PR - The EU's eSDI-Net+ project for identifying best practice in sub-national Spatial Data Infrastructures is holding its UK/Ireland workshop at the Foresight Centre in Liverpool on 11th Feb.

This is one of a series of workshops across the EU which aims to find good examples of spatial data infrastructures below the national level. The INSPIRE Directive now being implemented calls for much greater collaboration between all organisations providing and using spatial information for environmental purposes.

The best practices are being identified under four headings:

• Technology, innovation and originality


• INSPIRE compliance or readiness


• Co-operation across organisations or disciplines


• Applicability to other countries, regions or disciplines

This workshop is being run by Robin Waters, of RSW Geomatics and Professor Ian Masser, author of 'Building European Spatial Data Infrastructures' who are both Advisory Board members of eSDI-Net+. It is supported by the Association of Geographic Information (AGI), the Irish Organisation for Geographic Information (IRLOGI) and the European Umbrella Group for GI (EUROGI)

The workshop will hear about best practice from 12 SDIs from the UK and Ireland including:

• Atkins PUSH - making flood risk information available to planners and the public for the Partnership for Urban South Hampshire


• Atlantis - a collaborative initiative involving government agencies for better modelling and prediction of flood events for the 21st century


• Dudley - Getting Information Simply - Maps On-line (GISMO) is available on every PC in Dudley - from the primary school classroom to the council chamber


• EDINA - the UK's national academic data centre that provides an on-line service to over 40,000 users that must all be licensed & monitored


• Fingal DataHub - Fingal County Council's administrative SDI covering northern Dublin and the airport


• Forth Valley GIS - a joint commercial venture between three Scottish Councils which is expanding a shared service model for spatial data


• GeoHub NI - Northern Ireland's unique portal for government, councils and citizens to find and use spatial information on their desk tops


• Irish Spatial Data Exchange (ISDE) - for scientific and environmental data holdings


• Marine Environmental Data Information Network - a new initiative to access information about the UK's exclusive economic zone from many different agencies and research centres


• National Land & Property and Street Gazetteers (NLPG/NSG) - local government's definitive gazetteers maintained & used by 400 councils in England and Wales


• South Dublin Connect - using spatial data as a catalyst for an organisational change programme


• S.Wales Fire & Rescue Service - a cutting edge infrastructure for an emergency service used in real time for co-ordinating responses over ten council areas.

The workshop will discuss and validate 'best practices' that have been identified by the project and help to set up the criteria for judging a pan European award - a sort of Euro-SDI-Vision competition that is being run during 2009. http://www.esdinetplus.eu/ 

Any queries about the workshop - which may have some places available - please email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or phone 01480 386644