Croydon, UK, August 2008 – East Sussex based Rother District Council has begun work transforming thirty years worth of paper based planning records into a geo-referenced database. Using GGP’s advanced Geographical Information System (GIS) more than 25,000 individual Planning Applications are being identified from historic records, located and plotted to the Council’s Ordnance Survey digital maps.

Dating from 1947 to 1974, the scanned Planning Applications are being uniquely referenced so that related documents can be assigned to the relevant application.  The archive planning information will be published on the Council’s website at www.rother.gov.uk, complimenting essential service information already shared with citizens.

“Without the advanced functionality offered by GGP GIS it would not have been feasible to undertake this project in-house,” commented Richard Gagen, Lead Technical Officer at Rother District Council. “Using GGP it takes just a couple of clicks to map each planning application to the relevant polygon within our OS MasterMap. Without this ‘snap-to-whole’ feature the project would have taken possible three or four times longer to complete.”

Rother is a long-term user of GIS and an early adopter of GGP’s mapping to web solution eGGP, which is used to disseminate service information and release the power of GIS throughout the organisation and to residents via Community Help Points and Information Points. This latest project will complete the transformation of planning service information, creating a complete, map referenced digital library of all applications since 1947. In a separate project the documents that make up each application; location map, site plan, decision notice and relevant correspondence will be scanned and referenced to the mapped application.

“GGP Systems offer flexible, concurrent licensing meaning we can scale up our GIS operation as and when we need to rather than having to pay for licences we are simply not using,” continued Gagen. “When coupled with the fact the system is easy to use, so new operators can be up and running in a matter of hours, GGP delivers real value and a return on investment.”

GGP Systems specialise in GIS and Gazetteer Management software specifically designed for the UK public sector. The South London based company provides easy to use solutions for the creation and management of corporate property databases, the ability to add and use a spatial element to all location based information and a range of solutions to meet t-Government directives.

Enquiries to Prim Maxwell at GGP tel. +44 (0)20 8686 9887, e-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , www.ggpsystems.co.uk