Download the case studies booklet from the 2006 Awards here
You can read the full Exemplar Award write up here
NLPG awards
Winner ‘Most creative use’ - London Borough of Brent
Having had a land and property gazetteer embedded in the council for a number of years means that departments were familiar with the concepts of referencing and a single data store. Judges were impressed with the moving of this application into a new arena with the integration of the LLPG with Digital TV to allow citizens to access property related information from the comfort of their own home and without the use of a computer. The judges felt that this shows a new level of application of address data and an excellent use of technology.
In addition, the life long standing use of the LLPG has given it credibility in challenging population and addresses counts from ONS in relation to the Census.’
Winner ‘Most improved’ - Dartford Borough Council
The improvements to Dartford’s LLPG have started to break down barriers between departments that traditionally were slow, or in some cases reluctant to share data. This project has helped to promote the exchange of information across the Council, and not just property details.
The judges stated that this was an excellent paper and extremely well presented. The judges were impressed with the detail provided and the precise explanation of the business case and the benefits to the council as a result of instigating the LLPG project. The LLPG has undergone an outstanding improvement in data quality and matching to live departmental data including council tax, electoral roll, business rates, housing and the contact centre all at 99.9%.
Winner ‘Best use internally’ - Sedgefield Borough Council
A simple and elegant application of the LLPG into a CRM application which is relevant and close to the heart of citizens and tax payers. By simply entering an address within the borough, officers and the public can find out their Ward, Council Tax Band and day of their bin collection and recycling collection. One of the first things people moving into a newly built home want to know is “What day are my bins collected on?” Residents in Sedgefield can now obtain this information almost before their property is built!
The ease of use has lead to a pro-active response to requests and facilitated route planning for the street scene team. The application can be easily mirrored to other departmental areas within the council, a case of keeping it simple and not trying to do too much at once. This simple use of the LLPG has connected together many disparate systems and services and opened up silos of information not only to officers but also to the public. It has lead to efficiencies not only in data management but also in business processes and service delivery.
Winner ‘Best use with partners’ - Huntingdonshire District Council
Huntingdonshire’s gazetteer not only includes all domestic and non domestic properties, but also holds many types of Objects Without Property Addresses. Many properties have alternative addresses and each property has been allocated a property type. In order to facilitate data exchange with partners property types are broadly constructed using the Valuation Office Agency’s primary categories but do have some customisation locally. The appropriate Ward and Parish is a further attribute that is attached at property creation.
With more than half a million cross references to other datasets, the LLPG is a rich source of property based information. It is frequently used to produce customised textual and spatial reports and analysis with various permutations of address data by Ward, Parish, street, postcode and property type. All this has benefited in sharing information with external organisations such as the emergency services, the county council through a joint CRM project and also with links to the district valuation office agency where both council tax and business rates have a 100 % match rate.
NSG awards
Winner ‘Most creative use’ - Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council
Sandwell entered probably the most comprehensive paper for the NSG awards, demonstrating their commitment to the NSG by integrating their street gazetteer into many different business areas, from street signs and lighting to risk management and pedestrian crossings.
Winner ‘Best integration’ - Kent County Council
Kent County have worked hard, together with their districts, to set up an excellent arrangement regarding the exchange of street name change intelligence. An example that all two tier authorities should follow. With the most creative paper, following a World Cup 2006 theme, Kent are worthy winners on the Best Integration Award.
‘Awards for exceptional performance in contribution to the NSG’ - North Somerset Council and Halton Borough Council
This year we decided to give two awards for exceptional performance in contribution to the NSG. Since Intelligent Addressing took over custodianship of the NSG in August 2005, 2 authorities have uploaded their LSG extracts each month proving a continuous commitment to the NSG and a high quality of the data contained in their Local Gazetteer.
The NSG custodian (Nick Turner) and the team at Intelligent Addressing and IDEA believe that this kind of commitment should be commended and have chosen to do this by means of a special award for exceptional performance. Winners:
- North Somerset Council
- Halton Borough Council
NLPG
Highly commended ‘Most creative use’ - Chorley Borough Council
The judges believed that this entry was an excellent use of technology and web applications to facilitate the council’s introduction of an electronic service for a change of address and business name. The application provides the public with a quick and accessible way to apply to change the name of their property or business, either online from their own home computer, or in the One-Stop shop when they come to the Council to request a change. The application produces a form that is emailed directly to them on completion, enabling the LLPG team to amend the addresses in the LLPG as quickly as possible, thus keeping the LLPG up to date.
The entry also highlighted the successful integration of services across a number of software platforms/vendors
Highly commended ‘Most creative use’ - South Somerset District Council
In spring 2004, the LLPG custodian at South Somerset District Council was approached to advise on how the council could roll out wheelie bins to approximately 70,000 domestic properties. Some challenges were identified such as 1) How do we identify domestic properties? And (2) How can we identify properties that are not suitable for standard wheeled bins?
A combination of mobile devices preloaded with the LLPG and mapping facilitated the collection of data in the field together with address validation. The gazetteer, containing all the attribute information, was then used to mailshot all occupiers informing them of the refuse collection details with the new wheelie bins. The Wheelie bin provision roll-out proved successful and the LLPG was used to confirm address type and bin type depending on access.
All the data was then made easily accessible via the front office call-centre and 'Your neighbourhood' part of council website.
Highly commended ‘Most improved’ - London Borough of Lambeth
The judges commended this project as a good programme of work to reduce the anomalies and an innovative use of scheme for users of the data to understand the veracity of the information in the LLPG. This has led to people trusting and understanding the data and how it should be used.
The polygonisation exercise will provide many benefits for the council in the linked applications - again the scheme used to validate the captured polygons is simple to understand for users.
Highly commended ‘Most improved’ - Richmondshire District Council
The in-house development of a Gazetteer Management System has greatly assisted in defining data needed for particular tasks which can later be validated by more skilled resources and others that have the wider knowledge of BS 7666 and address management within the council. NLPG NSG Exemplar Awards 2006 8
This has had the added benefit that where required, work can be done out of the office using a 'mobile' version of the LLPG. The adoption of standard MS office tools which have been utilised to view and query the data has facilitated wider usage and user take up without specialised user training associated with off-the-shelf gazetteer management products. The case study shows a good improvement in data quality over a very short period of time and the inclusion of missing property information as a result of matching key datasets and validation of the associated local street gazetteer. Data quality improvement has been undertaken alongside the development of the software to maintain the gazetteer to great effect.
Highly commended ‘Most improved’ - South Hams District Council
The judges thought the paper was very well presented. The council had clearly defined targets that were achievable for the authority with respect to data cleansing. A methodical approach was adopted, with an approach of not trying to do too much at once. This has helped build confidence in the data and simplified the electronic linkage to the gazetteer with planning. Project planning has enabled a virtual team to be put together with the important SNN function central to address quality. All this has kept motivation for the project going with clear goals and outcomes.
Highly commended ‘Best use internally’ - Leicester City Council
The Gazetteer has enabled large numbers of staff across the council, as well as the public, to access Gazetteer and map data very easily.
The number of staff using the Gazetteer has been greatly extended compared to the number that would have used it if it were only in operational systems. Furthermore, in some service areas, the system is preferred to their operational systems. The basic structure of the Gazetteer, using the BS7666 format, has enabled a powerful interface to be created that makes finding addresses simplicity itself. This combined with the growing trust in the accuracy and comprehensive scope of the data has led to its use in all departments.
An excellent entry and good application of the concepts around LLPG creation, maintenance and use to the whole council. It clearly demonstrates that the authority is looking at the gazetteer to underpin many of its services in the future.
Highly commended ‘Best use internally’ - Stockton-on-Tees Borough Council
The entry highlighted the good use of technology and internal resources to push LLPG usage to all council employees via web based intranet and internet applications together with desktop GIS.
They were particularly impressed by the impact of the gazetteer on e-Government priority outcomes, which served as a focus to the project and illustrated to the Council as a whole the relevance of a single, high quality address database.
Highly commended ‘Best use with partners’ - Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council
The judges noted that Bolton had undertaken considerable effort with datacleaning and clear plan for integration with other systems within council.
Bolton now has a much higher quality LLPG which is maintained in a sustainable environment and fit for its role as a key tool in joining up services and improving the service to the customer.
Highly commended ‘Best use with partners’ - London Borough of Haringey
The judges believed that this was a good solid example of LLPG creation and improvement process which was continually seeking new ways of improving accuracy by matching to other internal and external datasets (VOA). This work provided clear benefits to within the Council and has provided the basis for the joining-up of services, both between different departments within the Council and also with partners such as the Social Services, Emergency Services and the Primary Healthcare Trust.
NSG awards
Highly commended ‘Best integration’ - Durham County Council
Durham have demonstrated proactive partnership working across the county with regular meetings and correspondence with district authorities entering into the Best Integration category and receiving a highly commended award.
Highly commended ‘Best integration’ - Swindon Borough Council
With their impressive Flash presentations, Swindon proved with their paper that they are forerunners in the race for integrating cutting edge GIS technology.
