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Greater Manchester datastore launched

Local authorities and public sector organisations open data for public use at joint website
datagm
DataGM
DataGM

Last modified on Thu 24 Feb 2011 06.44 EST

Greater Manchester now has a datastore at datagm.org.uk to hold information on public sector organisations in one place available for everyone to view.

Launched this week, it already contains some details about public sector spending across Greater Manchester, transport, crime data, and locations of recycling centres, schools and GP surgeries. It will also contain data about education, the economy and health.

It's the result of a collaboration between public bodies such as councils and transport providers with open data campaigners including the FutureEverything project.

FutureEverything's Julian Tait said he hoped the store would grow quickly and people would start to see the benefits of having information from across authority boundaries available, not only to cut costs where duplication exists, but also to open opportunities for developers and businesses in the region.

During the launch at Trafford Council, Emer Coleman Director of Digital Projects at the Greater London Authority (GLA) shared her experience of developing the London Data store when it was launched a year ago:
"Data release is a way you can begin to have the conversation about how we (the public sector) need to fundamentally change from broadcast to engagement."

Her presentation from the launch can be seen at the blog of
Open Data Manchester's developer community representative Ben Gibbs
.

Through the initiative, local authorities and public sector organisations are being encouraged to publish non-personal public sector data in open formats under an open licence with no restrictions on its use.

Formats

The data is marked up to identify the structure and meaning, making it possible to compare information across the authorities and re-use it in different formats. Members of the public will also be able to request data sets as well as uploading information to build up a more complete picture.

* I've been having a play around with the site this week and found there's still some glitches in its just-launched state. I found the tag cloud on the right of the page one of the easiest ways to access the data and have passed stumbling points onto those involved.

Can you do something with this data?

Flickr Please post your visualisations and mash-ups on our Flickr group
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https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2011/feb/24/manchester-datastore-open-data-manchester
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