Subsequent to the recent consultation on Ordnance Survey data and Gordon Brown’s commitment to opening up (an unspecified amount of) the data in a speech last week – today the UK’s mapping agency is releasing a significant portion of their data for free use by the public.

More information is available in the following report, published yesterday by Communities and Local Government:

• http://www.communities.gov.uk/publications/corporate/ordnancesurveyconresponse

The datasets which have been opened up include:

• OS Street View
• 1: 50 000 Gazetteer
• 1: 250 000 Colour Raster
• OS Locator
• Boundary-Line
• Code-Point Open
• Meridian 2
• Strategi
• MiniScale
• OS VectorMap District (available in May 2010)
• Land-Form PANORAMA

We’re glad to see that it looks like the data will be available under an open license:

this licence will allow the data to be used and re-used for free by the public, including for commercial use. (p. 17)

The official link to the data on their website has been overwhelmed all morning (which surely says something about public demand!). Some downloads are available from mySociety at:

• http://parlvid.mysociety.org:81/os/

Big kudos to the folk at Ernest Marples, who did a great job in encouraging people to respond to the consultation and facilitated nearly a third of submissions through their online tool.

More information is available at:

• The Guardian
• BBC News
• The Register
• Tech Radar

This is excellent news – and we very much look forward to learning more about the details as they unfold. We sincerely hope (given the date) that its not an elaborate joke!

Related posts:

1. Ordnance Survey to open up UK geospatial data In a press release earlier this week, it was announced that there will be moves to open up geospatial data produced by the Ordnance Survey: The Prime Minister and Communities Secretary John Denham will today announce that the public will...
2. Response to the consultation on opening access to Ordnance Survey data The Open Source Geospatial Foundation, or OSGeo, founded in 2006 is a not-for-profit organization whose mission is to support and promote the collaborative development of open geospatial technologies and data. The Open Knowledge Foundation (OKF) is a not-for-profit organization founded...
3. Mapping open government data initiatives around the world The Open Knowledge Foundation and Access Info are currently seeking information on open government data initiatives around the world, as part of a scoping paper supported by the Open Society Institute: http://opengovernmentdata.org/ With major announcements from the UK and and...