Place Digger's presentation during the Digital Catapult's Environmental Data Exchange Hack Weekend. Find out more about the Environmental Data Exchange here: http://bit.ly/19p2zUW

1. Place Digger
Dig before you decide
Team Members:
Mahtab Farshchi
Rowena Parsons
Lise Quesnel
Sunny Townsend
Chris Taylor

2. How can I understand what a place is like?
● Before I move there
● Before I invest in property there
It is difficult to find out about the quality of the natural environment
e.g.
● Air quality
● Land contamination
● Quality of green space
particularly when moving from far away.
The Problem Being Solved
#edxhack

3. #edxhack

4. #edxhack

5. Lots of sites for property searches e.g. Zoopla, rightmove
These site have rich functionality e.g.
● Price comparison
● Map of local schools, transport, healthcare, etc.
● Local ratings, e.g., crime rates, tax rates
– but they lack the environmental dimension
#edxhack

6. House buyers have the option
to pay for an “Environmental
Search” but in effect this is only
a Land Contamination search.
● Costs about £30
● Takes about 48 hours
● Most people opt out
We believe there is a gap in the
market for a complete overview
of Environmental Open Data in
a convenient format.
#edxhack

7. It also means there is less pressure from citizens to improve the
natural environment.
#edxhack
This means people make bad decisions about where to live

8. The Solution
#edxhack
Dig before you decide

9. PlaceDigger Phase 1 Customers
#edxhack
● People looking for an area to move to
● People at the point of buying a new property,
undertaking due diligence on their purchase
● Existing residents interested in their local area
● Institutional investors in property

11. How PlaceDigger uses Environmental Data
Potentially there is a lot of data to present
● users need help to dig it up
But it is likely to have gaps
● some types available for some areas but not others
● in some areas issues may not be significant e.g. no risk of coastal flooding if you live
inland
And different users will be more or less interested in different things
● consider different factors to be more or less important e.g. greenspace v air quality
● what is important may vary over time e.g. if you already live there vs if you’re looking to
buy
Our ‘relevance engine’ makes the best of the data
we have for each user who wants it

12. PlaceDigger’s Relevance Engine
#edxhack
Schools, transport,
communities
Mortality, health
problems
House price trends,
local jobs
Relevance
engine
User preferences
Social
Health
Economic
Environmental air quality
green space
contaminated land

13. Monetisation & Value
#edxhack
• General
consumption
Phase 1
• Advertising
Phase 2
• Licensing
Phase 3

14. Evolution of the PlaceDigger product
Target user or customer
#edxhack
● General public
● House buyers
● Renters
● Local authorities
Phase 1
● Property Developers
● Commercial users
● Institutional investors
● Insurance companies
Phase 2
● 3rd Party websites
Phase 3

15. PlaceDigger: Monetisation Phases
Phase 1
PlaceDigger Beta
15
Phase 2
PlaceDigger
Phase 3
PlaceDigger Lite
PlaceDigger Pro
Free search by postcode Free search by postcode Free search
Instant Paid Report
Ad Sales
Revenue
Ad Sales
Click Through Referrals
Report Charges
Ad Sales
Click Through Referrals
DataOffering
Natural Environment
Natural Environment
Quality of Life
Natural Environment
Quality of Life
Property Quality Report
#edxhack
Ads c5p to £5 per click Referrals c£5
Conveyancer environmental
search : £30
Full conveyancing report: up to £2000
taks 48hrs to a week
Comp-
etition

16. PlaceDigger Pro offerings
#edxhack
Natural
Air
Water
Land
Wildlife
Biodiversity
Green spaces
Common land
Social
Crime
Schooling
Average age
Community
Social trends
(newspapers, life
style, etc.)
Care homes
Health
Hospitals’ quality
ratings
Local hospitals
A&E departments
GPs and clinics
Mortality rates
Life expectancy
Economic
Property prices
Transport
Shopping
Jobs
Employment
Council tax
Insurance
ele/gas/internet
Ground rates
Removal rates
Stamp duty

17. Some EDX datasets with relevant subject areas...
Riskof Floodingfrom Rivers and Sea
Postcodes in Areas at Risk
Historic Flood Map
Source: Environment Agency
3 hourly weather forecastand observational data - UK locations
Source: Met Office
SPOT-1
Source: Astrium GEO-Information Services
TerraSAR-X
Source: Astrium GEO-Information Services
Applications: Cartography, surface, civil planning and mapping, digital terrain models, environmental
monitoring, maritime monitoring, surface movement monitoring, change detection
RDF International Waste Shipments from England ...
URL: http://www.geostore.com/environment-agency/
Category 1 and 2 pollution incidents by sourceto ...
URL: http://data.defra.gov.uk/env/spfg15-serious-poll-incid-201112.csv
Atmospheric Model Data from the TEMPEST
Source: NERC
UK-DMC1
UK-DMC2 2010 Archive Direct Download
Source: DMCii
Applications: Forestry, Agriculture, Emergency and Disasters, Land Cover Mapping
Air Quality Monitoring Stations
Source: Salford City Council

18. PlaceDigger Partners
#edxhack
People who give us property data to display on our site e.g.
● Zoopla
People we refer our visitors to e.g.
● solicitors
● conveyancers
People from whom we get data to show on our site, e.g.
● local authorities
● Defra, EA,
● Twitter
● local community groups

19. Validation
#edxhack
Internally:
Defra
Environmental Agency
AMEE
Future validation will include survey of the users, focus groups and other scientific studies relating to choice of
places for residential and nonresidential purposes

20. #edxhack CSV file downloaded

21. #edxhack Bluemix: IBM SQL Database

22. #edxhack Bluemix: Browse to CSV file

23. #edxhack Bluemix: Specify date formats

24. #edxhack Bluemix: Preview the data

25. #edxhack Bluemix: Select ‘Create New Table’

26. #edxhack Bluemix: Preview Data Types

27. #edxhack Bluemix: Success!

28. Mining the Datasets
Good News! Many datasets with relevant titles
Challenges
not all accessible for “automated download”
not necessarily immediately usable information
Requires more costly human expertise & intervention initially…
Linked Data is part of solution….

29. Potential partners / channels and next steps
#edxhack#edxhack

30. Thank youspecial thanks to DigiCatapult, the judges,
Lewis@RedNinja, Nick@AMEE
© 2014 Gabriella Karney Photography