With millions of pounds of public money being spent on civil assets every year, it is the role of the Strategic Investment Board (SIB) to keep citizens and industry informed about current and planned projects. To assist it in this mission, SIB has launched a new on-line Strategic Investment Portal incorporating ArcGIS at www.isni.gov.uk
Unique in many respects, this interactive solution points the way ahead for governments around the world.
Strategic Investment Board Case Study
Introduction
Across Northern Ireland, schools and colleges are being modernised, a new water and waste water infrastructure is being delivered, roads are being improved and much more besides. So much so that ESRI’s Gov 2.0 web site now features the SIB Investment Portal site on their home page. See http://www.esri.com/industries/gov20/mapping-applications.html
The Client
The Strategic Investment Board(SIB) supports the Northern Ireland Executive and government departments in delivering the investment strategy for Northern Ireland. Owned by the Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister (OFMDFM), the organisation provides strategic advice on the co-ordination, financing and procurement of major capital projects across the region, with the singular aim of accelerating delivery and securing value for the public purse.
The Challenge
One of the SIB’s biggest challenges was to find a way to communicate government plans to all of the various stakeholders, as well as the general public. “It is important in these more challenging economic times that the government can communicate the positive things that are happening”, says Martin Spollen, Strategic Adviser at SIB. There is a lot of change and tangible investment going across the region. We wanted to find a way to help the Executive to communicate this to a diverse stakeholder base”
Solution
To address this challenge, SIB decided to develop an on-line information portal to provide private sector contractors and the general public with visibility of all current and planned capital investment in Northern Ireland.
Benefits
“The solution is an outstanding example of how GIS can be used to really drive forwards people’s understanding of what is happening across a large and diverse landscape in different timescales, with different bodies”, believes Spollen.
Technology Used
The entire project took less than six months to complete, with most of this time being devoted to the development of the back end systems. “The deployment of ArcGIS as part of the total solution was very straightforward” recalls Spollen.
Northern Ireland Housing Executive
The Executive is one of the largest property owners in Europe, it is a long standing user of ArcGIS and has an active and productive GIS Unit .
Introduction
The Executive is one of the largest property owners in Europe, it is a long standing user of ArcGIS and has an active and productive GIS Unit
Client
The Northern Ireland Housing Executive is a Non-Departmental Public Body, established by the Housing Executive Act (Northern Ireland) 1971. Under this Act, the Executive took over the housing responsibilities of 65 separate authorities and became Northern Ireland’s overall housing authority.
Challenge
The ongoing challenge for NIHE is how to best use GIS to facilitate the management of its extensive property portfolio, whilst leveraging the skills of it’s GIS unit.
Solution
In addition to building an extensive corporate GIS with a central Geodatabase the Executive has built a range of both desktop browser based applications that can visualize, analyise and report on information held in the Geodatabase from a wide variety of perspectives depending on the business need. This suite of applications support every stage of the Executive’s business cycle from initial assessment of need for public housing, planning developments, property transactions, grounds maintenance and subsequent social need applications.
Benefits
As a result of their success with ArcGIS the Executive contend that ”considerable time resources have been saved by the access to this information and efficiencies have been generated with regard to enhanced spatial planning analysis and improved decision making”. Recognizing the value of ArcGIS to their organization the Executive, through ESRI Ireland, have now signed a three year Enterprise License Agreement with ESRI Inc., and intend over that time to make even greater use of ArcGIS across their business.
Technology Used
The Executive has built a extensive corporate GIS with a central Geodatabase as its foundation. The Geodatabase contains a wealth of data pertaining to the individual properties under the Executive’s management as well as geo-demographic and socio economic information pertaining to the population.
Case Studies Railway Procurement Agency
The RPA's is charged with overseeing the operation of the Luas system, along with the planning of new Luas and Metro lines for Dublin as laid out under the Governments Transport 21 Investment Programme.
Introduction
The RPA's is charged with overseeing the operation of the Luas system, along with the planning of new Luas and Metro lines for Dublin as laid out under the Governments Transport 21 investment programme.
Client
The Railway Procurement Agency (RPA) www.rpa.ie is a State Agency of the Department of Transport in charged with the development of light railway and metro infrastructure.
The Challenge
An essential stage in the development of a railway is the identification and careful cataloguing of the information related to every property that will be affected by the railway alignment. To facilitate this process the RPA use ArcView from ESRI Inc., to compile a Geodatabase of properties along each alignment that will be affected by the railway, either temporarily during the construction or permanently thereafter. To each property on the digital map the RPA attaches the relevant information on ownership including a description of the premises, its area, the occupiers, lessees and owners as well as references to paper based information held on file.
The Solution
Once catalogued in this way the information is then available to any person in RPA who has access to the Geodatabase simply by clicking the relevant position on the map. This has greatly facilitated access to property information across the organization as the Geodatabase now becomes a single de-facto source of information which is easily accessed. It has overcome the problem associated with paper based systems whereby the paper files can be difficult to retrieve or often may simply be unavailable because they are being consulted by another person.
The Benefits
ArcGIS Server could also extend the reach of GIS both within the RPA and also amongst its external stakeholders. For example using ArcGIS Server opens up the opportunity to share the information via the Internet with external stakeholders such as the Local Authorities, Property Owners and Developers as well as Contractors who may be carrying our work on behalf of RPA.
The Technology Used
The RPA is now working on implementing ArcGIS Server based technology. ArcGIS Server effectively makes the Geodatabase accessible to anyone within the organization who has an Internet Browser. This reduces the level of expertise required to access the property information and also means that property information can be simply hyperlinked to from other information sources and databases.
ArcView
An essential stage in the development of a railway is the identification and careful cataloguing of the information related to every property that will be affected by the railway alignment. To facilitate this process the RPA use ArcView from ESRI Inc., to compile a Geodatabase of properties along each alignment that will be affected by the railway, either temporarily during the construction or permanently thereafter.
ArcGIS Server
The RPA is now working on implementing ArcGIS Server based technology. ArcGIS Server effectively makes the Geodatabase accessible to anyone within the organization who has an Internet Browser. This reduces the level of expertise required to access the property information and also means that property information can be simply hyperlinked to from other information sources and databases.