our members in a more cost-effectiveway, releasing resources so that we have the optionin future to invest in new initiatives.”

“Council took the difficult decision to close theAGI office and to significantly reduce the size of theAGI team from the start of April 2016. Whilst AGIcontinues to maintain healthy reserves, like manysimilarly sized membership organisations, theCouncil recognises the need to plan for a sustainablefuture whereby membership fees and events are notrelied upon to cover the organisation’s costs; indeed

a restructuring of our current membership model isalmost certainly required. We are of course amembership organisation and supporting ourmembers is our core activity. Whilst it’s reasonable toobserve that we need some degree of administrativesupport, there are different, more cost-efficient,ways to achieve this – a fulltime staffed office incentral London is well beyond what is required forthe administration of AGI.”

“We are acutely conscious that we need to betalking to members but as yet that is difficultbecause we are only half way through considering anumber of different scenarios and identifyingactivities required. The AGI has strong reserves andfollowing recent changes is now in a position wherecurrent income generation is expected to cover ourannual costs. We are working on opportunities tostreamline and automate many of our processes,such as membership renewals. Future activitiescurrently being considered include webinars,

roundtables and events which follow the format ofthe recent regional conferences run by Scotland andNorthern Ireland – which proved to be popular andcost effective to run – benefitting from strongsupport from our supporters and volunteers.”

Abigail Page adds that too much valuableresource has been spent on administeringmembership and therefore AGI was not able to putresource behind those activities which add value tomembership. It has been the volunteer led activitieswhich add greatest value, she argues. GrahamWallace comments that “what we have is arebalancing so we can focus all of our resources sowe can provide value for money to members.”

Graham Wallace adds that “in our role asdirectors of AGI it is beholden to us to look at howwe can manage things more cost effectively andmake the membership pound go further throughstreamlining the service.”

Q: With a significantly reduced team do you reallybelieve that AGI will continue to be able to deliver itsmission by relying more heavily on volunteerresources?

David Henderson: “It is notable that over the last fewyears AGI’s most progressive activities have beendelivered by a core of committed volunteers realising

“Our mission is quite unique and our work is far from done!” Recent changes in staffing and direction have beenannounced by the Association for Geographic Information. After a long haul and some toughdecisions – the AGI looks set to embark in a new direction. GiSPro recently caught up with keymembers of the Council to talk to them about the changes and the future for the organisation.

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AGI: council members explain


GiSProtalksto:



. . . we arelooking to runevents in a

different way –with a greater

focus onproviding aplatform for

sharing insights,networking and

thoughtleadership.

“

“a new wave of exceptional member value – thedevelopment of the Geo:Big 5 event series andassociated thought leadership; the subsequentcompilation and publishing of the AGI Foresightreport at the end of 2015; and the continueddevelopment of our Early Careers Network, which isnow attracting international interest. However, thedelivery of these have relied too heavily on a core ofcommitted volunteers. By taking a new focusedapproach, with the benefit of a lean operatingmodel, we feel that we will be in a better position todeliver the mission.”

“We continue to retain important contractedsupport to assist with the management of ourfinances and our marketing and communications. Itis essential that any future appointments are additiveto the strength of our volunteer base and can helpprogress our mission.”

Q: Okay, do we really have enough volunteers to setup events, manage them and deliver them on the dayor will you outsource the work?

Abigail Page: “We will always need some degree ofsupport for our activities. While we hope to seemembers continuing to lead initiatives and activities,they need to be appropriately supported. A moreflexible model for administrative support will allowus to have the right skills available at the right time,without the overhead of a fulltime office.”

“It’s also worth noting here that AGI is muchmore than events. Whilst events are a good way toshare insights, develop consensus, build networksand celebrate successes – it is not necessary for AGIto only run events on our own to achieve theseoutcomes. The running of events cannot and shouldnot be run to the detriment of other activitiesundertaken by AGI. The success of our 2016 eventsthus far are evidence of our ability to maintain highquality events under a very different model.”

“There are a broad range of other activities thatexist today and in which our members are able toparticipate. Whether that’s in our National andRegional Groups, meeting with like-mindedcolleagues in our active Special Interest Groups orusing our social media channels to encouragediscussion and debate on key topics of interest –there’s lots of ways to contribute.”

Q: How will the website be maintained? How will theimportant day-to-day management of subscriptionsand membership work? Will there continue to be aphone number that members (and importantlyprospective members) can call?

Abigail Page: “Arrangements have been made toensure that we continue to provide members withappropriate levels of support with respect toadministration of membership, finance, marketing

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and communications. From the start of April, wehave had a fulltime reception service to answermembers’ calls and emails. A service desk system isensuring that all enquiries are dealt with and that wecontinue to support our members on a day-to-daybasis. In this transition period there is a reliance on acore resource that has been provided voluntarily bymembers of AGI Council and over the comingmonths we will transition to a more permanentarrangement.”

“Our website is maintained by a number of webauthors and supported under contract. Along withrecent investments in CRM, our website is a keypoint of access for prospective new members. Weare also in the process of moving the organisation’sIT systems to the cloud, which will give greaterflexibility and present less of an overhead.”

Graham Wallace adds that two years ago a lot ofeffort was put into improving the website (mainly byAbigail Page) to make the navigation easier so thatmembers can self-serve. Abigail adds that the newservice desk service distributes queries to mainly councilmembers, which has given them an insight into the sortof issues and problems that come from the membershipsuch as CPD, a key issue for members.

Q: Can you explain within the context of the changeswhether there will be an annual conference this yearand if there is, how you will manage it without thefulltime support of a secretariat?

David Henderson: “I’m really glad you’ve given us theopportunity to talk about events! Over the last fewyears we’ve continued to run an annual conference;and in 2014 and 2015 our Geo:Big 5 event seriesopened a new dialogue with organisations andpartners who typically sit outside of the geospatialindustry. Those who participated found them to be aresounding success and of course these events actedas an invaluable input to the 2015 Foresight Report.”

“From 2016 we are looking to run events in adifferent way – with a greater focus on providing aplatform for sharing insights, networking andthought leadership. In recent times the cost base ofour events has necessitated a greater focus onsponsorship which has, at times, distracted fromwhat the focus of our events should be about!”

“We have already had some fantastic eventsduring 2016 with those in Scotland and Northern



Future events are likelyto look significantlydifferent to previousyears.



. . . the markethas changed

from GIS beinga specialism tosomething witha much widerfootprint: thereach is no

longer the GIspecialist.

“

“Ireland seeing a record attendance and a high levelof engagement with new attendees. Both eventshave been the subject of significant social mediaattention and continue to play an important part ofthe national GIS agendas of Scotland and NorthernIreland. We also know that AGI Cymru along withmany of our special interest groups and regionalgroups across England are making plans to ensurethat networking and knowledge exchange continuesto be at the centre of their activities.”

“In terms of ‘big shows’, AGI is delighted tocontinue to partner with RICS, TSA and ICES and theteam behind GeoBusiness, which brought togetherseveral parts of the wider geospatial and geomaticsindustries for two days in May. A decision onwhether AGI runs a UK-wide event later in the yearis still being considered – however, if it is run, it islikely to look significantly different to previous years.GeoCommunity has been a fantastic event formembers, however increasingly our members havefound it difficult to attend a two-day residentialevent and any future such event will necessarily haveto be built around a different sponsorship model. Wewill continue the success of the AGI Awards and thiscurrently presents the most likely focal point to bringmembers together at the end of the year. We’d bedelighted to hear from members and / or sponsorswho would like to be involved.”

Henderson adds that AGI has an active, excitedand motivated group around early careerdevelopment, CPD and special interest groups, whileolder members tend to the view that, well it’s donewhat it was set up to do. The focus therefore has tobe on that former group for the future. “We learnt alot from the Big 5 events in 2014 and 2015 whichattracted people who were traditionally viewed asfrom outside our industry.”

Abigail Page argues that it was important for theGI membership where that “siloed” people need tobe more aware of initiatives like Future Cities andBIM, otherwise they could be left behind. “So it wasabout moving our membership on” she concludes.

Graham Wallace adds that the market haschanged from GIS being a specialism to somethingwith a much wider footprint: the reach is no longerthe GI specialist. It extends to people working inanalytics, Big Data and those involved in businessprocesses within organisations. With that has comeengagement with organisations like RICS, Institutionof Civil Engineers and others in the BIM sector.

Q: So can we say that these changes are down to thegrowing maturity of GIS?

David Henderson: “Yes I would say that. I wouldrefute any notion that AGI has completed what it setout to do. The mission continues to evolve. Fromtwenty years ago when we didn’t have Google maps,the Cloud, the Internet of Things, if we looked at

where we are today and ask does this look likesuccess, I think we would rightly consider ourselvesto be very proud of our achievements! We are nowway beyond mapping and the early advent of GIS.Geospatial is effectively mainstream and ourmessage is no longer an explicit one but an implicitone. GI is part of the solution so we have to work inpartnership with other organisations.”

Graham Wallace adds that last year’s ForesightReport highlighted where the footprint of GI hadmoved to. It found that the nature of GI skills waschanging so that it was no longer about the geekyrunning of computer systems; it’s about how data isassembled, how it can be put together from the web.So the aim is to re-position what skills people are goingto need to survive over the next twenty or so years.

Q. Okay, so does the Council as presently constitutedhave enough skills and resources to manage this?

Well it’s not just the Council, says David Henderson. Wehave active national and regional groups. The EarlyCareers Network is coordinated by Andy Murdoch,Special Interest Groups are generally run by non Councilmembers and we call upon an invisible but activevolunteer membership that we often don’t give enoughcredit to, just as the membership at large probablydon’t realise the amount of effort that Council puts in.We want to get the AGI back to where the Councilprovides strategic support and guidance to the businessrather than propping up operational activities. Theseare an interim measures while we transition from onemodel to another.

Graham Wallace adds that there are somediscussion groups which have been looking atvarious scenarios and costing them up based on theoperational restraints and resources. Membershiptoo has made suggestions. “The change in theoperational model will enable us to engage withsponsors on a different level” he observes.

Q: Where does the Council envisage that futuregrowth will come from? Are members going to see amajor recruitment drive?

Andy Wells (Honorary Treasurer): The environment inwhich we work is changing rapidly and the need tobalance membership cost with benefit is coming intoever sharper focus. We only have to look to thegovernment funding situation to see this. However,from the two events run this year and the feedbackfrom the Foresight report, it is clear there is an appetiteif we get the balance right. If we had stayed with thecurrent model, we had little flexibility. With the newmembership cost model and the events approach, wewill have this. Therefore, we believe we are in a betterposition to provide an offering that will halt the declinein membership and start to see new entrants as well assome lapsed members returning.

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Partnerships,collaborations

and closerworking

between like-minded

individuals andorganisationsare key to

future success.

“

“Q: What are the prospects for merging with a largerorganisation like the RGS or RICS?

Graham Wallace: “AGI is a relatively small association,but with big ambition. As members we’vetraditionally punched well above our weight in termsof voice and reach. Our members believe thatgeographic information has an important role in thedigital market. Whilst it is true that GI has becomefar more implicit in the digital society, where thevalue of location has become ubiquitous with day-to-day decisions, it is also true that location offers adegree of structure and analytical value that is stillunder-appreciated in big data analytics and thedevelopment of the increasingly smart societies inwhich we aspire to live, work and play. Our missionis quite unique and our work is far from done!”

David Henderson adds, “In today’s global societyno single organisation will win on their own.Partnerships, collaborations and closer workingbetween like-minded individuals and organisations arekey to future success. Where there are opportunitiesfor our mission to be delivered with others we willincreasingly seek opportunities to do so, bothinformally and more formally if this is appropriate. Atthis time, there are no current discussions withexternal bodies on anything further than encouraginggreater strategic alignment between respectiveorganisations’ missions and activities.”

Q: What are the views of the major sponsors of AGIabout the changes, like Esri and OSGB?

David Henderson: “The views of all of our members,be those individual or organisational, are important.Our membership model has traditionally relied onsupport from a small group of sponsor membersfrom across large government departments andcommercial vendors who value the networking wecan offer. While continuing to want to collaboratewith AGI, these members are increasingly looking fordifferent things and wherever we can we willcontinue to work with them to ensure a two-wayexchange of mutual value. We continue to benefitfrom strong representation on the AGI Council frommany of these members and their views continue tobe fed into our restructuring plans.”

Abigail Page adds that new members areattracted by what AGI is doing through specificactivities. Sponsor support likewise will be attractedby these activities rather than simply sponsoring theorganisation.

Q: So who leads the AGI and what might we expect forthe remainder of the year? Does it want to get back towhere the organisation has a leader, a CEO?

We will continue to be membership led. Without thepassion of commitment of our members, there is no

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long-term sustainable value in AGI. At the AGM lastyear, we challenged all our members not to ask“what AGI is doing for me?” but rather to consider“what might I do to support the mission of AGI?”.Since then we’ve been really encouraged by thenumber of new members contributing - not leastthose coming together to collaborate on a range ofactivities like our Early Career Network, across ourNational and Regional Groups or Special InterestGroups. We can’t stress the importance of this activeparticipation strongly enough. AGI’s lifeblood is theactivity undertaken by the membership and thisstrong commitment to be an organisationunderpinned by active members continues to be astrength we celebrate.

Council will be focused on the followingpriorities for the remainder of 2016:

1. Complete the restructuring of AGI operations –ensuring that we meet the needs of our membersin a more sustainable, yet cost efficient manner.

2. Review our membership model and tradingstatus so as to ensure we are attractive to join,easy to engage and fleet of foot in meeting theneeds of our members, sponsors andcollaborators.

3. Develop a stronger voice for the role ofgeospatial as a positive agent for change duringthe significant period of environmental challengethat we are facing – be that social, economic,political or technological. There are greateropportunities for geospatial to make a differencein 2016 than at any time in our history – AGICouncil are committed to ensuring that the greatforesight captured in our report published lastyear is given greater exposure.

4. Celebrate the most progressive applications of GIand geospatial technologies at our Awards eventin November and look to wrap a new styleconference around this annual event

On the question of a CEO Wallace says it’s definitelyone of the options that’s in the mix while Hendersonadds that it’s difficult to see how they can advanceAGI without someone in that ambassadorial role.

• GiSPro appreciates the candidness of Councilmembers. Watch this space for more on howAGI intends to move forward in thesechallenging times.



AGI Awards presentsthe most likely focalpoint to bring memberstogether.


. . . Nightmap,inspired by adodgy Google

mapped journeyin a foreign city,

aims to usestandardmapping

overlain withinformationabout street

lighting, shops,pubs and

restaurants thatstay open late. . .

“

“EARLY APRIL PROVIDED AN OPPORTUNITY for sixyoung entrepreneurial start-ups to show potentialfinancial backers their latest projects. They werelooking to interest and excite the audience to reach fortheir wallets for seed funding and production capital.

Hosted by Ordnance Survey’s Geovation Data Labin the city, the evening was kicked off by OS CEONigel Clifford. Geovation now has nearly 500members and backing from 80 companies. Apparentlyit was about “geography used in interesting ways”.

The first project, Ment.at was about machine learningso that a drone could safely negotiate a complex routeand perform a routine task. First you have to teach thevehicle’s software what is “normal” and about collisionavoidance. I was intrigued by the presenter’s example ofhow this might be applied. He mentioned an autonomousinspection by a drone of a windfarm in the middle of theAtlantic. I couldn’t help thinking the drone bit was just asmall part of the technical challenges involved here.

Aerial mapping by drone Each presentation wasintroduced by a major sponsor of the Geovation centre.James Prayne of DSTL (Defence Science and TechnologyLaboratory) introduced PodCloud from Insight Imaging,a ‘close-quarter aerial mapping system for drones’.Presenter Anthony Ashton was “passionate aboutdrones” with early experiments in homemade onesbefore they became available cheaply from Maplins.Hours of painstaking work assembling the device then atrip to the local park for the first test flight. . . and crash!I recall it was a bit like this for the Wright Brothers. . .

The aim of the project is to create a >1kg pod forthe drone that includes a web interface for aerial dataprocessed entirely in the cloud. Integration with airtraffic control is planned and the speaker argued thatregistration of all drones cannot be far off. With severalmajor clients already, including Yorkshire Water,PodCloud is currently looking for £80k seed fundingand a further £200k to get into production next year.

Late night safety Apparently 28% of women reportfeeling unsafe at night in London, despite a big increasein night buses and the impending all-night tube. Help ison the way. Anta Zeitlin has a very laudable plan tomake late night journeys for women much safer. HerNightmap, inspired by a dodgy Google mapped journeyin a foreign city, aims to use standard mapping overlainwith information about street lighting, shops, pubs andrestaurants that stay open late and thereby providereassurance to the lone walker. There are plans to includea facility to log-in/out at the start and end of a journey.

I can’t help feeling much of this feeling unsafe ismisplaced. Attacks are rare and more often than not

by young men on other young men. Also, there’s toomuch evidence of attacks in well populated placeswhere people do nothing to intervene when anattack takes place. And it’s nothing new. In NewYork in 1964 some thirty or so bystanders didnothing whilst a man raped and stabbed a womanto death.

Land management According to Tim Hopkin,England has 120,000 farms occupying 60% of theland mass. Yet farmers and estate managers arepoorly served by IT. Tim is therefore developing theLand App, a software as a service (SaaS) solution sousers can get or log data in one place as well ashelping design new schemes of land management.With an API that will be open for onlinecollaboration, already several major land managershave expressed interest including the Crown Estatesand estate agents Savills.

Forecasting capacity in transport networksSmart transport networks should be part of the smartcities initiative. Forecasting capacity based on travellersentering the network, awareness of events and usingsensors in the system to detect progress are all essential ifcommuters’ experience is to be improved and maximumbenefit is obtained. Open Capacity aims to deliver real-time forecasting of capacity based on data from ticketingto onboard sensors in carriages. CEO of Open capacityGerrit Boehm needs backing for live trials and has alreadyattracted interest from two rail operators.

A channel for data Do we need one single point forall data about an enterprise or organisation? Tom Rees,CEO of Datapress thinks so. After a shaky start to hispresentation (why did I feel a sense of schadenfreudewhen his Apple Macbook failed repeatedly to bootuntil an audience member lent a charger?). Reesdescribes his venture as ‘like a Youtube channel fordata’ with a vision that one day it will include socialdata. With currently around 50 updates a day, an earlyuser of it is the Greater London Authority which nowhas nearly 1000 datasets up there. To take the projectfurther Rees needs £800k - £1.2m funding.

Listening to these enthusiastic youngsters who’dclearly devoted a lot of time to developing their projectto the point that it was almost ready for launch, Icouldn’t help thinking they were not well served by anover warm room, a lack of a decent p/a system and, attimes, poor preparation of presentations. As this eventwas supposed to be about pitching to potentialbackers it was an important opportunity that was notalways exploited to maximum benefit.

Springtime for Geovation The Geovation Hub located in the City of London is Ordnance Survey’s contribution to encouraging location-based business

start-ups. GiSPro was invited to the Hub’s Spring Showcase.

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Geovation 2016

Above: Lost in thoughtat the Geovation Hub.


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Postcode-level UKwindstorm peril modelData services provider emapsitehas launched a postcode-basedperils model enabling insurers andunderwriters to assess thewindstorm risk to properties inthe UK. The data is available as adiscrete dataset and through anon-demand data-hub locationcontent platform.

The Met Office’s Nick Moodybelieves that windstorm ispotentially the most costly naturalperil in the UK. “Our highresolution hazard maps are basedon a detailed 35-year reanalysisdataset of extreme gust values,giving a robust view of locationand severity for the most com -monly researched return periods.”

The perils model provides adetailed perspective into thedistribution of risk based on MetOffice data tracking the most


extreme winds. Created throughclose liaison with insurance sectorclients, it provides postcode-sector level granularity along withdetailed risk scoring.

No-fly zones for dronesThe latest version of EuropaTechnologies’ global map dataproducts includes layers whichcan assist in the creation of no-flyzones for unmanned aerialvehicles (UAVs). A recent aircraft-drone collision in which a BritishAirways A320 aircraft was struckby a drone during its approachinto London Heathrow airporthighlights the problem.

Many media reports havereferred to on-board “geofencing”which is the concept of using GPS(or other positioning techno -logies) with a reference databaseof explicit areas which areinclusion or exclusion zones.

Should a geofence rule bebroken, an action can be taken. Inthe case of a drone, take-off couldbe blocked or onward movementrestricted. Some makers ofpopular UAVs, such as Chinesemanufacturer DJI, includegeofencing in their products asstandard.

In addition to an extensivedatabase of airports worldwide,Europa Technologies’ GlobalInsight Plus and GlobalDiscovery data products includea new airport areas layer.Captured from satellite imagery,the data outlines the opera -tional area of over 3000international and domesticairports worldwide, which canbe used to build buffered no-flyzones. Europa Technologies’Warren Vick comments, “Withthe FAA predicting that therewill be over 7 million smalldrones in US airspace by 2020,it is critical for the future of theindustry that mandatory safetycontrols, including geofencing,are universally implemented.”

Support for latest OpenDataproducts and MasterMapstylingBritish GIS software developerCadcorp has provided softwaresupport for three free-to-usedata products from OrdnanceSurvey. Support for OS OpenMap - Local; OS Open Roads; andOS Open Rivers was added in arecent service release of theCadcorp Spatial InformationSystem (SIS) software suite. Thethree vector-based datasetsprovide a nationally-consistentand high-level cartographic viewof buildings, road networks andrivers and waterways throughoutGreat Britain.

According to the OrdnanceSurvey, OS Open Map - Localprovides the most detailed level ofbuildings in the OS OpenDatasuite. OS Open Roads is a con -nect ed road network, andcontains all classified roads (such

as motorways and A & B roads) aswell as officially named unclass -ified roads. OS Open Rivers is ageneralised open water networkshowing the flow and thelocations of rivers, streams, lakesand canals. The three productshave been designed to be usedtogether.

OS OpenData products arefree to view or download for bothpersonal and commercial applic -ations and are used by manyCadcorp customers to provide abackground against which to viewidentifiable features in thelandscape for their own businessdata. This opens up extensivepossibilities for the users, allowingfor example, Cadcorp’s MapModeller software to run networkanalyses on the Open Roads data.Users of Cadcorp’s free desktopproduct, Map Express, can accessall of the OS OpenData, changethe style of the OS maps,determine which types of featuresto display or highlight, performspatial and attribute queries, andundertake thematic mapping.

Cadcorp’s Martin McGarry,underlined the significance ofsupporting these free mappingproducts. “Many of ourcustomers... depend on mappingfrom our national mappingagency... Cadcorp is an activemember of the OS Insightprogramme and as such has earlyaccess to new product develop -ments at the OS. We have usedthis position to make it as easy aspossible for our customers to readOS data formats and to importthis data into Cadcorp SIS.”

The new service release alsoincludes support for OSMasterMap Topographic LayerV9 Schema, providing 76 newdescriptive term attributes.Meanwhile, a new version ofMap Express which supports thethree Open Data products andthe new Topographic Layer V9Schema, can be downloadedfrom the Cadcorp website athttp://www.cadcorp.com

There is more news of products and services on our website at www.pvpubs.com To get your company featured on this page call Sharon Robson on +44 (0)1438 352617


products

CartoConsult, provider of smart 3D building and city models, can nowdeliver 3D city and building models on subscription via the web. Withlive web streaming, CyberCity 3D models can be instantly viewedanywhere, anytime on tablets, smartphones, interactive screens andPCs. Using Cesiumjs open architecture, a cross-platform virtual globedesigned for dynamic-data visualisation, can significantly boost theappeal of applying 3D capability to projects. The data is still fullycompatible with GIS, CAD and other mapping software with 3Dcapabilities, but it is no longer a requirement for viewing the data.

Tim Hughes, MD of CartoConsult 3D adds “Cesiumjs is the bestplatform for visualising spatial data on the web with high qualitygraphics and an easy, interactive user interface that is ideal for viewingour 3D smart city and building models. It offers lightweight, openarchitecture that can be deployed across multiple device types,including tablets, smartphones, interactive screens and of course thetraditional desktop. It also works as a ‘behind the firewall’ applicationfor defence or security conscious clients.”

calendarIssue No 70 June 2016

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| seminars | conferences | exhibitions | courses | events | workshops | symposiums |We welcome advance details of conferences, seminars, exhibitions and other events which are likely to be of interest to the GIS community. Please mention the name of the event, venue, date and point of contact for further information and send to Jason PooleGISPro, 2B North Road, Stevenage, Herts SG1 4AT or e-mail: [email protected].

Esri User Conference 201627th June - 1st July 2016, California, USAwww.esri.com/events/user-conference

ISPRS12-19th July 2016, Prague, Czech Republicwww.isprs2016-prague.com/

BCS - SoC Conference 20166-8th September 2016, Cheltenham, UKwww.cartography.org.uk/default.asp?contentID=581

GeoDATA Showcase 2016 Scotland6th October 2016, Assembly Rooms, Edinburgh, Scotlandwww.geoaware.info/#!geodata-seminars/c23xn

Intergeo 201611-13th October 2016, Hamburg, Germanywww.intergeo.de/intergeo-en/index.php

GeoDATA 2016 Brussels19th October 2016,, Brussels, Belgiumwww.geoaware.info/#!geodata-seminars/c23xn

The Commercial UAV Show 201619-20th October 2016, London, UKwww.terrapinn.com/exhibition/the-commercial-uav-show/index.stm

Trimble Dimensions 2016 User Conference7-9th November 2016, The Venetian, Las Vegas, USAwww.trimbledimensions.com/

GSDI 15 Conference 201628 November-2nd December 2016, Taipei City, Taiwanhttp://gsdi15.org.tw/

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