A Geog Blog

AGI - A Review of the Year

2008-12-26T16:29:00.003Z

It has, I believe, been a good year for the Association for Geographic Information (AGI) - my employers.

Firstly we have had a good year financially. For the fourth year in a row, we have posted a surplus. This has come from reducing our adminstration costs and increasing our revenue, particularly from membership subscriptions and from our annual conference. The current economic climate will give us some challenges next year, but we start with a firm financial base.

It has been a good year for the recognition of our unique place within GI and our ability to respond to Government initiatives swiftly and with authority. We can reflect a very wide range of opinion and can do so with clarity.

I think the AGI team have worked well this year. There are only 6 of us in the team and we have delivered a programme which belies our small size.

The volunteers have played a huge part in our success. Without a sense of purpose there would be no point to AGI. Our volunteers, through the AGI Council, our Special Interest Groups and our Regional Groups have given us that sense of purpose.

We have become more professional and have recognised the importance of providing our members with recognisable continuing professional development.

We are an important, I might even dare to say an indispensible, part of our industry. We are voice for the cutting edge of GIS innovation and at the same time a voice for gaining the widest possible benefits from that innovation. We are listened to by government and at the same time a catalyst for commercial progress.

I believe that we can look back with pride on what we have collectively achieved in 2008 and can look forward with confidence to what we can achieve in 2009.

Onwards and upwards.

The language of Geograpghy (3)

2008-12-20T16:20:00.000Z

A final thought for this year on the language of geography. I was amazed that my previous blog on this subject was picked up by a number of other bloggers and also led to some articles in ´GIS Professional´ magazine. I obviously struck some sort of chord.

So I guess my hopes are that in 2009, those who are putting forward ideas in GIS either in print or as a presentation, take some care of the language they use so that it makes their topic accessible to all. Spread the word by all means, but make those words understandable.

I am once again on the Action Working Group tasked with organising the AGI 2009 conference. When the papers are submitted, I shall be looking at the language used as well as at the concepts or case studies being highlighted. Misunderstandings which arose occasionally from this years conference were partly due to the fact that the language used by one person was interpreted incorrectly by another person.

´Clarity of ideas´ is perhaps my hope for next year.

The Rain in Spain

2008-10-17T20:46:00.001Z

Apparently it sometimes rains in Malaga even when I am not there.

Here is a report from 'Sur' -
'The bad weather over the last few days has meant considerable movement of sand on the Malaga province coastline. La Caleta beach in Malaga city is where the worst damage has been reported so far and it coincides with regeneration work, to cost six million euros, which is due to start tomorrow.
Francisco Javier Hermoso from the Andalucía-Mediterranean Coasts Authority explained in a press release that the biggest movements have involved the forming of sand "steps", some of them "a metre and a half" high.
As well as the damage caused by the wind and rain in La Caleta, beaches in Fuengirola have been affected and washed up 'steps' of sand have also formed on the Ferrara beach in Torrox
In general sand has been lost from all the beaches in the province though less than would have been expected given the weather. The Coasts Authority will now analyse the situation on the beaches in preparation for regeneration work which will need to be done in April or May next year in advance of the high summer season.
Work, which will start in La Caleta tomorrow, involves building breakwaters and replacing 500,000 square metres of sand.'

And it's not only rain, but mosquitos and bugs which are being blown into Malaga. At least I think that is what this report in today's 'Que!'is saying -
'El cambio climático y el transporte de mercancías transfronterizo parecen estar en la base de la proliferación de plagas urbanas. Expertos aseguran que especies como las chinches o los piojos encuentran buen refugio en nuestro país. La ‘chinche de cama’, por ejemplo, “ha aumentado su presencia en la Costa del Sol y Galicia”, según explica Milagros Fernández de Lezeta, directora
de la Asociación Nacional de Empresas de Control de Plagas. También las moscas han llegado antes este otoño y al parecer lo han hecho de forma masiva en Málaga.'

Another consequence of climate change.

Quiz answers

2008-10-16T23:23:00.003Z

Below are the answers to the quiz questions posted a few days ago. The winning team at our Conference scored 40/60, so if you came close to that, well done!

1 -Sydney
2 -New York
3 -Kendall (mint cake) first made 1869 – mistake in producing glacier mints
4 -Timbuktu (Djinguereber Mosque completed 1327 mainly mud&straw)
5 -Budapest
6 -Prague (Mozart Symphony 38 performed Prague 1787)
7 -Reykjavik
8 - Melbourne (Jason & Kylie – Neighbours Ramsay Street)
9 - San Francisco
10 - St Albans (Roman citizenship AD50 torched by Boudica AD61)
11 – Trumpton (members of fire brigade – never attended a fire because animation too difficult)
12 – Barcelona. (When dubbed into Spanish, the waiter became Paolo from Naples)
13 – Notting Hill
14 – Kansas (because of TV screenings, most watched film in history)
15 – Denton, Ohio. The Rocky Horror Picture Show.1975
16 – London –Born/died in Austria living in London in 1795
17 -Auvergne (Published 1923 – 1930) Chants D’Auvergne
18 – Texas (named after movie Paris, Texas)
19 – France (Bonnie Tyler)
20 – Moscow (played before news broadcasts on Radio Moscow)
21 – Dumfries (known as the doon hamers – doon hame)
22 – Pittsburg (steel industry)
23 – Paris 1900, 1924 (home city of Baron De Coubertin)
24 – Nottingham Forest (Twice 1979, 1980 – only winners to drop to third division)
25 – Canada (Moncton, New Brunswick) Invented by Scots but rarely won by them
26 – Singapore - sling Ngiam Tong Boon – Raffles Hotel
27 – Spain (Catalan dish)
28 – Iceland (Icelandic prohibition, government skull, crossbones on labels)
29 – Afghanistan
30 – South Africa (created 1925 Stellenbosh University)
31 – Rubicon (boundary Italy & Gaul. became an invader in Italy and am enemy of Pompey & the senate)
32 – Houston. Houston, Tranquility Base here; the Eagle has landed
33 – Naseby
34 – Paddington (opened January 1863 38,000 on first day)
35 – Manchester (Demonstration for parliamentary reform – 15 died, 400 injured military authorities)
36 – Teheran (prior to Yalta)
37 – West Lothian – Tam Dalyell
38 – Rome
39 – Cape Town 1960
40 – Witney, Oxfordshire
41 – Paris
42 – Shanghai (invaded following the bombing of Pearl Harbour)
43 – Westminster (September 3rd 1802)
44 – San Francisco
45 – Botswana in the books by Alexander McCall Smith
46 – Canada (Ontario – Alec Guiness spoke first lines in 1953)
47 – Birnham Wood – (witches said he would be safe – used Malcolm’s army as camoflauge to attack Dunsinane castle)
48 – Verona
49 – Henley Street (1564)
50 – Milford Haven (Cymbeline – the heroine Imogen runs away to MH described as city of treachery and wickedness)
51 – Tewkesbury
52 – River Lagan (mouth of river in Belfast)
53 - Great Dunmow
54 – The London Underground
55 – New Forest.
56 – Victoria (second largest freshwater lake by surface area, seventh largest by volume)
57 – Berlin – (52 10, 52 20, 52 30 N)
58 – Zagreb (Croatia)
59 – Flanders (Flanders & Swann, Gerard Mercator, born Rupelmonde, Flanders)
60 – Novosibirsk (Academgorodok, Maxim Vengerov, River Ob, Eclipse)

A Very Spatial Quiz (part 2)

2008-10-14T21:47:00.002Z

Here is the second part of the quiz I ran at our Annual Conference in Stratford-upon-Avon. Answers in a few days. Remember, every answer is a location or has a location as part of the answer.

Round 2 – Television & Film
Question 11 – Pugh, Pugh, Barney McGrew, Cuthbert, Dibble & Grub live in which fictitious town?
Question 12 – In Fawlty Towers, which city did Manuel come from?
Question 13 – Which 1999 film, named after the district in London in which it was set, was directed by Roger Mitchell and written by Richard Curtis?
Question 14 – To which American state does Dorothy return at the end of the Wizard of Oz?
Question 15 – ‘It seemed a fairly ordinary night when Brad Majors and his fiancee Janet Weiss left that late November evening. It’s true there were dark storm clouds, heavy, black and pendulous, toward which they were driving. It’s true also that the spare tyre they were carrying was badly in need of some air. But they, being normal kids and on a night out, were not going to let a storm spoil the events of their evening.’
From which American town were they driving?

Round 3 - Music
Question 16 – Joseph Haydn’s final, and possibly best known, symphony, no 104 in D major, is named after the city in which it was composed. Which city?
Question 17 – In the 1920’s, Joseph Canteloube collected and orchestrated a collection of songs from which region of France?
Question 18 – Before going solo, of which band was Sharleen Spiteri the lead singer?
Question 19 – In which country in 1976 did Gaynor Hopkins get lost?
Question 20 – Hidden tune (this question was in fact sung). Which city –
Не слышны в саду даже шорохи,
Всё здесь замерло до утра.
Если б знали вы, как мне дороги
Подмосковные вечера,

Round 4 - Sport
Question 21 – Scottish football clubs often have names which do not mention the home town – Albion Rovers, St Mirren etc. In 2008, one of these, Queen of the South, reached their first ever cup final. There was rejoicing in the streets of… where? What is the home town of Queen of the South?
Question 22 – In American Football, the Steelers come from which city.
Question 23 – Which was the first city to host the modern summer Olympics twice?
Question 24 – Which is the only soccer club to have won the European Cup / Champions League more often than they have won their own national league?
Question 25 – Which country, world champions 30 times in the past 50 years, will host the 2009 men’s world curling championships?

Round 5 – Food & Drink
Question 26 – A mixture of gin, cherry brandy, Cointreau, Benedictine, pineapple juice, lime juice, grenadine and angostura bitters, this cocktail was first slung together at the turn of the century in a hotel in which city.
Question 27 – Zarzuela is both a comic opera and a seafood stew in which country.
Question 28 – Brennivin also known as Black Death and made from fermented potato mash, is the national drink of which country?
Question 29 – Serat is a cheese made from sheep’s milk and dipped in beeswax to preserve it during long journeys, predominantly in which country?
Question 30 – Pinotage is a red wine grape in which country.

Round 6 - History
Question 31 – In 49BC, Caesar reportedly said ‘The Die is Cast’ upon crossing which river?
Question 32 – Which geographical location was the first word spoken from the moon?
Question 33 – The decisive battle of the English Civil War took place on 14th June 1645 and resulted in defeat for King Charles’s army. Where?
Question 34 – In 1863 the world’s first underground railway was opened in London, running from Farringdon to where?
Question 35 – In which city in 1819 did the Peterloo massacre take place.

Round 7 – Politics
Question 36 – In November 1943 Churchill, Stalin and Roosevelt had a conference to plan strategy against the Nazis in which city?
Question 37 – Which location has given its name to the supposed paradox of Scottish MPs voting on English legislation when, because of devolution, English MPs cannot always vote on Scottish legislation?
Question 38 – The EU was established in 1957 by a treaty signed in which city?
Question 39 – The wind of change is blowing through this continent. In which city did Harold Macmillan say these words.
Question 40 – Tory leader David Cameron is the MP for which constituency?

Round 8 - Literature
Question 41 – Dicken’s a Tale of Two cities refers to London and which other city.
Question 42 – J G Ballard’s Empire of the Sun is set in which Asian city?
Question 43 – ‘Earth has not anything to show more fair’. Those words were written by Wordsworth whilst standing upon which bridge?
Question 44 – In Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City series, the central characters lived at 28 Barbary Lane. In which city?
Question 45 – In which country did Ma Ramotswe set up the No 1 Ladies Detective Agency.

Round 9 – Shakespeare
Question 46 – In which Commonwealth country, excluding the UK, is there a town called Stratford on a river called Avon which has run a festival of Shakespearian Theatre for over 50 years.
Question 47 – Macbeth was deemed to be safe until which seemingly immovable object, moved?
Question 48 – Romeo, Romeo wherefore art though Romeo? We all know he was beneath the balcony, but in which city?
Question 49 – Shakepeare was born in Stratford upon Avon, but in which street?
Question 50 – Which is the only place in Wales which gets a significant mentioned in one of Shakespeare’s plays?

Round 10 – British Isles
Question 51 – The River Avon which flows through Stratford eventually joins the River Severn in which town?
Question 52 – Which river forms most of the boundary between Co Antrim and Co Down?
Question 53 - In which British town can a married couple win a flitch of bacon if they can persuade a jury of 6 maidens and 6 bachelors that in twelvemonth and a day they have never wished themselves unmarried.
Question 54 – What did Henry Beck map out in 1932
Question 55 – Most of Britain’s national parks were designated in the 1950’s, the Peak District being the first. But the newest national park was designated in 2006. Which one is it.?

Round 11 – World Geography
Question 56 – What is the largest lake through which the equator passes?
Question 57 – Which is further north – Stratford-Upon-Avon, Amsterdam or Berlin?
Question 58 – If all capital cities in the world were listed alphabetically, which would come last?
Question 59 – What links the singing partner of a mud-loving Swan and the birthplace in 1512 of the father of modern scientific cartography?
Question 60 – Name this city. Located 55 degrees north and 83 degrees east, it became in 1962 the youngest city in the world with a population of over 1m. Head for the station, and you can take a train westwards for 2 days without leaving the country. Change platforms and you can take a train eastwards for 4 days also without leaving the country. Head down the street past the sign to the academic town 30 km away and past the concert hall where its most famous son still occasionally plays and you will arrive at a river with a short name but a long journey – it will flow for a further 2000km northwards. On August 1st 2008 the city had a dark day. Which city?

A Very Spatial Quiz

2008-10-08T23:23:00.003Z

I ran a quiz at the AGI conference. By general consent, it was probably a bit too difficult. The winning team scored 40 points out of 60, which I guess proves that.

Anyway the first part consisted of written questions, and I am repeating them here. Answers will be posted in a few days.

In each case, name the town or city (& click on pictures to enlarge and don't look at the name of the picture).

1.

2.
‘These vagabond shoes, are longing to stray’

3.
It is made by combining sugar, glucose and water then boiling more fiercely in smaller pots. After cooling for several minutes, half on ounce of oil of peppermint is added to every 40 lb of mix. The blend is poured by hand into shallow trays where it hardens quickly and is rapidly transferred out of the sugar boiling room and wrapped. It has a subtle but stimulating flavor, cool in summer, fiery in winter and has a unique blend of textures, smooth and hard, but always creamy when sucked.

4.

5.

6

7.
64 9 N 21 58 W

8.

9.

10.

Parliamo Geo (part 2)

2008-10-06T13:53:00.003Z

Oh dear! A few days ago I did a post about the language of geography and how sometimes the specialist language used by geographers to talk to geographers is incomprehensible to the layman. I didn't give any examples.

Little did I know that an example would arise so quickly. There is a new job advert in the Guardian for a Spatial Analysis Co-Ordinator in the Department of Communities and Local Government. It states the following - 'Traditional spatial analysis is embedded with our analysts but we wish to extend into quantitative techniques such as spatial statistics and spatial modelling. The second area we wish to strengthen is online publishing of geographic information. This is already well developed, but we want to go further, to explore the potential of emerging web techniques to sharing place related knowledge.'
No doubt those at whom it is aimed might know exactly what this job entails, but I think the language used could have been a bit more understandable.

And so, almost inevitably, the press has picked up on this. Here is an article in the Telegraph.
And then a follow-up article.

And so, just as we are trying to get the importance of place highlighted throughout government, we lay ourselves open to a degree of ridicule though our use of rather baffling language.

The frustrating thing is that this job is a useful and necessary one. But the language used confuses rather than clarifies.

I think we need to be more aware of the importance, and consequences, of language.

Storm on the beach

2008-09-30T15:56:00.004Z

Today I saw some geography in action. Coastal erosion in fact. I am in Malaga for a few days. Yesterday there was an almighty storm. The gale force wind was parallel to the coast and the waves were crashing on the shore at an angle.

Today all is quiet But the Malaga beach has been transformed. One end is almost devoid of sand. The other end is full of sand, and stones and debris and driftwood etc. The local council lorries are busy cleaning up the far end and transporting sand back to the other end. No doubt tomorrow the beach will be as before. But this is a graphic example of the effects of longshore drift.

Parliamo Geo

2008-09-28T18:04:00.007Z

I have been with the AGI now for over three years. I arrived as the Finance Officer from the world of the arts with no knowledge of GIS.

As the recent debate about the content of this year´s conference has shown, there is an ongoing debate within the GI world on many subjects and particularly about the march of technological progress and its effects. I wish I understood more about the issues, but somehow I don´t always grasp the nuances of the debates.

I don´t think I am stupid. So why are the concepts so tricky for me? I have tried my best, as shown by the existence of this blog. But now I am beginning to think that the problem is not the concepts themselves, but the language used by geographers to explain the concepts. This language is evolving as a tool for geographer to speak to geographer. But as geographers learn that language and use that language, it creates an increasing barrier between the geographers and the layman. And an idea only takes shape once language is used to communicate that idea.

So ironically, just as the technology is making GIS more accessible to the public, the language is making GIS increasingly less accessible. It is almost as if geographers are uncomfortable with widening access to their ideas beyond a perceived audience.

I have always assumed that the concepts are too difficult for me to grasp, and rather accepted that position. But what if the concepts are easy and it is only the language which is difficult?
That doesn´t leave me in any better a position, but it does prevent me from doubting my own intelligence.

At the recent AGI Conference, I was room monitor on a number of occasions. And during some of these presentations, I felt that I was listening to a foreign language. Yet at other times a complicated concept became obvious because of the skills of the presenter.

The balance between being patronising and being elitist is a fine one. When I produce my finance reports, I realise that they must be accurate and comprehensive, yet understandable to a range of readers. And if occasionally I repeat things or become too simplistic, well to be honest that is fine if at the same time this makes issues understandable to all.

So rather than giving up on GI concepts, I shall now listen to presentations or read reports with a more questioning attitude on the language used. And maybe, just maybe, I shall reach enlightenment, if not yet, perhaps, nirvana.

AGI GeoCommunity´08 - part 2

2008-09-26T22:00:00.001Z

Some of the delegates who attended the conference have written blogs. Not all were entirely complimentary, though the criticism was about content and not organisation.

Since I am the finance guy at the AGI and not a geographer, I cannot really comment on the overall content or direction of the conference. Except perhaps to say that with nearly 600 delegates, the content will not reflect everyone´s views on every occasion. And some of the quality of presentation was, in my view, variable. But if the sessions have stimulated debate, then surely that is a good thing.

Yes the final session was a bit flat, and we will have to look at that for next year. How to conclude a conference on a high note is a difficult issue for us - especially as many delegates are keen to catch trains or to get home before dark. Keeping a buzz right up to the last minute is not easy.

From a personal viewpoint, I thought the conference went well. Being the accountant, I had to come out of my confort zone. I had to run the Icebreaker evening, attend a number of sessions, deliver the finance report and generally keep a profile that is a bit higher than I am used to. I was pleased at how well I acheived that. I thought the AGI team and volunteers were exceptional. All took their responsibilities very seriously and gelled very well. We, the AGI Team, get paid for what we do. The volunteers are exactly that - unpaid volunteers. My admiration for them knows no bounds. The conference would not happen without them. They were great.

We will of course have a debrief. Next year we will strive to make the conference bigger and better. But to bring 600 delegates to Stratford, manage all of their arrangements, produce a conference of a high standard, and have many of them intending to return next year, is a considerable achievement.

I am happy with that as a reflection on the past three days.

AGI GeoCommunity´08

2008-09-25T23:56:00.001Z

The conference is over. I have returned from Stratford upon Avon after the 2008 AGI Conference. I am exhausted, but very pleased with the way it went. A lot of people did a lot of work to make sure it went well.

The AGI Conference is always a bit strange for me, especially since my training is not in geography. It is a mixture of hard work and alcohol and not much sleep. And most of the work is different to what I am used to back in the office.

The work started on Tuesday when the team had to stuff a huge number of inserts into 600 delegate bags. My back hurt. Then in the evening came the pre-conference Icebreaker event. It´s the first time we have had one of these, and, scarily, I found myself volunteering to run it. I decided to run a dinner, a quiz and a theatrical event - Buffet, Brains and Bard.

So I found myself on stage leading a ´Very Spatial Quiz´. It was not long into this that I realised that perhaps I´d made the questions too difficult, but there was nothing I could do now. So on I went. I got particularly nervous over question 20 where I had to sing the question. But anyway I got through it and it didn´t go too badly.Then came the ´Earl of Oxford´s Men´ who did two performances from Shakespeare, one from Henry V and one from Midsummer Night´s Dream. The standard of acting was mixed but overall it was fine and delegates enjoyed both pieces. Finally I gave the quiz answers and announced the winners. The winning team got 40 points out of a possible 60 which I guess shows how tough the quiz was.

Over the next two days I was heartened by the number of delegates who came up to me to tell me how much they´d enjoyed the evening. Next day, feeling a bit groggy from the glasses of wine I´d had the previous night, I was room monitor in the Blenheim Room. No real difficulty there - just handing the microphone round during question sessions. At the AGI AGM, I then had to deliver the Finance report. The news was good, and although I do get nervous when delivering prepared reports, it went okay. AGI is in an improving financial position thanks to collective effort and a high degree of budgetary responsibility from team and Council.

That evening I dressed up in a very spiky wig for the party which had an eighties theme. It was fun. Crucially, I did not drink too much and went to bed shortly after midnight. Next day I felt okay and resumed my room monitoring duties and, despite briefly dozing off on a couple of occasions, got though them without incident.

And suddenly the conference was over. Tomorrow I will reflect a bit more about the conference. For today, I am just tapping into the positive remarks from delegates. I take my share of a collective pride in a job well done.

Heading for Stratford upon Avon

2008-09-21T16:19:00.001Z

I realise that there has been a huge gap in posts to this blog recently. But work at AGI has been continuing and the largest event of the year, our annual conference, takes place next week in Stratford upon Avon.

We´ve all worked hard on it, the programme is varied and of high quality, we have nearly 600 delegates booked-up. I have my outfit for the party! I am looking forward to the whole event.

AGIGeocommunity2008

2008-06-06T12:27:00.002Z

This week the Conference team have been in Stratford-Upon-Avon sorting our the programme for our annual conference which will take place there in September.

It was a long, tiring process. We had to read all of the submitted papers and decide on those which will be accepted. We then drew us a programme by slotting the accepted papers into themed slots. We agreed plenary sessions, workshops, debates etc. And finally we drew everything together in a coherent manner.

I think it has worked very well and I think we have a really strong conference. Details will be released within a few days once speakers have been contacted. Watch this space for the countdown to the conference.

Finances

2008-05-01T17:35:00.000Z

The control of finances at AGI are my responsibility. But of course the results come from the heard work of the whole team. Today the AGI Council approved the audited accounts for 2007. After small surpluses in 2005 and 2006, we made a surplus of over £45,000 in 2007. And now our financial base is stronger than it has been for some time.

This is excellent news and means that at AGI we face the future in confident mode.

Strategy 2008

2008-02-28T12:29:00.000Z

Each year, AGI produces a strategy for the year ahead. This is driven by the Chair of the organisation. Because the Chair only serves for one year, there is a danger that strategy can lack continuity. But recently the strategy has deliberately built on that of the previous year. And the strategy for 2008 is very much an evolution from what we strived to achieve in 2007.

This year we have 5 objectives -

Objective 1 – Membership
To strengthen and grow the membership base, by focusing on GI issues of
interest and relevance to members.

Objective 2 - Events
To run a programme of events that is relevant to the membership and breaks
into new areas of interest.

Objective 3 – Outreach
To work with outside bodies and seek partnerships with three other relevant
professional organisations to promote the AGI’s mission and the use of
Geographic Information (GI) in other communities, both regionally and
nationally.

Objective 4 - AGI Council and policy making
To identify and discuss the major issues relating to GI or affecting the GI
community, to determine policy through the elected Council, with input from
members, and to provide appropriate responses either as expert views to
government or information to members.

Objective 5 - Finance
To ensure the long-term financial stability of the AGI and seek to replenish
the financial reserves.

That seems to me to be a pretty good list. Now we need to head off and try to achieve them.

Geospatial Metadata

2008-02-16T20:48:00.002Z

For a number of years, the AGI has been running a geospatial metadata service called GiGateway. This has been funded by the Department for Communities and Local Government.

Recently, this funding beyond March 2008 has been in doubt. We were keen to continue to run the service beyond this date, both beacuse it is useful for the AGI and because we believe in the UK having access to up-to-date relevant metadata. Also, under the INSPIRE directive, the UK must prodide a metatdata service from 2009. So stopping the service on 2008 only to find that it meeds to be resurrected in 2009 did not seem to be sensible.

We have engaged constructively with the Department for Communities and Local Govermnment over this. We did this logically and unemotionally. I am pleased to say that this engagement has had a positive result and our responsibility for running GiGateway has been extended to March 2009, albeit on a care and maintenance basis.

For this we are grateful to the Department. We intend to use this time not only to ensure that GiGateway is maintained, but also that some improvements are made to the public interface and that the awareness of the service for users is also improved. If in 2009 it is to handed over to another department or organisation, then we will ensure that it is fit for purpose.

2008 - what's ahead?

2008-01-04T20:37:00.001Z

So what is there to look forward to in 2008?

Well generally in GI, I guess there will be more advances in technology. These will bring GI to the masses even if they would not recognise it as being GI. Google and Microsoft will produce better and more detailed maps. Commercial mapping companies will be concentrating on the added value they can provide for their specific clientele. The Location Strategy will be published and we hope that Government will see this as the beginning of a process and not the end of a process. The implementation of the INSPIRE Directive will be debated and hopefully decisions will be made to facilitate the implementation in the UK by hte 2009 deadline.

At the Association for Geographic Information, we must remain relevant and continually assess our relevance to all sectors within our membership. We will run a series of events which I hope will be useful and well attended. We will run a fantastic annual conference in September in Stratford upon Avon. We will deliver good value to our members for their membership fee and hopefully increase our membership base. And we will continue to be financially viable.

As for me personally, I intend to learn more about the world of GI, continue to represent the AGI to the best of my ability and do my best to keep the organisation profitable. And, by keeping work and life in balance, I hope to reduce my golf handicap!

2007 - an AGI retrospective

2007-12-31T18:37:00.001Z

The previous post was my personal take on the year just gone. This is more of a review from our business perspective.

More of this is contained in our activities and achivements report. And these achievements in 2007 have been considerable.

We have moved forward the debate in a host of areas, not least the implementation process for the INSPIRE directive. We have formed new Special Interest Groups. We had a hugely successful annual conference. Membership income has risen. The AGI team have performed magnificently. And we have made a significant financial surplus. Not a bad list of achievements.

All in all, an excellent year and one upon which we can build in 2008 in order to achieve bigger and better things.

If anyone actually reads this blog, then please have a look at the AGI website. And if you are not a member, well why not consider joining? There are many interesting things coming up. I hope to report on them here as they arise.

2007 - a personal retrospective

2007-12-31T12:18:00.003Z

For me it has been a strange year. Indeed a strange, and exciting, three years.

There I was three years ago in my 19th year of employment at the Royal Festival Hall, managing the finances and overseeing budgets on performing and visual arts. I was dealing with orchestras, dance troupes, foyer musicians. I was oblivious to the world of GIS and geospatial issues.

Then the RFH closed for renovation. I was offered redundancy. I was keen to go, and took it as a means to look for a more interesting challenge. I found that challenge, by accident, when I saw a job vacancy at the AGI.

At the start of 2007, I was the Finance guy at the AGI. So although I was interested in finding our more about GIS, hence the setting-up of this blog, my function was primarily in improving the financial situation. Knowledge of GIS was not key to this.

Then in March, our Chief Operating Office moved on to pastures new. With my Finance hat on, I had been banging on about the need to save costs on overheads, and salary costs were our biggest overhead. So I tentatively suggested that she should not be directly replaced, but that her work could be shared among the existing team. As a direct result, my role expanded. I took on the title of Chief Operating Officer and suddently I was going to meetings where participants were not interested in my financial background but instead expected me to at least make sensible comments about issues in the world of GIS. At first it was scary, but then it became quite interesting, almost exciting.

And so over the past 9 months, I have attended meetings of (apologies for the acronyms) JISC-GWG, SpLinT, IGGI, UK Geoforum and well as Scottish and Welsh regional AGI groups. I've been to meetings in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Leicester, Cardiff and Llandrindod Wells. And it has been fun.

I hope I have represented AGI well at these meetings. I feel I have made a generally positive contibution and where I haven't understood the nuances of an argument, I have been able to consult someone who has.

I am certainly now aware of the exciting developments in the world of GI. I am aware of the increasingly important role technology is playing. I am aware of the hugely dispirate group within this world, from corporate suppliers to local and central government including health authorities, police forces, insurance companies etc.

I have had a great year. And I am looking forward to learning more, and hopefully contributing more, in 2008.

Tsunami

2007-12-20T03:36:00.000Z

The blogs have dried up recently, partly because I have been too busy to find the time. And now here I am away from work in Patong Beach in Thailand.

And sitting at a beach bar having breakfast and watching the world go by, I cannot help but think of the people who were going about their daily lives, whether locals or tourist, when the tsunami struck three years ago. The bay currently looks so peaceful. The destroyed buildings have been rebuilt. And I dare say lives have also been at least partically rebuilt.

But geography has a part to play in both forecasting disasters and in helping the relief teams after disasters. And with flooding becoming the norm in the UK and global warming leading to more severe weather conditions worldwide, we must put the GI response to disasters up the agenda. I hope that we will do this in 2008.

In the meantime, I shall return to enjoying the marine facilities of this area.

Strategy

2007-11-07T09:11:00.000Z

This weekend I head for deepest Hampshire to take part in the annual AGI debate about future strategy. After the weekend, next year's Chair will produce a strategy document for approval by the AGI Council and then enactment throughout the next 12 months.

In my opinion, this year the strategy debate is even more important than usual. We are building on real successes in 2007, notably the conference, events programme and a membership increase, but the funding we receive for our running of the GiGateway metadata service is about to come to an end. We therefore will proceed with confidence but with caution. Twenty years after the Chorley Report, we need to refocus on who we are and what makes us relevant to our members.

And the end product from the weekend should not just be a written strategy document for the next twelve months, but a realistic and positive strategy to take us forward for at least the next five years.

It will be an interesting debate. It will, I believe, prove to our members that we have the energy and the ideas to meet the future challenges in the world of GI.

AGI Conference 2007 - review

2007-09-21T13:46:00.000Z

The conference is over. Two days of networking, of talks, of debates and of socialising has come to an end. After all the planning, the administration, the worry - it now seems strange to realise that it is over. And very gratifying to find that the planning work before the conference turned out to have contributed to such a successful conference.

And it was successful. The initial feedback from delegates was very positive. Generally the venue worked well. The talks were stimulating. The debates were energetic. And the party was enjoyable.

From a personal point of view, it was all a great experience. The fact that I had been asked to be a judge, meant that I attended far more sessions than I otherwise might have. I attended eleven sessions in total. That showed me the breadth of issues and the range of work which are covered by GIS.

I am hugely grateful to the AGI Team for all their hard work, especially Claire, Susan and Maureen without whom the event simply could not have taken place. Chris's work, especially on the printed matter, added to the quality of the experience for delegates. Steven was an excellent and enthusiastic Chair of the event. I am really pleased that his initial optimism about the event was fully justified.

I hope that issues were taken forward and that the event marked real progress in some of the issues that we face in the world of Geography. I hope the event was more than a talking shop. I think it was.

Right now I have just got home and I am exhausted. Others will no doubt reflect at length and more thoughtfully than I can. But I am happy and content that we delivered a great conference. And now we turn out attention to AGI2008. Watch this space.

AGI Conference 2007 - preview

2007-09-17T19:48:00.000Z

'Building a Geo Community'

The AGI conference starts on Wednesday in Stratford-upon-Avon. Bookings have gone amazingly well and the conference was fully booked a couple of weeks ago.

The AGI team, especially Claire, Susan and Maureen, have been working exceptionally hard on the administration. Now we move to the conference itself. We all head up for Stratford tomorrow to finalise the last-minute details ahead to the opening session on Wednesday morning.

It is always a bit scary a couple of days before the conference, but I am sure it will be a great success.

I have, much to my surprise, been asked to be on the judging panel for the 'Best Paper' award. I am honoured by that and will do my best to be fair and impartial and to give each paper an equal opportunity.

So, here's to a wonderful conference.

GI North of the Border

2007-08-25T09:04:00.001Z

On Tuesday I went to Edinburgh to attend a meeting of the AGI Scotland Executive. I remain impressed by the positive commitment to GI north of the border and by the collective commitment of the AGIS Executive to lead progress. It would appear that a change in Government to an SNP administration will also do no harm in pursuing a Scottish dimension for GI and in particular to taking forward a Scottish Spatial Data Initiative.

There is an AGIS conference in Edinburgh on 15th November with the title 'Inspiring Scotland' which will take that process and investigate aspects of how to move forward particularly in relation to the 'One Scotland, One Geography' paper which was produced recently for the Scottish Executive. It is described as an ideas forum and open competition to encourage and promote innovative thinking connecting the places, spaces and faces of Scotland.

It is good to see a united commitment to GI without the petty bickering which has hindered progress elsewhere.

Online mapping

2007-07-31T19:11:00.000Z

The scramble to digitalise the world of mapping. An interesting video from You Tube.

Who (What?) is JANET?

2007-07-10T11:59:00.000Z

In my new role at the AGI, I am enjoying attending a number of meetings of groups concerned with GIS in their sector. On Thursday I went to Glasgow to attend a meeting of JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee) . JISC's mission is to provide world-class leadership in the innovative use of Information and Communications Technology to support education and research.

The meeting I was at was one of the regular meetings held by their Geospatial Working Group. This is a group which does a lot of work relating to accessibility of Geographic Data for the academic community. The meeting was really interesting. But as usual the acronyms were impenetrable. In particular was the constant mention of JANET? Who is she? Or what is she? Dr Finlay's Housekeeper? Or something more?

Well it turns out that JANET is the network dedicated to the needs of education and research in the UK. It connects the UK’s education and research organisations to each other, as well as to the rest of the world through links to the global Internet. In addition, JANET includes a separate network that is available to the community for experimental activities in network development.

The JANET network connects UK universities, FE Colleges, Research Councils, Specialist Colleges and Adult and Community Learning providers. It also provides connections between the Regional Broadband Consortia to facilitate the DfES initiative for a national schools’ network. Over 18 million end-users are currently served by the JANET network.The range of activities facilitated by JANET allows individuals and organisations to push back the traditional boundaries of teaching, learning and research methods.

For example, JANET’s videoconferencing and video streaming capabilities are being used to deliver lectures to remote groups of students. For researchers, the high capacity of the JANET backbone allows the linking of large data storage and high performance computing facilities at a national and international level.

This all sound worthy of more investigation. In the meantime, further information plus a video relating to JANET can be found here.

Cairngorm

2007-07-03T21:40:00.000Z

On the way back from Orkney, I stopped off to see my parents and took them up to the Cairngorm car park. We hadn't been here for some time. I love the view from Cairngorm both upwards to the summit of the mountain and downwards to Lock Morlich and Aviemore beyond. As the ski-ing season in Scotland diminishes, areas like Cairngorm have to provide other facilities for tourists, including the controversial funicular railway. In my view they have done this is a sensitive and positive way so that the mountains retain their grandeur and beauty. These are three of the photos I took.

Orkney

2007-07-01T21:25:00.000Z

Orkney was magnificent. Much more beautiful, much more fertile than I had imagined. And on the surface it seems to be thriving. But since this is a geog blog and not a travelogue, I will not give a full account of where we were and what we did. Instead I will quote from Orkney 2020.

Orkney—key facts
Resident Population 19,245 (2001 Census)
Main towns Kirkwall (pop. 7,500 approx)
Stromness (pop.2,200 approx), both situated on mainland Orkney
Area 100,000 hectares over 67 islands
Industry Tourism, agriculture, fishing, oil processing, craft manufacture and retail

Orkney has 18 inhabited islands, two of which (South Ronaldsay and Burray) are linked to the
Orkney mainland by causeways. Island populations vary in size from a single family to several
hundred, and the geography of Orkney offers a significant challenge to public agencies seeking to
deliver services effectively and efficiently. Orkney 2020 states:
Some of Orkney’s barriers to inclusion are shared with other communities. Poverty may be
less visible in rural areas than in inner cities, but exists nonetheless, and is exacerbated by the
high cost of travel: whether to work, to access shops or services, or to visit friends and
relatives. Those who are disadvantaged by disability, ill health or unemployment will need
their interests represented, and their needs prioritised when targeting resources.
The geography of Orkney gives rise to other barriers to inclusion. It is impossible to achieve
truly equal access to services such as the Pickaquoy Centre when some communities are
several hours away by sea. Many hospital services can only be accessed in mainland Scotland.
Consequently, some compromises are inevitable. We can try to deliver local services which
meet as many needs as possible, and ensure that they are available to all. Where services
cannot be delivered locally, we can do our best to help people to travel to them.
Orkney 2020, OCPP, April 2003

Orkney’s population has fallen dramatically over the past century, to the point where the survival of the smaller isles communities is uncertain. To quote again from Orkney 2020:
A century ago, Orkney’s population stood at around 29,000. In 2000 it was 19,500 and, if
current trends cannot be reversed, it is forecast to fall to 17,500 by 2016. Over the last 50
years, with the mechanisation of agriculture, there has been a steady drift away from the isles
towards the towns on mainland Orkney, as people move to find work, or to retire closer to
their families. Most of the predicted population decline can be expected to affect the isles and
more remote mainland areas, where it will threaten the survival of communities whose
existence is already marginal. Below a certain critical mass, communities die. There are too
few children to keep a school open, and essential services cannot be provided at a reasonable
cost. Young people move away and there is nobody to replace the older generation.
In 1901, Orkney had 26 inhabited islands; today, only 16 islands have permanently resident
communities. If these fragile communities are to survive and flourish, we need to take action
to halt and reverse the population decline. Lifeline transport services and supply lines must be
kept open, and communities helped to establish new economic activities to replace those in
decline. Young people will always want to move away, to study or travel, and we should
encourage them to do so. Our challenge for Community Planning is to ensure that they can
return to live and work in a thriving community.
Orkney 2020, OCPP, April 2003

It is the cry of all small communities. But I will return to visit.

Off to Orkney

2007-06-22T12:39:00.000Z

This weekend, after a couple of days in Unstone near Sheffield, we head off to Orkney. Despite being born in Inverness, I have never been to Orkney and am huegley looking forward to the visit. The weather forecast is not good - windy and wet, but that might actually give us the variety of light and atmosphere for which Orkney is famous.

And of course it will be light until way past midnight and then again only a couple of hours later.

Above all it will be good to get out of the city, get north of the border, and experience nature, climate and geography close up and in an unrefined state.

Chorley Not!

2007-06-21T12:35:00.001Z

I attended the AGI Chorley Day on Tuesday. This was a review of the receommendations of the Chorley Report of 1987, 20 years on. Some have been enacted but sadly some have made little progress. Of more interest to me perhaps was the looking through a geographic window into the future. So much is changing and so quickly all driven by the inexorable march of technology.

And we at the AGI need to ensure that we are not a barrier to change but that we continue to reinvent ourselves to ensure that we are here and are relevant 20 years from now.

Sir Wally Herbert

2007-06-15T10:53:00.000Z

No sooner have I written about various explorers than one of the greatest contemporary British explorers sadly dies.

At the AGI conference last year I was fascinated and riveted by a talk given by Sir Wally Herbert's daughter, Kari, about her time living among the Inuit of Greenland both as a young child and subsequently. It was a life she had not chosen, she was too young, but one which she embraced with enthusaism.

Now her father has died, but rather than sadness the emotion must be of one of admiration for someone who lived life to the full, tested himself to the limits of human endurance and hightlighted the triviality of most of the difficulties which the rest of us face. I repeat here the obituary from today's Times newspaper.

The leader of the first expedition to make a surface crossing of the Arctic Ocean by its longest axis, through the North Pole, Wally Herbert was “the explorer’s explorer”. Sir Ranulph Fiennes called him the “greatest polar explorer of our time”. He proved his courage and determination time and again in both the Arctic and Antarctic, travelling more than 25,000 miles by dog sledge and open boats, and mapping 46,000 square miles of previously uncharted territory.
He loved the romance of exploration, and wrote a book about Antarctic men in blank verse. He relished the harshness and simplicity of the icy wastes. Though he rarely lost his temper, he was not to be thwarted, and long before he was finally knighted, his men would refer to him as “Sir Walter”.
Born into an English military family in 1934, Walter William Herbert served in the Royal Engineers, 1953-55, training at the School of Military Survey before learning the rudiments of navigation in the Suez Canal zone. He next worked as a surveyor in Shoreham-by-Sea until an entrée into the world of polar exploration literally dropped into his lap. A newspaper, fortuitously opened at an advertisement for men to join Britain’s Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey, fell from the luggage rack of a bus as he was commuting to work, with the result that he spent the years 1955-58 in the Antarctic, travelling with dog teams to map hitherto unvisited areas.
Being the first recorded human being to stand in a particular spot and the first to map a whole new area was always, for him, an exhilarating feeling. “We were a world of men in harmony with our environment,” he wrote of that first Antarctic experience. “We saw a paradise in snowscapes and heard music in the wind, for we were young, and on our long exploratory journeys we felt with the pride of youth that we were making history.”
Antarctica’s supply of virgin territory was dwindling fast under the onslaught of motorised expeditions, but 80 per cent of the Arctic was still uncharted. Therefore, his next big project was at the other end of the globe, where he planned to make the first surface crossing of the frozen Arctic Ocean by its longest axis, taking in the North Pole en route. Herbert considered this to be the last remaining element of a daunting trinity of challenges, the others being the ascent of Everest and the first surface crossing of the Antarctic ice cap.
His plan to walk “across the top of the world” involved traversing the more or less frozen Arctic Ocean, from Alaska via the North Pole to Spitsbergen, with the use of modern and traditional aids: radios, homing beacons and satellite information as well as dogs and sledges. In the four years, 1964-68, that it took him to plan the trip he would either spend 15 hours a day at his typewriter, drumming up what support he could from polar experts all over the world to help him to win the vital backing of the Royal Geographical Society, or would motor 260 miles a day between his parents’ house in Lichfield and the expedition’s headquarters in London. He often arrived in such a state of stress, despite tranquillisers, that he would have to shut himself away to unwind before getting down to business.
A spell of field training forestalled total collapse: he made a useful 1,200-mile dog-sledging journey across Smith Sound and through the Canadian North West Territories to test equipment and men – and finally, the British Trans-Arctic Expedition was ready.
Herbert, with his team – Allan Gill, Fritz Koerner and Kenneth Hedges, plus four heavily laden sledges and 34 huskies – set out from Point Barrow on February 21, 1968. On the map it was a 2,000-mile journey, but they all knew that the constant shifting of the ice could greatly inflate that mileage. Herbert and his colleagues, who would be spending a year and a half on the ice, would have to be ready every night for the sound of the sudden splitting or pressuring that would mean they had to move dogs, tons of equipment and themselves on to a new floe in double quick time.
Modern radio communications proved a mixed blessing. When Gill badly injured his back and the expedition committee in London radioed an order for his immediate evacuation, Herbert was incensed. The committee retaliated by suggesting that his opposition was due to “winteritis” warping his judgment. But in the words of a reporter for The Sunday Times, which shared exclusive newspaper rights to the expedition story with The Times: “Herbert has his faults – a Napoleonic sense of drama, impetuosity and a tendency to think too much in a loud clear voice – but he is a long way from going barmy. He wanted Gill to stay for the winter because the Arctic is Gill’s life and any alternative, death included, would be preferable to the stigma of failure during an expedition.”
Gill stayed, and gradually regained his strength. But the incident made Herbert enemies when some of his indignant remarks were relayed to a large readership. After this and other delays, it was only by dint of forced marches that the team reached the North Pole on April 6, 1969.
Arguably the worst of their journey lay ahead, with the ice splitting all around them as temperatures rose. But in mid-May they at last sighted land, and on May 29 an exhausted Hedges and Gill, his injury forgotten, summoned up the strength and the willpower to scramble on to Small Blackboard Island off the northeast coast of Spitsbergen, 3,620 miles after leaving Point Barrow.
Only half the team having landed, in Herbert’s eyes it was not the triumph he had hoped for, and he was further disappointed when the expedition’s achievement was, as he saw it, overshadowed in the eyes of the world by the almost simultaneous exploits of a new generation of explorers: the Apollo 10 astronauts, who were taking their first pictures of Earth from the Moon just as Herbert and his team were sighting land.
Yet the Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, rightly called his achievement “a feat of endurance which ranks with any in polar history”, and the expedition’s patron, the Duke of Edinburgh, numbered it “among the greatest triumphs of human skill and endurance”.
On his return from the Arctic, Herbert married Marie McGaughey, who not only understood his obsession with polar travel but was even prepared to share it with him. Two years later, with Marie and their ten-month-old daughter Kari, he journeyed to Qeqertarsuaq in northwest Greenland to spend two years living with the Inuit, recording their way of life before it was changed for ever by the incursions of the 20th and 21st centuries.
Hitherto a rather solitary man, he was greatly helped in his information-gathering by his wife’s gregariousness and the spontaneity of their tiny daughter, whose stay in the Arctic had been sponsored by Heinz but who was soon, with her mother, enjoying the sort of food that revolted Herbert, including the skulls and brains of little auks, cooked whole. When his daughter returned to Britain and a shop assistant overheard her talking Inuit, he relished the woman’s inevitable comment, “Oh well, it’s always nice to have a second language.”
After a sortie to Lapland in 1975 Herbert led an expedition in 1978-82 which attempted the first circumnavigation of the Greenland coast by dog sledge and skin boat, an enterprise that had to be abandoned after severe weather, problems with unseaworthy boats and expensive air rescues. This project never captured the imagination of public or press, but Herbert’s efforts won him renewed respect from his peers.
The death of his second daughter, Pascale, in an electrical accident in 1993, when she was 15, left Herbert devastated. Only a few years before, he had had a quadruple heart bypass, and after these two crises, painting and drawing pictures based on his many expeditions began to take up his time at home at Laggan in Inverness-shire. There were one-man exhibitions on several continents, and two of his works ended up in royal collections.
Among his books were A World of Men (1968), Across the Top of the World (1969), The Last Great Journey on Earth (1971), Eskimos (1976), Hunters of the Polar North (1982), The Noose of Laurels (1989), a controversial study which disputed Peary’s claim to have reached the North Pole, and The Third Pole (2003).
Knighted in 2000, Herbert was also a joint honorary president of the World Expeditionary Association and a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. His awards included a Polar Medal in 1962 and its clasp in 1969; the Livingstone Gold Medal of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society, 1969; and the Founder’s Gold Medal of the Royal Geographical Society, 1970.
He is survived by his wife and their elder daughter.
Sir Wally Herbert, polar explorer, was born on October 24, 1934. He died of heart trouble on June 12, 2007, aged 72

Exploration

2007-06-13T12:31:00.000Z

I am still struggling with the nuances of GIS, issues around GIS in government, geographical metadata, spatial data initiatives etc. etc.

But I can go back to historical geography and immediately understand geography as an incentive for intrepid early explorers to visit far away places and try to understand the physical world as a result.

History was about chaps, geography was about maps. And of course the chaps who drew the maps. Romantic names like Thales and Ptolemy from Greek and Roman times, then the European explorers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries such as Vasco Da Gama, Bartholemew Dias and Ferdinand Magellan. Even their names suggested exciting and remote journeys. No doubt some were concerned about enriching themselves but at the same time they enriched our knowledge base and transformed our fragmentary gleanings into a coherent body of knowledge.

Then in the nineteenth century James Cooke and Charles Darwin excited us all over again with a further interpretation of our world and the creatures who inhabit it.

And even today there are individual explorers climbing the highest peaks, crossing the hottest deserts, sailing the roughest seas and reaching both poles. Most do not have scientific research as their main driving force, but they do remind us of the geographic and climatic variety of our planet and our need to preserve that variety.

And on television, programmes such as Coast, or Micheal Palin's travel programmes are still fascinating for us, possibly because we have been to, or aspire to go to, some of the places which are being shown.

That's the geography I understand. Something I can visualise, something I can touch. And am still surprised when I look put of an aircraft window and see the land below exactly as it is portrayed on a map.

And that is why I am excited about my forthcoming trip to the Orkney islands, my first ever visit there. It's a new adventure, a new exploration and a chance to combine History and Geography in a single place. Chaps and maps.

Geographic Conferences

2007-05-31T07:13:00.000Z

My thoughts on the nature of conferences were stimulated by an entry in Ed Parson’s blog. This entry was written while he was at the geoTEC conference in Calgary. He made the comment that there was a high technical content at this conference and how this was an interesting contrast to conferences in the UK. He felt, and here I paraphrase, that UK conferences can comprise vendor sales pitches and OS bashing.

I am on the working group organising the AGI2007 conference in Stratford Upon Avon in September, though very much the layman on that organising group. I am interested generally in what constitutes a successful conference and specifically that we get it right for our conference.

It seems to me that there is no single ingredient, but a whole range of ingredients which go to making a successful conference. A bit like a recipe I guess – too much of one ingredient can jeopardise the whole end product.

What if we gave a conference and nobody came? Well of course that would be a total disaster. So the conference programme must attract attendees. That may seem obvious, but it must be uppermost in our minds throughout the planning.

I also feel that the conference must generally move debate forward. So whatever the individual content, there should be a desire to make progress collectively and take some issues up to a higher level. There may be specific issues where consensus could be achieved and that consensus fed into future debate or even future legislation. Effectively the conference must aim to be more than just a talking shop.

And what about the content? Taking Ed’s points, how technical should this be? Perhaps I can digress a bit here. I used to work at the Royal Festival Hall in London. We had debates about the concert programmes we should be offering. There was a school of thought that we should do endless ‘popular classics’ concerts – Mozart, Beethoven, a bit of Bruch and maybe the 1812 to finish. This would ensure bums on seats. Another school of thought was that it was our duty to highlight the work of contemporary composers and educate our audiences. Perhaps concerts of the compositions of Xenakis or Birtwistle. Of course both schools of thought, in isolation, were wrong. Too many contemporary concerts with low audiences would not be financially viable. But if we did endless popular concerts, they would end up not being so popular any more. We would have a declining, and increasingly elderly, audience. Balance was key. Audiences, who would not attend a concert of purely contemporary work, would happily listen to a contemporary piece of work as part of a more general concert.

Back to Geography. Surely the issue is the same. We have a very wide range of potential attendees, some from the corporate world, some from Government, central or local, some from health authorities, some from utilities etc. All sessions will not appeal to all attendees and we shouldn’t attempt to achieve that. A conference should surely have a range of topics and a range of technical content within those topics. But there must also be a recognisable theme and a number of logical strands. And yes we must stimulate debate, but not by putting up an easy fall guy and allowing delegates to vent their frustration. The debate should try to push delegates into thinking in ways that they might not hitherto have done.

And what is the measure of success of a conference. Strangely I do not think the main measure relates to that conference at all. It is not whether that conference made money (though that is certainly important). The success of a conference is the base it can build for the conference in the following year. I would want delegates to leave the conference asking ‘ When is next year’s conference? We want to keep our diaries free.’

As I mentioned at the start, we are running AGI2007 on 19th and 20th September in Stratford upon Avon. The general theme is ‘Building a GeoCommunity’. I am really excited by the format and by the programme. Details can be found on the AGI website. I think the technical content will be high, but also there will be useful content for the less technically-minded delegate. There will be relevance to a wide range of interests within the GeoCommunity. I think we will live up to the theme. And on the Wednesday night, there will be a fabulous party.

See you there!

Addressing

2007-05-18T21:26:00.000Z

I do realise that there is a debate going on regarding commonality of addressing. Not a debate that I can get involved in. Meanwhile, here are the British postcodes.

Infotech Golf Day

2007-05-10T22:02:00.000Z

I was pleased to have been invited today to a golf day organised by Infotech Eterprises who are an AGI member and a global software services company specialising in geospatial solutions.

The day was held at the Buckinghamshire Golf Course, which was in superb condition. The hospitality was excellent. The weather was not so great - windy and wet.

Despite the weather I really enjoyed the day. All the more so because I played quite well and, amazingly, won the event. I'm dead chuffed.

AGI2007

2007-05-06T09:57:00.000Z

I have, along with members of the AGI2007 working group, spent a couple of days in Stratford Upon Avon, venue of the AGI2007 conference in September. We reviewed the venue, the papers submitted and the administration.

At the end of the weekend, I was really excited by this year's conference. The selected papers are very interesting and thought-provoking, the proposed programme is I believe varied and educational and the venue is excellent.

I urge all who are interested in Geographic Information to make the effort to come along to our conference.

Data Links

2007-04-27T12:48:00.000Z

The directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 March 2007 establishing an Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community (INSPIRE) was published in the official Journal on the 25th April 2007. The INSPIRE Directive will enter into force on the 15th May 2007.

Should I get excited by this?

Well others are at least welcoming the progress made, even if some are I think questioning the direction and speed of that progress.

If we look at the INSPIRE website, I do not think we can quibble with the need for harmonisation and data comparability throughout Europe. As the site states,
'The general situation on spatial information in Europe is one of fragmentation of datasets and sources, gaps in availability, lack of harmonisation between datasets at different geographical scales and duplication of information collection. These problems make it difficult to identify, access and use data that is available.'

And if we further look at the ultimate aim, we cannot really quibble with that either -
'The initiative intends to trigger the creation of a European spatial information infrastructure that delivers to the users integrated spatial information services. These services should allow the users to identify and access spatial or geographical information from a wide range of sources, from the local level to the global level, in an inter-operable way for a variety of uses. The target users of INSPIRE include policy-makers, planners and managers at European, national and local level and the citizens and their organisations. Possible services are the visualisation of information layers, overlay of information from different sources, spatial and temporal analysis, etc.'

But as always, the path from A to B is not always straightforward and to get all European countries to enact the legislation and then put in the time and resources required to ensure harmonisation of data will be where the main challenge lies.

In the meantime I shall watch with interest the initial reactions and debates.

The Countries of the World

2007-04-21T10:41:00.000Z

I have in some posts given the link to a You Tube video. But I didn't know how to embed the video within my blog. Until now. Many thanks to Simon Brand for his advice.

So here I am experimenting with this facility. And of course the first one must have a geographic connection. Which this does. But since it is a weekend, the geographic connection is allowed to be tenuous.

Here is a listing of most of the countries of the world. I hope you like it.

AGI's old office

2007-04-19T21:35:00.000Z

This morning I returned to AGI's old office on Old Street. It was strange to see it without furniture, without cupboards, without clutter. It looked much larger, but soul-less. But then it was always rather soul-less. And speaking personally, I am glad to be out of it.

Here are some pictures of the old office as it looked this morning. It will be interesting to see who moves in and what they do with it.

Yes, actually, we have signed out. For the last time.

Royal Patron for Map Action

2007-04-17T11:31:00.000Z

I was pleased to hear that Prince Harry has agreed to become the Royal Patron of Map Action.

Map Action do a fantastic job in difficult circumstances around the world - see my earlier blog. This Royal patronage will increase their profile which will undoubtedly be beneficial for them and for those countries in which they operate both now and in the future.

AGI on the move

2007-04-16T18:53:00.000Z

Some of you may have visited us in the AGI office in Old Street. It was not the most inspiring of offices, but was expensive particularly because it had an area devoted purely to meetings. We were paying for this space all day and every day, but only using it perhaps once a week.

About a year ago, I was asked to investigate moving to alternative premises in April 2007 when our current lease was due to expire. The brief covered 4 major requirements -

A reduced fixed cost so that AGI could utilise a higher percentage on membership income back to the service of members needs and requirements.

More flexibility so that we are not locked into a long-term commitment which might not be appropriate in the future if for example we move to more part-time working, working from home etc.

Somewhere which has the ability to host meetings of AGI sub-groups.

An environment in which staff will thrive and give their best for AGI.

Meeting those requirements was not easy. But I am hugely grateful to the AGI team for their support and their embracing of change - indeed their enthusiasm for the change.

We found a suitable office off Bishopsgate near Liverpool Street Station. This is a serviced office run by a company called YourSpace which seemed to encapsulate within their philosophy the same philosophy which drives the AGI team namely an inspiration and a passion for their customers.

And so today we moved out of our offices in Old Street and into the new offices. The move went more smoothly than I had dared to hope. Our new address is
5 St Helen's Place
Bishopsgate
London
EC3A 6AU

I am looking forward to working in the new environment and using this as a base to continue to give our members real value for their membership. If any of our members read this, then please feel free to drop by and visit us. We will give you a warm welcome.

Weekend digression

2007-04-15T21:27:00.000Z

I feel that at weekends I am allowed the occasional digression completely away from geography. On Saturday I was driving up to Hitchin and listening to Dermot O'Leary on Radio 2. In his 'maudlin music' slot he played Rufus Wainwright's version of Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah. It is just such an amazing song.

I don't know how to embed You Tube videos into a blog, so I just give you the URL for the original version by Leonard Cohen. Stop what you are doing, click below, and just listen -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rf36v0epfmI

AGI Conference 2007

2007-04-09T19:56:00.000Z

The AGI conference will be in September in Stratford Upon Avon. The format is an exciting evolution from the format of previous years and the conference promises to be the major event in the UK Geographical calendar this year.

Chris Holcroft the CEO at the AGI (and my boss) has just started a conference blog. I urge anyone who strays onto my site to go over and read the conference blog. And even better, sign up to attend the conference itself. You'll have a great time, learn loads and come away with added enthusiasm for the potential of geographic information.

International waters

2007-04-09T08:35:00.000Z

At work last week I got a call from a reporter on Sky News asking if the AGI could advise on how international waters are set and checked. I was alone in the office and could not answer the question so I suggested he contact the UK Hydrographic Office.

The question was asked, of course, because of the abduction by Iran of 15 UK marines who, they alleged, had strayed from Iraqi waters into Iranian territorial waters and were therefore trespassing.

The dispute has now been settled and the marine have been released unharmed. But were they trespassing? Britain categorically says 'no', Iran maintains that they were. And I guess we will never know. On land, counties borders can usually be measured in relation to a river or at least some permanent geographical feature - sometimes a man made on such as a wall. But on the ocean there is no immediate feature. Of course a border can be categorized by its latitude and/or longitude, but presumably borders do not lie directly north-south or east-west, bit can be diagonal, zig-zag or whatever.

In this case we are dealing with the waters of the Shatt al Arab waterway. Apparently the dividing line between Iraqi and Iranian waters was first agreed in the 1970s and marked by buoys. But two factors have complicated matters. Firstly Saddam Hussain renounced the agreement. Secondly the boundary is defined by its distance from the coastline. But in that area the coastline is constantly shifting with mud flats appearing and disappearing over time.

So effectively neither side can claim with certainty that they were correct. It does seem to me that it was at best rather cavalier of the marines to move out of reach of their mother ship so close to a disputed boundary in a politically sensitive part of the world.

This is of some interest to me as I lived and worked in Iran in the late 1970s during and after the period of the Iranian revolution. It was an interesting time and I had a number of inadvertent adventures including the time being Scottish saved my life and the time the music of Boney M almost cost me my life. But those are long stories which probably do not properly reside in a geog Blog. So I will just sign off with copies of the maps that were used by each side to try to prove their point.

British map

Iranian map

A sense of perspective

2007-03-28T18:57:00.000Z

I think it is ironic that as technology moves on and millions start to use GIS either on the internet or in sat.nav. devices, one effect will be that we will lose a sense of perspective and a sense of scale.

Yes I use Streetmap or Google maps if I need to know at street level where a particular street or building is. I use them if I am meeting someone or have to get to a building I do not know. I love the car sat.nav. if I have a really obscure route to take.

But neither of these pays particular attention to North or South. They won't tell me where my destination is in relation to the rest of the country. They won't give an overall picture of the countryside.

So I will use them with caution. In some instances they are incredibly useful. But for some instances, and particularly for general knowledge and interest, I will be happy to stick with a paper map. Sometimes I want to enjoy the journey rather than get obsessed with reaching the destination. Geography should encourage exploration, it should feed curiosity. I fear that sat.nav. devices will destroy both.

Chorley Day

2007-03-20T18:37:00.000Z

In 1987 a Committee under the Chairmanship of Lord Chorley was asked to produce, and delivered, a report for the Secretary of State for the Environment into the handling of Geographic Information.

I work for the Association for Geographic Information, a body which came into being in 1989 as a direct result of some of the recommendations of Lord Chorley's report.

So was this report a milestone in the discussion of Geographic Information in the UK? Did it lead to major changes in the way Government dealt with GIS? Or did it simply gather dust? Chorley not!

Thankfully the report did much to foster the development of GIS in the UK. But could more have been done?

I am not planning to answer that. This post is simply to note that we at AGI are rightly marking the 20th anniversary of the publication of the Chorley Report. On 19th June, at the London Chamber of Commerce, we are running a Chorley Day to celebrate, and I am sure that is the right word, the anniversary of the report. The full programme has not yet been finalised, but this will be an opportunity for a wide ranging discussion of GIS twenty years on. And is is particularly pleasing that Lord Chorley will be attending the event. I am certainly looking forward to it.

Further details are on the AGI website.

Gradients

2007-03-05T18:16:00.000Z

Golf is of course a sport which demands fitness, strength and subtlety. More than that, it encompasses philosophy, mental strength - and of course Geography.

Today I was playing golf in Keith with my father - good going in his case since he turned 90 last July. I was reflecting as we went round on the geographic features both on the course and surrounding the course. On the course there are the hills, the differing soil, the water, the twists and turns and the slopes. The particular slopes which were bugging me were the very gradual ones on the greens which I could not read properly. I expected the ball to go straight towards the hole, but at the last minute it would turn left or right and remain stubbornly in view instead of disappearing in the cup.

But beyond the course as well, I looked at the Balloch as it rose above the town of Keith or Ben Rinnes in the distance. Maps often do not give that sense of varying altitudes. Even Google earth does not give quite the sense of geography being three dimensional, but it is getting there.

I was further reminded of this as I flew up to Aberdeen. It was difficult from the air to really appreciate the mountains of the Lake District or the Grampians. From the air, one can differentiate between water and land, between city and country, between fields and woods. But to gain a sense of height, to see hills and valleys, is much more difficult.

No conclusion to this. Just a rumination - and after all golf allows loads of time for ruminating.

(My Dad with a tricky chip)

Sea breezes

2007-02-26T18:47:00.000Z

Last day in Malaga - and another couple of hours on the beach. Time once more to ponder. Well that's what beaches are for.

As the afternoon wears on, there is a strong sea breeze. This has happened every day, but is not something which happens here in the middle of summer. Why is that?

Here again I need more Geographic information than I have. But I suspect that the explanation is something like this. The temperature in Malaga is now 21C. This is much higher than it has been recently and crucially is much higher than the temperature of the water. I did in fact go for a (very short) swim today and can personally vouch for the fact that the water is still very cold!

So I guess the temperature of the air above the land is higher than the temperature of the air above the sea. Warm air rises. Therefore I suspect that as the warm air rises above the land, the space below that warm air sucks in the colder air from the sea. This effect is more pronounced in the middle of the afternoon when the temperature on land is at its highest. And thus we have quite a strong sea breeze.

In the summer, the water is much warmer than now in February (I certainly hope it will be) and the air temperature differential between land and sea is less significant. Thus the sea breezes which would be so welcome in July, unfortunately do not happen.

I am not sure if this is a correct explanation, but is seems logical to me.

I return to London tomorrow, so will leave with a picture of the Malaguata beach this afternoon looking northwards from Malaga towards El Palo. Back I understand to a London which is wet and windy.

Pebbles on the sand

2007-02-25T18:41:00.000Z

I often stare at waves. Usually though I am staring beyond them in a spiritual way and pondering the eternity of waves compared with the transience of my existence. Or something like that.

Today I was sitting on the Malagueta beach watching the waves. And looking at them rather than beyond them. The waves were not hitting the shore straight on but at an angle of about 10 degrees. I watched a pebble just within reach of the waves. When a wave retreated the pebble was washed a couple of feet away from the shore. And when a wave broke, it was washed a couple of feet back toward the shore. But because of the angle of the wave, it was a few inches further along the beach. I believe that retreating waves are always at right angles to the shore - it is only the breaking waves that may not be straight at the shore. Anyway with the coming and going of each wave, this pebble moved inexorably a few inches further along the beach.

So where would it end up? Will it eventually get to Sitges? Might the Spanish pebble eventually become a French pebble? And from where will the pebble come which presumably will take its place?

Too many questions and no answers. But this must be another example of longshore drift, which I am reading about in school Geography blogs. And this is the phenomenon which gives rise to erosion and to spits.

But that´s enough for today. The sun is getting low and the local chiringuita is serving excellent Rioja. The waves will be here tomorrow. Hopefully, so will I.

Malaga Playa

2007-02-24T18:02:00.000Z

I am currently in Malaga. On the morning I left after my last visit, 24th January, it was windy. All planes were slightly delayed as the wind forced times between departures at Malaga airport to be lengthened. What I did not know, was that the wind strengthened during the day of 24th January and finally ended up as the strongest gale along the Costa Del Sol coast for many years. Some trees were uprooted and buildings were damaged. And in particular the beaches were affected with sand being washed away in some places and many stones being deposited on beaches in other places.

I guess this is an example of longshore drift where strong waves at an angle to the shore sweep away stones from one part of the beach and deposit them on another part.

Today in Malaga it was warm and sunny. So I went to the Malagueta beach, the local town beach. This was always a beach which has a line of stones just below the waterline. But now there is a new line of stones about 6 feet up the beach from the edge of the water. Presumably these were deposited by the large waves on 24th January. And apparently the local authorities are to import tonnes of sand to deposit on the beach in time for the main tourist season.

In the meantime, the stones were not a major problem. Especially for me - the water was freezing and I had no intention of going down for a swim. But the evidence of my eyes for theoretical Geography having a practical consequence was interesting.

School Geography

2007-02-23T17:32:00.000Z

I got an O-level in Geography in Inverness and a Higher in Geography after we had moved to Keith. But that was almost 40 years ago, so my memory of exactly what I did in School Geography is dim. I cannot even remember the name of my Geography teacher in Inverness, though I do remember Eric Barton, my teacher in Keith, whose daughter Erica was in my class. A few years later he taught my father word processing at an evening class I believe.

But quite what we did in the Geography class is not something I can particularly recall. Indeed I remember rather better the Geography projects we did at primary school. For example I did a project on Sydney, Australia, and as part of the project sent off to the Australian Tourist Board for some leaflets. A huge pile of wonderful glossy brochures on all parts of Australia arrived at our door in Inverness, and I still remember the excitement of looking through those at a world which seemed impossibly far away. I wonder what I would have said had I known that I would spend a year in Australia some 20 years later. And I remember also doing a project on the Irrawaddy River which seemed so much more exotic than the mundane River Ness.

But now I find that some Geography classes at schools have their own blogs and are doing exciting projects on map techniques, population, settlement, water resources etc. One such blog is from Paul Williams, a Gegraphy teacher (perhaps the Geography teacher) at the Shrewsbury School in Bankok, Thailand. Not only does this site have interesting information of its own, it has a myriad of links to other educational Geography blogs.

And that would seem to be a reasource that I can use in this quest to make sense of Geography. I can go back to school without ever having to enter a classroom. So I will do exactly that, and I will report again on how I get on.

But currently I am in Malaga and such educational issues will have to wait. I am off to explore the varying Riojas of the region.

Per Ardua Ad Cadastre

2007-02-17T15:30:00.000Z

Last year I was getting to grips with the term 'mashup' which seemed to appear in every GI article I read.

Now I am finding many references to 'cadastres'. At the AGI council meeting last week, one speaker mentioned land parcel cadastres. An email received yesterday on potential subjects for our Chorley Day mentioned land values as a key component of cadastres.

But I don't know what a cadastre is. So off I go to try to find out.

Firstly I find that in Roman times a Cadastre is a land information system particularly minor roads, ditches and boundaries. The establishment of a cadastre was preceded by surveying (limitatio) and the establishment of survey markets (terminatio). One legacy of the Romans in Britain was the centuriation of land, basically an information system for land parcels based on grid structures.

Nowadays, cadastral maps define legal repositories of land ownership, value and location. The plotting of the edges of land parcels can be incorporated into a digital cadastral database. These can incorporate an interest in, and ownership of, the land parcel. This can be done for fiscal purposes, legal purposes or land management purposes.

And this is not just a historical process, but very much an integrated contemporary process which can map environments for 3D geomarketing which can use the visualisation of strategic information relying on geographic supports for decision making.

But I am falling into the trap of reason being submerged by jargon. So lets stop there for the moment and return later to learning more specific uses for cadastres.

Geography goes west

2007-02-13T13:23:00.000Z

History is history as far as many pupils in British education are concerned. A recent survey has shown an alarming reduction in pupils studying history at GCSE level. I really do think that this is serious as it means that in the future many British citizens will not have a historical perspective in which to judge current events.

But this is not a history blog. I am more directly concerned with geography. Surely geography might be benefiting from this phenomenon. Well, no actually. In fact the number of pupils studying geography is showing an event steeper decline and now represents only 3.7% of pupils.

All of this is because these are no longer compulsory subjects for the over 14s. The number of pupils studying subjects such as media studies have increased by 32%.

So in the future citizens might get more insight into watching Big Brother but will know nothing about the facts on climate change.

Isn't it about time those involved in geography took this issue seriously and did what they can to reverse this decline? The future of geography is at stake.

Tracking the snow leopard

2007-02-05T12:50:00.000Z

Apparently Global Positioning Systems (GPS) are helping to track the whereabouts of some elusive snow leopards in Central Asia. The GPS devices are attached to a small collar around the neck of the leopards and their movements can then be tracked. And how do they get the collar onto the leopards? Not, apparently, by going 'here kitty kitty' and then slipping the collar on. But through capturing the leopards through non invasive leg traps, which sounds like a contradiction in terms to me.

But this is certainly an innovative use of GPS technology.

Reaching the heights

2007-02-02T12:57:00.000Z

Highest Mountain in the World (and Asia)Everest, Nepal-China: 29,035 feet / 8850 meters

Highest Mountain in AfricaKilimanjaro, Tanzania: 19,340 feet / 5895 meters

Highest Mountain in AntarcticaVinson Massif: 16,066 feet / 4897 meters

Highest Mountain in AustraliaKosciusko: 7310 feet / 2228 meters

Highest Mountain in EuropeElbrus, Russia (Caucasus): 18,510 feet / 5642 meters

Highest Mountain in Western EuropeMont Blanc, France-Italy: 15,771 feet / 4807 meters

Highest Mountain in OceaniaPuncak Jaya, New Guinea: 16,535 feet / 5040 meters

Highest Mountain in North AmericaMcKinley (Denali), Alaska: 20,320 feet / 6194 meters

Highest Mountain in the 48 Contiguous United StatesWhitney, California: 14,494 feet / 4418 meters

Highest Mountain in South AmericaAconcagua, Argentina: 22,834 feet / 6960 meters

Nearly all higher than I have been. I've been to Cusco and Quito, but since I got to both by plane they hardly count as having reached a high altitude. In Scotland, climbing to the top of Cairngorm is the highest I have reached. And worldwide, I guess some climbing near the top of Mount Damavand in the mountains above Teheran would represent the highest I have been above sea level, probably at around 16000 feet.

How low can you go?

2007-02-01T12:48:00.000Z

About this low in fact -

Lowest Point in the World (and Asia)Dead Sea shore, Israel-Jordan: 1369 feet / 417.5 meters below sea level

Lowest Point in AfricaLake Assal, Djibouti: 512 feet / 156 meters below sea level

Lowest Point in AustraliaLake Eyre: 52 feet / 12 meters below sea level

Lowest Point in EuropeCaspian Sea shore, Russia-Iran-Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan: 92 feet / 28 meters below sea level

Lowest Point in Western EuropeTie: Lemmefjord, Denmark and Prins Alexander Polder, Netherlands: 23 feet / 7 meters below sea level

Lowest Point in North AmericaDeath Valley, California: 282 feet / 86 meters below sea level

Lowest Point in South AmericaBahia Blanca, Argentina: 138 feet / 42 meters below sea level

I confess that although I knew that the Dead Sea was the lowest point on earth, I had not realised that it was quite so far below sea level.

I once payed golf in Death Valley, California. The club pro watched me hit a few balls, came
over and rather conescendingly said 'Never mind - it will be the high air pressure which prevents you from hitting the ball very far.'

Malaga (2)

2007-01-27T14:39:00.000Z

There is a completely different perception from above a city. At street level there are few landmarks, the sun does not permeate to that level and working out one's position in relation to the rest of the city can be tricky.

But it is easy to climb to the Gibralfaro, the citadel on the hill overlooking Malaga. From here one can see the streets, work out their position in relation to the sea or the hills or the river.

This picture shows the Plaza Merced which is close to our apartment in the Calle Pena.

And here we see the Teatro Cervantes, and the H-shaped roof in the middle of the right edge of the photo is in fact the roof of our apartment block. It is interesting to look down on one's home and of course Google Earth gives a very similar picture of the area although the picture there was taken before out apartment was built whereas this was taken today.

Mapas de Malaga

2007-01-26T15:30:00.000Z

I am currently sitting in an internet cafe on the Plaza Merced in the old Centro Historico of Malaga. As I walked around the narrow streets in the Centro Historico, I reflected on how useful a map of the district is. The streets in the area are very narrow, and the buidings very tall. Sunlight rarely permeates down to street level. So unless one has an inate sense of direction, which I very certainly do not, it can be really difficult to know whether one is going north, south, east or west.

I remember when I lived in Teheran all those years ago, getting one´s bearings was easy because the whole city sloped gradually from north to south.

But although Malaga has high mountains behind it and, obviously, the sea at its other edge, the city itself is relatively flat. So by the time I have turned left, right, left and right again, I have no idea whether I am going in the same direction or in the opposite direction. If I am lucky, I might get back to the place from where I stated.

But of course a map allows me to continue to where I am headed and get there in a reasonably straight line. Provided of course I am on foot.

In a car, with directions made even more difficulat by one way streets, I often take a huge unplanned detour. But now satnav will prevent such difficulties. All I need to do is learn Spanish. Now is ´izquierda´ left or right?

Fit for purpose

2007-01-20T15:50:00.000Z

'The INfrastructure for SPatial InfoRmation in Europe initiative (INSPIRE) aims at making available relevant, harmonised and quality geographic information for the purpose of formulation, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of Community policy-making.'

Sounds logical to me. There must be some kind of data standard throughout Europe to allow harmonisation of this data across borders. The principles in INSPIRe also appear to be logical and sensible, namely -
'Data should be collected once and maintained at the level where this can be done most effectively
It should be possible to combine seamlessly spatial data from different sources and share it between many users and applications
Spatial data should be collected at one level of government and shared between all levels
Spatial data needed for good governance should be available on conditions that are not restricting its extensive use
It should be easy to discover which spatial data is available, to evaluate its fitness for purpose and to know which conditions apply for its use. '

And now there is an agreed text which will now go for ratification to the Parliament and Council of Ministers.

The ramifications are beyond me at present. Others will no doubt comment on this and I shall bring you their thoughts in due course. But if the Directive makes geographical data fit for purpose, then this is to be welcomed.

The Father of Geography

2007-01-16T13:20:00.000Z

Apparently Eratosthenes could be described as the first geographer. He was born in 276 BC in Cyrene (now Libya) and died at the pretty good age of 82 in Alexandria. He was a mathematician and philosopher (weren't they all in those days) and was the first person to measure the circumference of the earth.

He was accused of being a jack of all trades but master of none. Apparently his mates called him 'Beta' because he never came first at anything! Certainly he had a wide range of interests, including Geography. He sketched, quite accurately, the route of the Nile to Khartoum, showing the two Ethiopian tributaries. He also suggested that lakes were the source of the river. A study of the Nile had been made by many scholars before Eratosthenes and they had attempted to explain the rather strange behaviour of the river, but most like Thales were quite wrong in their explanations. Eratosthenes was the first to give what is essentially the correct answer when he suggested that heavy rains sometimes fell in regions near the source of the river and that these would explain the flooding lower down the river. Another contribution that Eratosthenes made to geography was his description of the region "Eudaimon Arabia", now the Yemen, as inhabited by four different races. The situation was somewhat more complicated than that proposed by Eratosthenes, but today the names for the races proposed by Eratosthenes, namely Minaeans, Sabaeans, Qatabanians, and Hadramites, are still used.

Somehow he also found time to write. His writings include the poem Hermes, inspired by astronomy, as well as literary works on the theatre and on ethics which was a favourite topic of the Greeks. Eratosthenes is said to have became blind in old age and it has been claimed that he committed suicide by starvation. Not something for modern day Geographers to emulate, though I guess blindness in those days must have really stopped all his interests.

What I wonder would he have made of Google Earth?

Geography and war

2007-01-15T12:54:00.000Z

You may have read at the weekend that British Army intelligence in Basra in Iraq have complained that terrorists attacking British bases have been using Google Earth in order to pinpoint their attacks. A raid on the homes of insurgents has uncovered print-outs from Google Earth. Apparently these show vulnerable areas inside army blocks such as tented accommodation, toilet blocks or vehicle parking areas.

Soldiers are threatening to sue Google if it transpires that one of their number is killed as a result of information gleaned from Google Earth.

It is certainly an interesting issue. Though I suppose that the British Army also finds commercially available satellite images useful for their purposes. I know that Russia during the cold war period used to produce maps which were deliberately not to scale in order to confuse an enemy who might get hold of those maps.

Should Google stop mapping sensitive military areas? Who would decide on which areas fall within that definition.

I guess this does show that geography now impacts on such a wide range of issues these days. I suspect this is something we must just live with and of course in most parts of the world such up-to-date detail is very much a benefit.

Weekend break

2007-01-13T16:42:00.000Z

I can't keep up a geography blog seven days a week. Sometimes I, and you dear reader whoever you are, need a break. Particularly at weekends.

So today has nothing to do with geography. Well almost nothing, though I guess rainbows do have a geography connection. And geography probably has a rainbow connection.

I do spend some time browsing YouTube. And one of my favourite YouTubers is a photography studio called Stonewall Studios in Niagra, Canada. A few days ago I mentioned to them the fact that I loved the music of the late Eva Cassidy and particularly liked her version of 'Over the Rainbow'. The guys at Stonewall kindly added some visuals to the music and downloaded it to YouTube. And here it is. I hope you like it.

I like maps

2007-01-11T14:46:00.000Z

I've always liked maps.

As a very young boy, I used to follow the map when we went for the weekend from Inverness to visit my grandparents in Craigellachie.

When we went on caravan holidays to Gairloch or Ullapool, I used to ask for a map in order to locate on a map the islands I could see from the caravan window.

I remember in primary school we did a school project on Takoradi in Ghana, and I was fascinated by maps of the area. I resolved to go there, but unfortunately that has not yet happened.

My first visit to Russia was in 1986. We were under the strict control of Intourist but in Tbilisi (not longer in Russia of course) I resolved to slip away from their clutches. A locally-purchased map showed a tram line going to a nearby lake. On evening, I slipped away from dinner and boarded that tram. The actual route did not seem to correspond to the map. At one point, well outside Tbilisi, the tram started to go through a cornfield. Time to get out I decided. No one else did. I then walked to the edge of the field and there a mile away was the lake I sought. I walked to a village on the shore. The villagers had never encountered a tourist and I was invited to share some tea with them all in the village square. Afterwards, as dusk was falling, I went back to the field. There I was, waist high in corn, beside a rail line waiting for what I fervently hoped would be a tram. And yes it turned up. A great evening that was not in the guide book, only on the map.

On another visit to Russia, I found, on a map, a church on the shore of the Volga. Two of us took a bus and visited the church. We opened the door. There was a wedding taking place. We shut the door. It was then thrown open. Our visit apparently was deemed to be good luck and we were invited to be guests in the front row. After the ceremony, we gave our Best Wishes to the couple and went off to the water's edge. It was a hot day. I decided to go for a swim. I had no swim shorts, but there was no-one around. So there I was splashing around naked in the River Volga when suddenly the bridal party and all their guests came down to the river for the wedding photos. I hope the viewers of those photos look only at the foreground and not the background.

I remember in India finding Kanyakumari on a map and wanting to go there. Not much of a town, but at dusk we sat on the roof of a hotel watching the sun setting in the west over the Arabian Sea and the full moon rising in the east over the Gulf of Mannar. Magical.

Guide books tell you to do what others are all doing. Maps let you decide for yourself. I like maps.

Reflection

2007-01-10T06:50:00.000Z

Ten days in - and of course I am questioning the raison d'etre of this blog.

Firstly of course I am writing to myself. Is that one step worse than talking to myself? Probably.

And this is blog about Geography written by someone who knows nothing about the subject. How silly is that? It's a bit like Ann Widdecombe wring a good sex blog or Jade Goody doing a philosophy blog.

And then although I am writing from a personal capacity, I am aware that I work for the Association for Geographic Information, albeit as the finance guy. This is a members-based organisation and of course I cannot say anything that would upset, disadvantage or unduly favour any of our members. That caveat might become rather restricting.

But the blog is a journey of understanding. Starting very much from square one. And already I have felt that the discipline of writing the blog had been helpful to me. I have no idea where this journey will take me. I will hit barriers of understanding I am sure. The jargon will be a problem, the acronyms also. But in order to meet my responsibilities to both the AGI and to our members, I believe that I really do need to gain further understanding of Geographic Information and all the concepts which are wrapped up within those two words.

So onwards and upwards. And please click here for a rather amusing lesson about the countries of the world.

Layers

2007-01-09T20:12:00.000Z

I am beginning, I think, to understand the concept of layers when applied to maps. Initially a map appears to be a flat one-dimensional representation of a part of the world. But even the most basic map has a number of features - hills rivers, lakes, villages towns etc. And I guess it was when I first discovered Google Earth that I understood that you can take a digital map and then decide to overlay it, or not, with roads, points of interest, town names etc.

I remember listening to a talk at last year's AGI conference on fresh fruit deserts (as opposed to fresh fruit desserts) in Liverpool. In that instance a map of Liverpool was overlaid with those retail outlets which sold fresh fruit and vegetables. Because increasingly shopping is done at out of town supermarkets, many small shops in the inner city have stopped stocking fresh produce because they cannot guarantee to sell it before it deteriorates. So there are whole parts on the inner city where it is impossible to obtain fresh fruit and vegetables. Yet these are the poorest areas of the city and it is in these areas where many people do not have their own cars. So they cannot get to out of town supermarkets. So a whole swathe of the poorest people in Liverpool have no real access to fresh food. They are eating tinned food, not always by choice, by by necessity. That for me was an example of using mapping and combining it with data whose connection to maps was not immediately obvious, in order to highlight the problem in a way that raw data could not.

Local government has the opportunity to overlay maps of their area with a whole host of data, from bus routes to school catchment areas to health service provision to drainage etc. This video from YouTube shows this working in San Francisco.

So I presume that a lot of the GIS software being developed is allowing maps to be overlaid with useful data either for internal use of for proving information to the public. Add I can undertand that if this layered information is held digitally then it can be analysed and the spatial relationship of the data can be queried in a range of different ways for a range of different purposes.

Am I beginning to understand at least the basic concepts do you think? Let's hope so.

Map Action

2007-01-06T21:56:00.000Z

There are many commercial members of the AGI who are involved in producing GIS software. But I confess that I am not sure exactly what each does and for whom.

At the 2005 annual conference I attended a talk by Roger Wedge of Map Action and suddenly I was introduced to a use of GIS which I has simply not envisaged.

Map Action are a mainly voluntary group who swing into action whenever there is a major natural disaster. They arrive with their laptops and remap the area so that aid agencies can get their relief to outlying areas quickly and safely. This is how they do it.

Recently they have been working in Kenya and previously they helped in Indonesia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. They do an amazing job and put geography in the forefront of aid deployment. I am pleased that we have given them honorary corporate membership of the AGI.

Too much information

2007-01-05T06:24:00.000Z

Before Christmas I decided a needed a PDA. My needs were simple. I mainly wanted a reliable one with Microsoft Outlook which I could sync to my PCs at home and work, and thus have a master diary.

But reviews in the computer magazines and on-line gave me great detail about the technical aspects of each machine, about facilities I don't really need and about compatibilities, extra software, upgrades etc.

They are probably all capable of doing what I want. But because of the plethora of information, I simply have not been able to make up my mind. So I haven't bought one. I am confused by information which I recognise is not even relevant to me, yet that is hindering my decision-making.

At present I am finding Geography a bit like that. I simply want to understand the basic concepts of Geographic Information. But because I work for the AGI, I get inundated with newsletters, press releases, marketing pitches etc. And all of these are aimed at geographic professionals. So they are full of acronyms and jargon and assume a degree of knowledge which I do not have.

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with that. These are not pitched at the layman. The audience to which this information is pitched does presumably have the knowledge which can recognise the acronyms and understand the jargon.

But for me this represents a problem. How can I find somewhere which gives more basic information which I can latch on to? I want my learning curve to be gradual. Perhaps that simply is not possible. Onwards I search for the simplicity I need to allow me to move forwward at my pace up that learning curve.

What is GIS software used for?

2007-01-04T08:19:00.000Z

This thought was prompted by an article in this week’s GISCafé newsletter. North Somerset Council have purchased software to help them ‘deliver services from the back office to the customer’.

Now, using the previous definitions of Geographic Information, I can understand that local governments would be a user of GI. I can think of a number of instances where a local authority is involved with location – roads, housing, school catchment areas, refuse collection, council tax etc. We at the AGI have a number of local authorities among our membership, though it has to be said there are even more local authorities who are not members and a major task for us this year is to persuade all local authorities of the benefits of membership of the AGI.

But back to North Somerset Council, who are indeed members of the AGI. They state that they purchased WebMap software in order to ‘deliver back office functions using front office staff’. Now I don’t exactly know what this means. Their problem as I understand it was an inaccurate database with many duplications and no unique referencing system. The software purchased was, I believe, a gazetteer management system which would allow them to clean and match the gazetteer data. They used their in-house GIS team to do this with the software purchased.

Now I don’t begin to understand yet exactly what this software does, but if the end product is an accurate database which can match assets with council tax, waste services, planning etc. then I can see the advantage. And it appears that they have delivered this information to their front office staff via an intranet site and to the public via their internet site.
They claim they can deliver more integration, more functionality and better reporting. And finally they say that staff and public are beginning to realise the value of GIS.

Except that the layman does not presumably realise that it is GIS that is delivering these benefits. And this is still the concept that I am trying to understand. It will take me some time before I understand more about what GIS software actually does and how it does it. For now it is enough for me to know that GIS software can significantly improve the quality and availability of data.

And it is important for me to realise this because I suspect that for the take-up of the technology to increase within local authorities throughout the land, there will be a number of non-geographers, particularly finance guys, within those local authorities who will need to be persuaded that the benefits outweigh the costs.

G.I.

2007-01-03T08:44:00.000Z

The organisation I work for is called the ‘Association for Geographic Information’. Not, you will note, ‘for Geography’ or ‘ for Geographers’, but ‘Geographic Information’.

So having identified that Geography relates to the location of items, what do I now make of Geographic Information (GI)? What sort of information is that? I guess this must be any information whatsoever which relates to location.

I have recently returned from Malaga. This is a city south of Nerja. Presumably that is a piece of Geographic Information. Someone else might tell you that Malaga is north of Marbella. Another piece of Geographic Information. Put the two pieces of information together, though, and there is no increase in clarity. Even less if you do not know where either Nerja or Marbella is located. I suppose that is because there is no unique reference point and no commonality in those pieces on information. Presumably this is similar to the debate going on regarding commonality in addressing data. But I am getting ahead of myself there.

Malaga is 36.43 north and 4.23 west. Now that is Geographic Information which can pinpoint Malaga exactly on any map of the world. Very precise, very useful. And in a format that can be applied to any location, anywhere.

The AGI website is full of information of all types. It also includes a definition of Geographic Information as follows - 'Information about objects or phenomena that are associated with a location relative to the surface of the Earth'. I can understand that without too much difficulty and can immediately see that latitude and longitude fulfill that definition totally.

Where I do start to have a problem is with the use of Geographic Information in areas which might not at first seem to have a direct relevance to geography. We at the AGI have a large group of members who are commercial companies. This means that they sell things. Presumably. And I would have thought that most of what they sell can loosely be termed as geographic Information. But the key question for me is who is willing to pay for that information and why do the buyers feel that this information is valuable to them. Who uses Geographic Information and for what purpose? Does it supply commercial benefits, social benefits, benefits to the citizen or all three?

And to answer that question, I guess I must look at the websites of a number of organizations who refer to Geographic Information. But that is for another day. For the moment I just start with the knowledge that there exists a pile of information regarding location and that this information is useful for a huge range of purposes. And again I can see that our organization, the Association for Geographic Information, is uniquely placed, not to create that information ourselves, but to make information about that information available to our members via the website, via seminars, via the annual conference etc.

Oops now I’ve introduced the concept of information about information. Which is the same I guess as data about data. And I know that is known as metadata. But now I really am getting ahead of myself and straying into concepts that I need to leave for another day.

What is Geography?

2007-01-02T06:21:00.000Z

As I start on my learning curve, asking this fundamental question seems to be a good starting point. However the question is not as straightforward as it seems. Indeed if I was able to answer the question with a definitive answer, then presumably I can close this blog. Job done!

But I cannot give a definitive answer. I can I suppose begin by reaching into the far recesses of my mind to those days of Geography classes at the Inverness Royal Academy in the mid 60s. I remember learning about glacial features - especially relevant in Scotland. I seem to remember terminal moraines which were not apparently fatal headaches. I remember oxbow lakes. My favourite part of the Geography course was using graph paper to trace the heights of a line drawn through an Ordnance Survey map thus bringing into true perspective the altitudes shown there. For some reason the map we were given for this purpose was always of Clackmannanshire! From Alva over the Campsie Fells if my recollection is correct.

But where can I go to learn what Geography is? Let's try our own AGI website -
'Geographic Information - Information about objects or phenomena that are associated with a location relative to the surface of the Earth'.
Hmmm. A start I guess. So it's all about location?

What has the Chief Executive of the Geographical Association got to say? -
"Successful study of geography brings a rounded understanding to events and processes, and to the way the world works. The subject has the power and potential to educate, through developing with people a way of thinking that keeps the world whole and connected: the physical and the human, the social and the economic, the near and the distant, the familiar and the strange. Geography helps us contemplate our place in the world."
Okay, I'm not sure I understand the first bit, but 'place' I understand.

Let's try the website of the Royal Geographical Society -
'Geography is the study of the earth’s landscapes, peoples, places and environments. It is, quite simply, about the world in which we live. '
There's that word 'place' again.

So I have a general understanding about Geography being about the location of something and about the landscape surrounding that something. So far so good.

But this answer now raises so many other questions for me. Particularly relating to the impact of Geography on the efficiency of our life and on our knowledge base. But that is for another day and that is where I fear that the jargon may get in the way.

For now, as a layman, I am happy to have made a start.

2007 The year Ahead

2007-01-01T10:31:00.000Z

I work for the Association for Geographic Information known as the AGI.

Quoting from our website, this is who we are -
'The AGI exists to represent the interests of the UK's geographic information (GI) industry; a wide-ranging group of public and private sector organisations, suppliers of GI software, hardware, data and services, consultants, academics and interested individuals. The AGI, by way of its unique membership forum, brings together this previously disparate GI community to share ideas on best practice, experience and innovation, and offers access to unparalleled networking opportunities with significant business benefits.'

I really believe passionately about the relevance of the AGI especially in today's expanding world of GI. But because we are a membership-based organisation, we depend on membership subscriptions for our financial viability. We have to set subscriptions at a rate which is commensurate with the benefits that we offer.

As the Chief Financial Officer, it is my job to maintain our finances and to try to balance income and expenditure. That is quite a challenge for us. In past years we have increased our investment in membership services and benefits. We must now make ourselves known to all practitioners in the world of geography to ensure that we have a large and vibrant membership base. I believe that we are a unique and important resource for all in the world of Geography whether they are large commercial enterprises, government bodies, health authorities, mapping organisations or individuals.

2007 is a critical and exciting year for us. We will be moving into new premises in April, we have a new Director starting in February, we have a new format of Annual Conference in September and we have a talented and committed team of 7 staff in the Head Office.

If anyone who is reading this is interested in Geography, please look at our website. And if you are not a member already, please think about joining us. We offer courses, events, seminars, conferences, website benefits, information and professional development. And parties! The more members we have the more we can do together. Please come on board. You will be made very welcome.

And I hope you will follow this blog. This will be my take on the year as it unfolds, written from a personal point of view but hopefully of interest to others. It will not be a technical blog - my knowledge of Geography is not sufficient for that. It will be as honest as I can be. I dare say it will reveal frustrations as well,I hope, as achievements. I am learning about the world of geography and I look forward to sharing that learning process.

A non-geographer's perspective

2007-01-01T10:00:00.000Z

Welcome to the blogsite of someone who rather unexpectedly finds himself working in the world of geography without having any particular knowledge of this world and who, even more surprisingly, is getting enthusiastic about geography and all that it offers.

This blog will hopefully record my day to day involvement in geography, the issues and the opportunities.

I am the Chief Financial Officer with the Association for Geographic Information (the AGI). Yes I'm an accountant. Not a geographer. But I am passionate about the importance of the AGI to both those already in the geographic domain and those who need and use geographic information (GI) even if they perhaps do not realise that they do use GI.

I hope that I can simply record my thoughts, my views and my perceptions as a non-geographer for whom the world of geography pays my salary and forms my working environment.

The AGI is an umbrella organisation for individuals, companies and organisations who use geography. It is I believe an important resource. It speaks for its members, and consequently this blog cannot, and will not, make personal remarks against any individual or organisation within our membership. But I hope I can give reactions which might be of interest to those on both the periphery and the centre of the world of geography.

Lets see what happens.