Government GIS
Singapore’s OneMap journey: Think big, start small, scale fast
By Clarice Africa | 7 June 2013
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Wei Choong Lee, Senior Manager, Geospatial Information Services at the Singapore Land Authority shares the success behind the agency’s award-winning OneMap portal.
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In the island nation of Singapore, with a population of five million and a limited land area of 710 square kilometres, geospatial data and analysis is used to carefully plan socio-economic development activities crucial to ensure a good quality of life for its citizens.
As part of its ongoing efforts to leverage geospatial information and technology, the Singapore Land Authority (SLA) launched, in 2010, its OneMap initiative for the entire government to share geospatial data with the general public.
The initiative stemmed from the need to have a common map platform where agencies can share non-sensitive geospatial information with the public, and provide basic map services such as search and routing.
According to Lee, SLA aims to achieve the following objectives: provide a common base map for government agencies to present geospatial information and deliver geospatial services; inculcate the concept of location-based information and services; and showcase the innovative use of geospatial information and technology.
Designing the User Interface
“The primary concern is the ease of use for the public. We considered various designs and finally decided on a minimalist approach where the User Interface was concerned.”
“We even looked at various map portals around the world and attempted to innovate from those. However, an important concern at that time was providing a solution that would address cross-browser incompatibilities. In the end, we chose a flash-based user interface. This enabled anyone using any browser to enjoy the services we were providing without the hassle of experiencing varying results due to the way different browsers rendered the views.”
Meanwhile, In terms of the services, SLA provided an alternative way of accessing and visualising some of the data.
“For example, BizQuery makes use of authoritative data from the Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA). We assisted them in geocoding data and displaying the locations of registered businesses in the ACRA database onto a map. At one glance, users can see where registered businesses in Singapore are located. They can easily click on each location and buy business information from ACRA directly through OneMap.”
BizQuery displays location of registered businesses in Singapore
“We also provide geospatial services in collaboration with various agencies. For example, we worked with the Ministry of Education (MOE) to come up with SchoolQuery. This service shows the user buildings within 1 and 2km from any school, and also displays school within 1 or 2km from any building. Geospatial visualisation adds value where it takes information that is traditionally difficult to visualise, and displays it in such a way that makes it so much more easy to understand.”
SchoolQuery highlights buildings within 1 and 1 to 2km
“We also worked with Ministry of National Development, Urban Redevelopment Authority and the Housing Development Board to provide recently transacted Property Prices for both public and private housing. The value-add for this service is the convenience of bringing information that is traditionally only available by separate agencies into a common platform, in which complementing information can be placed together to provide the user with a better overview.
PropertyPrices displays transacted properties and prices
GIS 2.0
Lee explains that OneMap was originally focused to enable government agencies to share geospatial information and services. However, due to an overwhelming response from users, its features evolved over time to accommodate more innovative mashups from NGOs and government organisations.
“For those who wish to include a simple location map, we provide tools that enable them to publish maps with their location data overlayed onto the OneMap base-maps. For the more advanced users, we provide tools that enable them to mash up their own data and design more complex user interfaces to provide a better user experience for their users. The best part of this is these maps can run seamlessly on their own websites.”
“Because of these tools, private organisations can then use the wealth of authoritative data and base maps to complement their offering to their customers. Together with the Infocomm Development Authority, various call for collaborations are held with the industry to encourage them to adopt geospatial information and technology and OneMap is used as the conduit to achieve this.”
Call for collaboration
“Innovativeness is in the core of the things we do in OneMap. Thinking and doing things in a different way enable us to discover more uses for geospatial data, and continuously roll out creative services,” he says adding that another essential ingredient to the success of the OneMap was collaboration and partnerships.
“Since it was difficult to persuade other government agencies to use the OneMap portal and encourage them to share their data and information to the public, we tirelessly go about forming partnerships from different domains to proliferate the use of geospatial information and technology through OneMap.”
SLA led the initiative with seven agencies from the Culture, Recreation and Sport sector, and ran roadshows to various agencies to illustrate examples of how geospatial information was useful and demonstrate how they could better serve the public.
“When we launched the portal in March 2010, we had 16 contributing agencies and 20 themes and five services. Today we have about 34 contributing agencies, 64 themes and 37 services, all thanks to the persistent efforts in advocating the value of OneMap,” he says.
Think Spatially
“For other public sector organisations looking to embark in the same initiative, we encourage you to:Think big, start small, scale fast. In addition, try to leverage on agencies for contribution of information, ideas and domain knowledge,” Lee comments.
He shares that when OneMap was first conceptualised, they acknowledged that it would be challenging to convince the majority of government agencies to “think spatially” within a short project implementation period.
“We needed a few “anchor” services and features to showcase the value of geospatial information and the convenience map-based applications bring to the people, public and private sector. Although we started with just a handful of services and thematic information, we persevered and, along the way many agencies saw the potential of what Geospatial Information and Technology (GIT) can accomplish and began to contribute actively and develop services with OneMap.”
“We have come to discover that scalability is an important factor especially dealing with geospatial data. In today’s world, data can come in at a very fast-pace. With technology evolving to collect data automatically through sensors, storage needs to be scaled, as well as computing power to process the wealth of data.”
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Singapore"s OneMap journey: Think big, start small, scale fast
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