Cambridgeshire Insight Open Data: What we’ve learnt from the unexpected Hendrik Grothuis Research Manager - Local Intelligence & Data Management Cambridgeshire County Council Making Transparency Work, Birmingham, 09th June 2014. A presentation on the Cambridgeshire Insight Open Data project with a general overview of project progress and development.

1. Cambridgeshire Insight Open Data:
What we’ve learnt from the unexpected
Hendrik Grothuis
Research Manager - Local Intelligence & Data
Management
Cambridgeshire County Council
Making Transparency Work, Birmingham,
09th June 2014.

2. Who we are
• Cambridgeshire County Council Research Group.
• Team of researchers and analysts.
• Topics covered include customer insight, consultations, crime,
education, economy, health, housing, needs assessments and
Census 2011.
• Work in partnership cross-organisation and geography.
• All our work is published on the Cambridgeshire Insight
website.
• We need to manage and analyse a lot of data from many
sources.

3. 3 main avenues of
information dissemination
1. Cambridgeshire Insight
● Local Information System (LIS) Website
● Holds information on many local research and
information themes
2. Cambridgeshire Atlas
● Interactive data visualisation tool
3. Cambridgeshire Insight Open Data project
● Open data portal
● Developing open methodology to release unique local
datasets to stimulate economic growth and innovation
● Educating data personnel and consumers

4. Who are our customers?
• People who use public data.
• Public sector officers interested in evidence led policy.
• Elected district and county members (councillors).
• Residents, community and voluntary groups, including
those seeking funding.
• Data analysts/researchers from partner organisations
e.g. NHS, housing agencies.
• Private sector data consumers.

5. Who uses our information…
51.9% are repeat visitors
Real Estate/Residential
Properties Consumer
Electronics/Mobile
Phones
Home & Garden/Home
Improvement
Autos &
Vehicles/Motor
Vehicles
Financial
Services/Investment
Services
In-Market
Segments

6. What questions do we
answer?
What percentage of
children in a local school
are eligible for Free School
Meals (FSM)?
What impact will the Local
Housing Allowance (LHA)
changes have upon
Cambridgeshire?
How deprived is my local ward
for barriers to housing and
services?
What is the
demographic make-up
of my local ward?
Using data to inform the conversation and enforce
evidence led decision making through local insights

7. 3 main project phases
1. Data scoping and community engagement.
2. Data inventory and methodology development.
3. Data portal technology sourcing and implementation.
“Open” is key
 Open data standards (W3C and ESD toolkit).
 Open data formats (CSV, XML, JSON, RDF).
 Open technologies (Drupal CMS).
 Understanding local need and demand for open data.
 Focus on customer centric analytics to present the right data in the
right way to the right audience.
 Combining innovative use of our “old” data and new ways of presenting
open data and information.

8. Standards help us
But which ones?
The 5 Stars of open data
• ★ make your stuff available on the Web (whatever format) under an open
license
• ★★ make it available as structured data (e.g., Excel instead of image scan of a
table)
• ★★★ use non-proprietary formats (e.g., CSV instead of Excel)
• ★★★★ use URIs to denote things, so that people can point at your stuff
• ★★★★★ link your data to other data to provide context

9. The 5 Stars of Engagement
Engaging open data should:
 ★ Be demand driven
 ★★ Put data in context
 ★★★ Support conversation around data
 ★★★★ Build capacity, skills and networks
 ★★★★★ Collaborate on data as a common resource
Supporting open data use through active engagement (2010), Tim Davies
http://www.w3.org/2012/06/pmod/pmod2012_submission_5.pdf
Remember though, 5 stars of open data are not concerned with quality hence use
Open Data Institute (ODI) certificates
Standards help us (2)

10. Quality
The Open Data Institute (ODI) 4 levels of open data certification:
Standards help us (3)

11. Careful though...
http://xkcd.com/927/

12. 1. Data scoping and community
engagement
How we consulted
We held a series of consultation exercises to find the “What, Why and How” of local
open data. These included:
· Online Survey
· Focus groups and workshops
· Attendance at local data groups
· Online seminars
· Discussion groups online
· E-mail and telephone discussions with key contacts and interested parties.

13. Initial consultation results:
Priority and important data

14. Data that is important & not
a priority

15. Survey results
Within the online survey, respondents were asked to select three data themes from
the list that they would consider a priority.
Six datasets from those listed stood out as being more popular:
 Transport: Public transport data (32.6% respondents included this in their top 3)
 Housing: Planning and new developments (32.6%)
 Demographics: Data and forecasting (28.3%)
 Housing: Affordable and specialist need (21.7%)
 Planning: Land ownership (19.6%)
 Housing: demand and turnover (19.6%)

16. Online survey responses – “What factors
do you think should inform prioritisation
of datasets for publication?”

17. 2. Data inventory and
methodology development.

18. Priority datasets
Economy  Employment in the hi-tech community: Cambridgeshire & Peterborough
2012
 Cambridgeshire East of England Forecasting Model 2013 Baseline
Housing  Local Housing Allowance (LHA) Changes
 Registers of expressed need compared to lettings and sales
 Affordable Housing Completions
 Planning Permission Granted and Housing Completions
 Housing need register applicants parish preference, social rented lettings
and bidding behaviour
Demography  Cambridgeshire Dwelling Stock Forecasts 2012
 Cambridgeshire Population and Dwelling Stock Estimates 2012
 Cambridgeshire Population Forecasts 2012
Transport  Traffic Counts

19. 3. Data portal technology sourcing
and implementation.
● DKAN
● Drupal-based open data platform with a full suite of cataloging,
publishing and visualisation features that allows governments, nonprofits
and universities to easily publish data to the public.
What we learnt
● There’s support out there
o Open source community
 Drupal
 DKAN
o Open data leaders in public sector
o Interested local partners, especially ones with data
● We can develop modularly
● No need to reinvent the wheel, others are doing similiar

20. So what have we learnt?
● “Open” is key (Data, communication, technology)
● Data Education of ourselves, staff and consumers is a challenge. It's not
just for app developers. We need to explain complex concepts and
educate data producers and consumers to develop a new open data
centric culture.
● Engagement: Partners and customers are vital in driving open data
agenda and developing a partnership ethos about open data.
● Publishing and communication go hand-in-hand.
● Need a mantra: Start small, learn quick and build.
● Follow the standards:
o Format: 5 Stars of Linked Data for format
o Engagement: 5 stars of open data engagement
o Quality: Open Data Institute (ODI) certification scheme
Finally...
● “We’re not there yet, but we’re getting there”

21. Contact Us
• W: Cambridgeshire Insight | Informing
Cambridgeshire
www.cambridgeshireinsight.org.uk
• Twitter: @CambsInsight
• Pinterest: pinterest.com/cambsinsight
• Google+: Cambridgeshire Insight
• Slideshare: CambridgeshireInsight