Plotting the UK’s Ancient Woodlands

In an article by the BBC’s Science and Environment team this week, it was reported that the “scale of ancient woodland being lost to development is being made worse because of a lack of accurate data.”  

In the report, The Woodland Trust claimed that it is not possible to identify how much ancient forest has disappeared in the last decade.  

“Our data supports The Woodland Trust’s position that ancient woodland has been disappearing over many years,” confirms Chris Stubbs, Managing Director – Environment & Mapping at Landmark Information Group:  “However, it is not correct to say that data isn't available to demonstrate what is being lost each year.  Here at Landmark, we have the data available to show designated ancient woodland, both historically and today, and can overlay a range of datasets to show how it has changed over the years.” 

By overlaying historic maps with ancient woodland maps (dating as far back to 1600 in England and Wales, or 1750 in Scotland), it is entirely possible to visualise any changes that may have occurred. And by overlaying data from current and approved planning applications we can identify if proposed or approved future developments put more ancient woodland at risk. 

Continues Chris: “The data is out there. Our historic mapping is able to reveal the changes to the natural landscape, with the impact of development being clearly visible not only for ancient woodland, but also on green belt, Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty, Sites of Special Scientific Interest, nature reserves, country parks, and many other notable locations.”

Landmark has an unrivalled source of large-scale current and historic digital maps together with high quality environmental risk and planning information.   Its digital archive of historical maps is the UK’s largest and most comprehensive, comprising of over one million historical maps.

Example Ordnance Survey maps showing an area located in Reading (NGR 466070, 154481)

www.landmark.co.uk

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University 'Data & Mapping' Lecture Tour reaches Newcastle

The team from Landmark has undertaken a workshop at Newcastle University to provide students with an insight into the range of digital mapping datasets used in today’s commercial world.  

The aim is to support their current MSc studies and future careers in land and property-related industries.

Using the Promap service, students were able to access Ordnance Survey maps, plus a wide range of datasets that provide current and historic mapping data. The extent of the data enables users to determine an area’s risk of potential threats, such as flooding or land contamination, as well as access historical land use data and more.  

Through the session, students were able to interrogate the Promap system, which is widely used throughout the commercial world, and determine the extent of the land and property data that is available to them, both now for their studies and also for when they move into their future careers.

Philip James, Senior Lecturer in GIS, School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences at Newcastle University said: “Around 70 of our MSC students, who are currently studying a range of degrees including geotechnics, hydroinformatics, environmental consultancy and engineering geology, took part in the Promap session. 

Having the team from Landmark host the Promap masterclass offers students a real flavour of what data is available in the commercial world.   Here at the University, we have access to virtually any dataset we need for academic use. It’s therefore important for our students to understand what data, maps and reports are available to them when they graduate and start working in commercial consultancies. It also provides a good insight into the related costs that businesses have to budget for in order to access the information they need for a project.

There is an enormous wealth of data out there and this session provided a great insight into what datasets are available and just how they can be put into practice.”

The workshop is part of a University Lecture Tour that Landmark is conducting throughout 2014, which provides students studying a range of courses including Real Estate, Construction, GIS, Geotechnics and Environmental Consultancy with practical, hands-on use of digital mapping tools that are heavily used by commercial practices.

Do you want your university to be part of the tour?

For any universities interested in joining the Promap University Lecture Programme, please contact Paul Marshall or Nick Mills on 07798 611 121 / 07920 784887 or email Paul.Marshall@landmark.co.uk / nick.mills@landmark.co.uk. 

Darren Connaghan from Argyll Environmental was recently posted to the Philippines with MapAction. Here, Darren shares his experiences…

For the past nine years Darren Connaghan, a GIS Consultant at Argyll Environmental Ltd., part of Landmark Information Group within the Daily Mail General Trust, has played an active role in the charity MapAction, which specialises in providing mapping for humanitarian emergencies and disasters. Darren and MapAction were needed in late 2013, when Typhoon Haiyan devastated the Philippines causing huge amounts of suffering and loss of life. Below, Darren shares his story of his time in the Philippines, providing a first-hand account not only of how desperately challenging it can be to get help where it is most needed in the immediate aftermath of a humanitarian disaster, but also how essential modern mapping technology is in terms of responding to the clean-up operation. 

“I remember watching the news the morning the disaster struck, on 8 November 2013, although as MapAction already had a team pre-deployed, I was aware of the scale of the disaster due to the MapAction Support Base structure the charity has in place. The images of devastation and destruction were horrendous and reminded me of my deployment to Haiti in 2010, it was going to be a tough and challenging deployment.”

Even before the Typhoon first hit land, MapAction had already mobilising its cohorts of volunteers, drawn from a wide variety of backgrounds and specialisms. Darren, because of his work for Argyll, is part of the data team whose responsibility was to manage the GIS data that is present in all reports generated for clients.

“I flew out on the 16 November and arrived in the country after 20 hours of travelling. I was in Manila for five days liasing as Team Leader with the UN country coordination team but then deployed forward to Tacloban which is on the Eastern side of the archipelago, to catch up with the team that had split due to the various demands upon us. The UN organised a shuttle bus service between the RDC (Reception Departure Centre) at the airport and the UN OSOCC (On Site Operations Co-ordination Centre) for all incoming aid workers. During the journey, a normally chatty bunch descended into silence as the destruction was in all directions, only a few brick buildings still standing. On arrival at the OSOCC, I immediately joined the MapAction forward team, received a briefing from the team leader and started work on a task to produce a map product showing camp locations and numbers of occupants.

“We realised almost immediately that the situation was far graver than what we’d seen on the news. The weather was horrendous, hindering all forms of transport and communication; two tools which are vital to first responders in the wake of a disaster.”

Darren was staying in a tented space within a partially destroyed athletics stadium but it was sobering to think that it was a hundred times better than what people were experiencing outside, in the aftermath of the Typhoon. The UN OSOCC was one minute walk from the tented area. The ongoing challenge for Darren and the team was to decide how they could put their limited resources to the best effect.

“Our main role in the relief effort was to provide mapping and analysis of the incoming data as well as printing maps for relief workers. During our time in the Philippines we generated and printed well over a 1000 maps and trained numerous workers on how to analyse and use mapping data to help improve the relief effort. We were based in a coordination centre, which was located in the partially damaged local athletics stadium. Despite the considerable destruction, what stood out for me was the desire of the local population to get back to normal as quickly as possible. The road clean-up was in full swing and soon enough the market stalls and street sellers began to return to the area.

“Food was simple with ration packs being the highlight of the day. After nearly 7 days in the field and over two weeks since the Typhoon hit, we were very fortunate that we found a local street seller selling a bottle of beer – a one litre bottle of Red Lion. Sharing that among nine people, strangers only a few days previously, demonstrated the camaraderie that front line disaster humanitarian workers share.

“The team worked extremely hard in Tacloban, providing the UN with much needed mapping and data assistance. We also supported the UN with administrative tasks such as printing briefing documents, IT support and other non-MapAction related work.” 

Everyone pitched in where needed. Darren and the team were regularly working 13 hour days, with Darren joking that “the accommodation also came with a built in alarm clock – the daily helicopter landing and taking off at 5am”. 

After being in the Philippines for 13 days, Darren returned back to the UK, although even this was not without its difficulties.

“Transport in and around disaster affected areas is always going to be difficult and, when we arrived at the airport, we were only to be informed that our plane had departed two hours earlier than planned. However, the welfare of the volunteers is a high priority and our UK travel coordinator pulled out all the stops to get us home in time for work on Monday morning!”

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Darren Connaghan BSc MSc, GIS Manager, Argyll Environmental Ltd.

BSc Cartography and Computer Studies, Oxford Polytechnic 1992
MSc geographical Information Systems, University of Greenwich 1995

Darren is a Geographical Information Systems consultant with over 15 years’ experience working throughout the world for some of the largest Corporate (Shell) and NGOs (United Nations) in the world. Darren is an active member of the only Humanitarian Mapping charity (www.mapaction.org) in the world, having deployed to Pakistan (2005 earthquake), Kenya (2006 flooding), Sri Lanka (2008 UXO clearance), Haiti (2010 earthquake) and Philippines (2012 flooding) to name a few, to support the humanitarian response.

Landmark's University Lecture Tour visits Chester

The team from Landmark today hosted a workshop at the University of Chester to provide students with an insight into the digital mapping datasets that are used in today’s commercial world, as part of their Natural Hazards Management course. 

The aim of the workshop was to provide students with an insight into the range of data sources available to environmental consultants, surveyors, developers and other commercial land and property professionals, with a particular emphasis on flood risk.

Dr Servel Miller, Lecturer, Programme Leader – Natural Hazard Management at the University of Chester said: “When studying Natural Hazards Management, the second year of study concentrates on UK-based hazards.  A large focus of this concentrates on flooding and flood risk management.  Participating in the Promap session introduced the students to a new skill. While they already have experience with GIS, this provides a new perspective on data sources that can be fed-in to GIS.  It’s a great opportunity to review what flood data is available to them, plus I believe it provides them with additional skills and experience, which could provide students with a competitive edge when they move out into the commercial world.”

The workshop is part of a University Lecture Tour that Landmark is conducting throughout 2014. It provides students studying a range of courses, including Real Estate, Construction, GIS, Geotechnics and Environmental Consultancy, with practical, hands-on use of digital mapping tools that are widely used by commercial practices.

For any universities interested in joining the Promap University Lecture Programme, please contact:  

Paul Marshall, +44 (0) 7798 611121 / paul.marshall@landmark.co.uk

Nick Mills, +44 (0) 7920 784887 / nick.mills@landmark.co.uk 

Paul Marshall (left) and Nick Mills (Second Left) and Dr Servel Miller (right) with students from the University of Chester