1. The European Location Framework
Andreas Busch (BKG, Germany) on behalf of EuroGeographics GISCO
Good afternoon. I am Bernd Richter from BKG Germany but making this presentation on behalf of EuroGeographics, of which BKG is pleased to be a member
the Competitiveness and Innovation framework Programme (CIP)
ICT Policy Support Programme (PSP) Call 6

2. The European Location Framework is a technical infrastructure which delivers authoritative, interoperable, cross-border geospatial reference data for analysing and understanding information connected to places and features.
You are probably wondering what the European Location Framework is – it is a technical infrastructure which delivers authoritative, interoperable, cross-border geospatial reference data for analysing and understanding information connected to places and features.
the Competitiveness and Innovation framework Programme (CIP)
ICT Policy Support Programme (PSP) Call 6

3. Where we want to go with this project
Today
Access to NSDI data mostly national
Only global players provide easy access to geographic data
NSDI data is not used for the European policy decision making
Use of INSPIRE data services starting
Common tools not co-ordinated
The ESDI does not exist
After
Access possible for National, European and Global use
More applications by SME
Authoritative NSDI data is used for European policy decision making
INSPIRE services utilized
Common tools (in the cloud)
The ESDI is compiled from NSDI
The E-L-F has been conceived as a way to change the way geo-information from the national cadastre and mapping authorities in Europe is delivered. It will make the ambition of a European Spatial data Infrastructure, mandated by INSPIRE, a reality.
It is a multi-scale, multi-purpose and multi-country, including the regions within them data as a service solution.

4. What does it mean?
It will combine national reference geo-information through the E.L.F. platform based on INSPIRE;
It targets European, Cross-border and National use;
It has a flexible architecture and will connect with the INSPIRE platform, open data platforms, National platforms, etc
It will be a new large scale service for Europe based on authoritative up-to-date sources offering many visualizations
It will be available in a number of European languages
It will make finding and accessing reference data easy based on geographical names, addresses & admin units
It will deliver Geo-tools for making national data interoperable
It will integrate other domains of data content (national or thematic)
In practise the project will (read slide)

5. Best practice ESDIN: www.locationframework.eu
It is based upon and will further develop the best practices implemented in the ESDIN project

6. The E.L.F. project Start 1st March 2013 36 months project 30 partners
Implementation of the European Location Framework
Three phases
The project started on 1st March and will last 36 months. 30 partners will invest over 1,000 man months the Commission’s ICT Policy Support Programme will support it with up to six and a half million euro.

7. Both Technical and Policy Developments
The project will tackle all the components necessary to allow people to discovery, license, access and use, Quality Checked, Multi-level Authoritative Geo-Information from Europe’s National Cadastre and Mapping Authorities

8. Ensuring National Data Interoperability
European Location Framework Specification Data
Deliver Geo-tools to build cross-border/Pan-European interoperability based on national (INSPIRE) sources
NMCA Authoritative data
Quality
Edgematching
tools
Consistent
identifiers
Generalisation
Transformation

9. The planned E.L.F. coverage
Not available
Phase I Global and Regional (September 2013)
Phase II Cluster areas 15 data providers (March 2014)
Phase III New cluster areas NSDIs (March 2015)
Note:
Phase I covers also phase II countries
Phase III covers also phase I and II countries
In phase 1 the existing EuroBoundaryMap, EuroRegionalMap and EuroGlobalMap will be made available for Use and Re-Use. EuroGlobalMap by the way was made available under an OpenData licence on 8th March.
In phase 2 countries in the three areas indicated on this map will make their national data available and in the last phase we will try to expand the coverage available to other countries.

10. Content Specifications Master Regional/Global
Key to the success of the project are INSPIRE compliant data specifications. This work package is lead by BKG. Specifications will be developed for all level of details including the Master Level, that is cadastral parcels. But also for data maintenance and processing as well as future products and services.

11. GeoTools: Edge-matching Tool
CONSISTENCY
There are many connecting features to be taken into account when combining national datasets. This picture illustrates what has to be taken into account. The key for solving this issue is to have agreed state boundaries and then link these connecting features to it.

12. Geo-tools: Consistency of data
UIDs and Generalization
Implementation of UIDs for regional data
Generalization from national level to regional
Consistency
EuroBoundaryMap will be used as a source for administrative boundaries in ERM and EGM. This will guarantee that we will have consistent administrative boundaries in all our products.
We are currently working on refining the selection criteria in our existing products so that generalization levels would be consistent
Based on ESDIN results we are working to create EGM from ERM using generalization, the biggest challenge here is the consistency of ERM so that we can use automated processes. The target is to have EGM based on ERM in 2014.
The picture shows the generalization process of hydro from ERM to EGM. The generalization process is currently developed by IGN France.
I have already mentioned that we are working to link ERM hydro to the RDAhydro so that there would be an upgrade path for keeping the hydro up-to-date for GMES services

13. Geo-tools: Automatic Online Quality Validation
Implementation of ESDIN Data Quality Web Service
Enable use of the Quality validation for national, regional and global data
Quality
We are starting an accreditation programme for our data providers. The best practice comes from OS Great Britain and there is now a proposed technical specification in ISO (19158) where EuroGeographics and EuroSDR have been involved in the development- Based on this standard we will progress on accreditation of our data providers. This helps us to ensure that we have good data.
Also we are progressing on QA of our existing products. We have taken the results from ESDIN and now introduced a comprehensive testing of logical consistency in ERM. Our Quality KEN activities provide the path to utilize the best practices from our members in Europe but also a way to introduce European best practices to our members.

14. Geo-tools: GeoProduct Finder
Access
Finding the dataset
Bind the agreement
Agree and access
See video in Youtube
The ESDIN project revealed the difficulty people have in finding the authoritative geo-information they want and developed a concept for overcoming this. You can see the video on YouTube. ELF will put the concept into practise.

15. Technical Architecture
ELF Apps
(ArcGIS Online)
(Oskari Map App)
ELF Geo-tools
Tier 4
ELF Applications
Cloud Platform 1
Cloud Platform 2
Tier 3
ELF-based Cloud Services
Service Cascade
Tier 2
ELF Platform
Pan-European Services
GeoLocator
Oskari
Platform
ELF National Service
Tier 1
ELF Platform
National Services
For those interested in the technical architecture this is the conceptual model.

16. User and third party content
Identification of needed content and services
Land Cover/Land Use
EUDEM30
Orthoimagery
Hydrology
Postal Code Areas
Railways
Transport
Connecting public services to E.L.F.
National and Regional SDIs
EU portals
Providing E.L.F. platform to aggregated services and content
Industry and VARs
A very important component of the project is to identify types of data which users find important but are not usually available from the NMCAs and to agree licensing terms for including them.

17. What to connect? Broad themes Agriculture (CAP, LIS)
Addresses (postal codes)
Transport (roads, railways...)
Environment (water basins, water levels, noise, pollution, etc)
Regional / municipal data (spatial planning, crime scenes, traffic, etc)
Statistics (census, etc)
Geology
Inventory
Questionnaires
Reports, market studies
Best practice (success stories):
National and Regional SDIs
EU projects and portals
Direct dialogue with user communities
Current thoughts are that these might include (read the slide)

18. Applications Transportation Health & Human services Business Education
Natural resources
Health & Human services
Defence
Education
Public Safety
Government
Transportation
Utilities and
Communications
Insurance/
Reinsurance
Health statistics
INSPIRE
Geoportal
Emergency
Mapping
Open Source
Code Sprints
Real Estate
Community
Portal
Oskari Web Map
Demo app
Maps
Open-data.europa.eu
User Communities
To prove the potential of the ELF the consortium will, during the project deliver applications in at least four areas:
Emergency mapping – Ithaca (M 18) to satisfy the needs of GMES Emergency Management Service Insurance and reinsurance – Europa (M 24) to meet market needs Human health and safety – Ginst and Kadaster (M 24) strongly linked to the initiative of Eurostat and UN-GGIM to link statistics with geography
And finally Real Estate – WirelessInfo (M 18), again to meet the markets needs for more reliable data.

19. Engagement and Sustainability
Strong emphasis on engagement activities (website, factsheets, press releases, reference guide)
European and Regional Workshops
Non-EU members participation
Training
European Location Framework websites, blogs
Work to agree how to sustain the services by agreements (also part of the EU Location Framework project)
Establishment of licence and other Agreements
A very important task within the project is to provide (read the slide)
ESDIN closing workshop launching E.L.F.

20. ONE REFERENCE GEO-INFORMATION SERVICE FOR EUROPE
Ladies and Gentlemen, I must finish. Thank you for the opportunity to introduce you to the European Location Framework. We have only just begun, we have three years of hard work but by working together we believe we will be successful in delivering ONE REFERENCE GEO-INFORMATION SERVICE FOR EUROPE.
Thank you.
Edge Matched at National Borders, Quality Checked, Identifiable, Multi-level Geospatial Reference Information for discovery, Licensing, Authentificating.
Accessing and Using the Authoritative Geo-Information from Europe’s National Cadastre and Mapping Authorities