Stirling, Scotland, 21 March 2018
Lincolnshire County Council has implemented a new online Geographical Information System (GIS) infrastructure from thinkWhere. In a move to address issues with legacy software and disparate data silos, thinkWhere’s Location Centre platform is now helping Lincolnshire County Council (LCC) improve the accuracy, currency and availability of data and systems on which business critical service decisions are made. The fully implemented Location Centre includes a securely hosted online data store accessed by a range of Web Maps, Web Services and Web GIS, and is also integrated with an Open Source, desktop GIS.
“Prior to the start of this project we had a number of unsupported software packages, running on an end of life operating system, accessing potentially out of date data,” commented Andrea Bowes, ICT Data and Information Systems Architect within the Information Management and Technology team of LCC. “This entire project was about reducing risk by giving users across the organisation easy access to accurate, current and consistent data in order to make informed decisions.”
Following an extensive investigation and review of potential solutions offered on the Government’s digital marketplace G-Cloud, LCC selected the Location Centre based on system specification, functionality and price. Working alongside thinkWhere users and data were migrated to the new infrastructure, department by department, over a six month period.
The Location Centre platform includes the datastore, a securely hosted, fully managed depository for geographically referenced data, acting as a ‘geospatial library’. Containing countywide coverage of the datasets from Ordnance Survey covered by the Public Sector Mapping Agreement (PSMA), third party datasets and LCC’s own data, the data store currently holds more than 1.8 gigabytes of data.
As part of the Location Centre project LCC also chose to implement QGIS, an Open Source, desktop GIS application that integrates with Location Centre via a thinkWhere developed plug in. Using QGIS, as well as the Location Centre’s web based map and GIS functionality, more than 600 users across the Council are now accessing up to date, accurate, current and consistent data to underpin decision making, improve service delivery and inform customer interactions. Users of GIS data range from super users that create and maintain map layers to casual users who might just look up an address or location or print a map.
“Feedback to date on both the support and solution provided by thinkWhere has only been positive,” concluded Bowes. “As we move forward with the Location Centre we hope to explore opportunities offered by web services improving engagement using smartphone technology.”
[line]Contacts
Editorial Enquiries – Robert Peel (PR), +44(0)1666 823306, robert@market-it.co.uk
Reader Enquiries – Fiona Thomas, Business Development Manager, +44(0)1786 476060, Fiona.Thomas@thinkwhere.com
Notes to Editors
thinkWhere provides an online platform for storing, sharing and using maps and geographic data. Utilising Open Source Geographic Information System (GIS) technologies, thinkWhere has developed cloud-based software applications and tools, backed by a wide range of Open GIS implementation, consultancy and training services.
Originally Forth Valley GIS, the company started in 1993 providing GIS services to Central Regional Council before, following local government reorganisation, developing a shared GIS service for three unitary authorities. In 2007 the company began operating as an arms-length commercial operation and rebranded as thinkWhere in 2007.
Based in the historic city of Stirling, Scotland, with customers across the UK and worldwide, thinkWhere pioneered the development of web-based platforms for collaborative GIS products and services. The company has a 10 year proven track record of delivering solutions at local, regional and national levels in the UK public and commercial sectors. For further information visit www.thinkwhere.com
