GEOPOLIS: GEO-Information made accessible for everybody

Flevoland is the youngest Province of the Netherlands, literally being “made” out of the North Sea as recent as 1945. Where once was only water with some small islands is now the most desired region of space in the crowded small country of the Dutch. The design and planning of this region is vital to the survival of the countries growth. The province of Flevoland has developed an advanced method with respect to the use of geo related information to support its young population with more influence on what their new land is designed into.

Geo information is made accessible and unambiguous for other public authorities and the citizen. This working method has become pivotal under the name “Geopolis” in Flevoland.
The timing seemed right. The second Dutch cabinet of Balkenende was working on a more enterprising government and for the first time one spoke about digital access to government information and exchange of digital zoning plans.

The Provinces in The Netherlands deal with more than only the national eGovernment plans. They have to implement the DURP initiative on digitalisation of Spatial Plans and the semantic exchangeability of zoning plans as well. These will be building blocks of the new Law of Spatial Development (nWRO)

An important part of the nWROis fact thatit is now obligatory to have all zoning plans available in digital format. For that reason Flevoland has launched the Prof project with all partners directly involved. Policy makers, geo visualisation and Geo ICT had to work in close harmony to create faster decision making . Flevoland went beyond the demands or the legal obligations of the nWRO.  They realised that in order to develop integrated policies for  the planning of the future of the Province, they would have to include all policy sectors and provide the actors with al relevant information.
The Province decided to have a number of principles for planning information with legal relevance:

  1. Single objects in all documents;
  2. Uniform exchangeability of information for all partners in the chain;

Geo-information would be an active platform for policies;

According to the Province, the collaboration wit municipalities, waterboards and other public authorities in the policy formation chain is intimately connected to the exchange of information, policy formation, deliberation and access to plans. At he chain view on service delivery poses an additional challenge to the teams working on Geopolis.It had serious consequences for the cartographers of the Province, for instance. The most important change to earlier ways of working has been the use of maps as means towards decision making and deliberation rather than a representation of the decisions AFTER they had been made. Different sectors of policies can be compared regarding their effect on the region and all players have a more comprehensive overview of the legal consequences for their interests.

Regional development Plan

The “Omgevingsplan” counting over 200 pages, is the Dutch regional development plan for the area and it is legally binding. The Omgevingsplan for 2006 had already been created together with all partners in the policy chain.The objects on the map to be governed and the texts expressing the policy intentions are made in digitally exchangeable format.

Semantic interoperability
The same word can have different meaning in different policy sectors and some concepts may have more meanings the other way around. Beside the meaning of a word, the status in the deliberation process can differ as well; a plan tekst can have different legal status, like enforcement framework or just a vision scenario on the future or purely informative updates. To avoid confusion during deliberations due to comparison between texts and words and policies with a different legal status level, all maps received a status-tag of T (enforcement), I (informative) or V (Vision). Speaking the same language is important in planning development.!

Visusalisation in 3D
Flevoland realised that technology van support deliberation in more ways than one: if the data is stored in the right way, one can represent new ideas and plans in 3D format far more easily .It can also help to simulate future developments. This potential is now being exploited for an important part of the region and one of the most ambitious projects combining recreation, the European Natura 2000 directive and economy  ; the Oostvaarderwold.

Ketenrelaties

 

Samenwerken

Geo-communicatie
Hetzelfde woord kan in diverse beleidsvelden verschillende betekenissen hebben en andersom kan een bepaald begrip meerdere benamingen hebben terwijl hetzelfde wordt bedoeld. Ook de status van een plan kan verschillen: is het een toetsingskader, geeft het een visie weer of dient het slechts ter informatie? Om te voorkomen dat appels met peren worden vergeleken, wordt aan de beleid- en kaarttekst een status toegekend. Een T staat voor toetsingskaart en juridisch kloppend, de V staat voor visie en de I staat voor informatief. Dezelfde taal spreken is erg belangrijk voor het samen maken van plannen!

Geo information is now an integrated part of policy generation and policy expression. The texts and the maps are consist in the ways they sow what is allowed and what is planned and what is still under deliberation. But it is not ready by far:

The Feed project
Feed is part of the European funded eParticipation programme  http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/egovernment/implementation/prep_action/index_en.htm   . It is one of the 8 research initiatives aimed at showing the possibilities of ICT technologies  to include citizens , business and other players into the deliberation process. They are to be showcases http://www.ep-momentum.eu/   of participation, eDemocracy and improved decision making. Feed is coordinated by the University of Athens, Greece. The Dutch part of Feed consists of Flevoland, Zenc and the University of Amsterdam. For them Feed is an opportunity to combine the knowledge obtained from the (eContent) ADDWIJZER project with the advanced Flevoland infrastructure. This effort is called the “What-is-allowed-where-Map” initiative or Legal Atlas. The “what-is-allowed-where-Map” (or watmagwaarkaart in Dutch) had been investigated by Zenc under guidance of the Ministry of interior and two regions had been highlighted as probably fruitful grounds showing the useful combination of Laws and Maps: Flevoland and the city of Eindhoven.

Feed

Eu