DoC on-line datasets for the public
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Original post
DOC now provides detailed track information to the public.
In recent months, DOC has received increasing requests from the public to download DOC spatial information to their personal GPS, to see where our tracks are on public conservation lands and to view these on Google Earth and Virtual Earth, in order to be able to plan tramps and compare data. As a result, DOC tracks are now available for the public to download, via
the Koordinates website
This new information is already improving visitor/tramping opportunities and continues to engage the public further in conservation.
Also check out http://koordinates.com/layer/754-doc-public-conservation-land/
This data has been collected by DOC staff using DOC systems, in conjunction with other national data sources and it marks a big step in the sharing and promotion of DOCs spatial information, at no charge to the consumer. The application of this data extends beyond tramp information, ranging from cartographers creating atlases, to supermarkets wanting to calculate their
national carbon footprint.
Improving access to the Governments spatial information is a goal of the NZ Geospatial Strategy and DOC is taking a lead on this. The mission is to provide online, free and unrestricted access to environmental data and information, thus building trust, transparency and collaboration.
*How was the track information compiled?*
This track information has generally been captured by field staff on their GPSs then handed over to Conservancy Information Management Unit (IMU) staff who quality assure (QA) it against other datasets like topo maps and aerial photography and maintain it in a national dataset.
Conservancy IMU staff have also worked with Area Offices and Land Information New Zealand (LINZ) to supply tracks for the new 1:50,000 topographical map series (Topo50) coming out next month to replace the existing NZMS 260 series.
With any data there are risks and limitations and its fitness for purpose. Some of this data is captured off a 1:250,000 map so is not suitable to load onto your GPS and navigate a narrow ridge during a white out. There is an accuracy attribute and disclaimer but DOC can take steps to reduce risk through user education and maintenance of our data.
*What is the difference between Topo50 tracks and DOC tracks? *
Topo50 is a cartographic product that has been generalised for a 1:50,000 scale and contains tracks managed by councils and tramping clubs in addition to tracks on DOC land. DOC tracks have been captured for asset management purposes initially, and are as accurate as practical.
*Why are huts in AMIS, but we have to capture tracks and roads separately? *
Asset Management Information System (AMIS) captures point features such as huts or points along a track. Someone has to fill the lines between these points, which is where the expertise of the field staff and their GPSs and the QA from IMU staff come into play.
*How can I improve the track data for my patch?*
Get out your GPS and go see your Conservancy IMU staff, especially if there has been a change to the track that they might not know about
Sorry for the DoC spin above but I copied it verbatim...I've had a look and the Cadastral dataset omits Paper Roads, Marginal Strips and DoC negotiated Easements. This means you may get the erroneous impression that you can't access DoC land without needing to obtain permission for the Pastoral Leasee or Landowner.
The track/route information is astonishingly inaccurate as you will notice when you check out the site. It is basically useless. However there are 4WD tracks marked on this dataset that do indeed exist but are not marked on either the current Topomaps or Freshmap which is dependent on deriving its data from LINZ.
Let's hope that DoC can make the necessary amendments when we send them our gpx. files as requested. However at this stage, LINZ has failed to incorporate accurate GPS data sent to them by mapping software developers (pers comm).
"The mission is to provide online, free and unrestricted access to environmental data and information, thus building trust, transparency and collaboration".
On this note I hope DoC will now publish on-line contact details for Pastoral Leasees and landowners to enable the public to be able to phone these people to ask permission for going on their properties to tramp and climb. This is sorely needed as often this information can't be obtained at all from the internet including the White Pages or the LINZ website.
A DoC employee stated this information was not available on-line in order to protect the privacy of the farmers. In the meantime we can pore over Pastoral Lease Reviews on the LINZ website and find out far more personal information about the farmers' arrogant transgressions e.g failing to get permission from the Commissioner of Crown Lands before building an aircraft hanger on a neighbours property despite being requested to several years before.
Frank says: "Probably a good time for people with the inclination to start thinking about
a public track coordinates website.
If done well Google ads might make it quite lucrative...."
Interested, Matthew?
I think it is going to happen that this information will become more public. There are privacy issues, I know when I was worked at the Council the interpretation was that it was OK to tell someone who owned a property but it was not OK to tell someone where that person lived. In most cases people live at the address that they own anyway.
Hopefully a lot of this will be sorted when the Access Commission get going. I imagine one of the most effective ways they will be able to function is to provide good information.
I have a bit of an issue with maps of tracks. What is a track anyway? Last weekend in the Kaimais we found quite a good track that does not appear on current maps. Apparently it appears on old maps but, despite the fact that it is obviously cut and maintained by local hunters, it has been removed from recent maps, presumably because it is not "official".
I was in a meeting with some DOC staff recently where we discussed the idea of marking and sign posting a track that we use for pest control operations. It is a lovely track and my motive was to share the experience with others. But the obvious reaction from DOC officials is that having this track made "official" was going to cause complications. They were going to have to have a Botanist inspect it, clasify it, do risk assessments etc etc. Then they worried that the use of it by the public might compromise they efforts to get permission to do the pest control opperation. In the end they obviously did not want the hassel.
In the meantime the track exists, it is still a nice walk, it is in Public Reserve and I am quite happy to tell anyone about it if they want to know about it.
I've sometimes thought that if I owned a farm which many people wanted permission to walk over, I might just get sick of people asking after a while, even if it was just a case of wanting to know when and where to expect people. I also doubt that I'd *really* want my direct contact details to be made available to anyone and everyone.
I haven't checked (lately) exactly what the Walking Access Commission is working on, but would there be any benefit in having a proxy service for people to gain access permission? ie. Have a central service that collects requests on behalf of the property owners, then provides the owner with a list of people (with contact details) to expect on any given day... and obviously the property owners could pass back certain notes or restrictions or flat out blanket refusals if there were reasons they wanted to say no (pre-emptively or otherwise).
I imagine in the situation you mention where lots of people want to use a particular route over private land then the preferable option would be that the Access Commission negotiate access along a particular route and then marks and signposts this appropriately. There are plenty of examples of this at the moment. I doubt the farmer would be interested in who uses the route as long as they abide by any conditions that may be negotiated.
Yes, pmcke. A good example of this is the access to climb Mt Torlesse - a very popular mountain an hour's drive from Chch. Access without permission from Brookdale Station was negotiated a long time ago. They would have been driven nuts if we'd had to ring them etc. The new owner is an American and he has continued the courtesy.
Regarding your lovely track, I would just go ahead and mark it with permolat. We have recut and marked at least 10 overgrown Forest Service tracks. Generally they lead to neglected huts and bivs or are flood tracks. One we cut through gorse and blackberry as the farmer didn't appreciate trampers climbing over his fences and walking in his paddocks. DoC and this farmer are often using our cut tracks as bait lines now so it's a win/win.
Another example is Poronui Station in the Kaimanawas. In this case there is a paper road but common sense has prevailed here and an agreement has been reached that allows trampers to walk along the formed road rather than the paper road.
There are also cases in the Ruahines where the initial part of a route is marked through farmland.
In many of these cases legal access does exist. As the Access Commission does not have the power to force access over private land I imagine in many cases its negotiating power will be in places where paper roads already exist.
However, there is a problem with agreements such as Poronui in that walking access has been negotiated but this leaves other recreational users out in the cold, for example 4WD drivers and mountain bikers do not have permission to use this access. If they were able to locate the paper road they would be perfectly entitled to use that route.
One of the fears of the 4WD lobby is that the Access Commission will negotiate away their rights in favour of walkers.
I am very keen on http://tramper.co.nz/?view=gpxFiles as a repository for GPS traces as they have been obtained by members on the ground
An other map resource I use is: http://www.openstreetmap.org/ and I am currently uploading my GPS traces, marking huts, bridges, tracks/routes etc. which will also make a public repository of free data that can for example be loaded on a GPS, modified, copied, destributed, added to a website etc.
Example - Lagoon Saddle & Bealey Spur, see: http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=-43.0389&lon=171.61645&zoom=13&layers=B000FTFT
There are still some rendering decisions with huts to be sorted out but that will hopefully be addressed in the near future
SEE: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Proposed_features/wilderness_mountain_buildings
The advantage I see is that the data in the two options above can be freely changed/modified/used and is unencumbered by copyright issues unlike Google Earth and the Koordinates website (if I understand the Terms of Use correctly)
However data from Google Earth & Koordinates can be used for planning purposes but I suspect not uploaded to any other websites eg. http://tramper.co.nz
An advantage with OpenStreetMap (& probably Tramper.co.nz) is that if an error is found eg. a hut or bridge is removed, or a track re-cut a registered user can make immediate corrections to the map.
This is not that case with GoogleMaps in particular is that the data is often wrong, the problem is that errors take a long time (or never) get fixed and I suspect that would be the same on Koordinates
Here is an example I'll call - "who stole the top half of Bottle Lake and all of Spencer Park?":
http://maps.google.co.nz/maps?ie=UTF8&ll=-43.451237,172.700615&spn=0.045175,0.077162&z=14
It is possible to later download the latest and greatest track, hut location etc. data from OpenStreetMap (as a .gpx) and upload it to a GPS.
The maps themselves can be loaded and used on the flasher GPS devices. There are also topo style cycle, skiing & hiking maps for some areas, although currently the cycle map doesn't display hiking routes (I'm intending to propose a modification to this)
SEE: http://www.opencyclemap.org/ & http://openpistemap.org/
SEE ALSO:
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/WikiProject_New_Zealand &
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/DOC
cheers
I am also interested in this site as a repository for GPS tracks and have contributed most of the recent ones. People are free to use these as they wish as far as I am concerned and if they assist someone in having a great trip then that is all I want.
I would be interested to know how people have used my tracks. Do they just view them in this site, download them and view them in Google Earth or load them onto a GPS and go tramping.
The difference between this site and something like OpenStreetMap is that on OpenStreetMap you are contributing to a map. So presumably the feature you are contributing is worthy of being on a map, ie is a track, route or some feature. The GPX traces loaded on this site are just represetations of trips done which may be a track but may also not be. It is only meant as a guide to someone following and may not even be the best way.
I think of them as virtual cairns. Little piles of stones showing the way I went. You can follow them if you choose, or just ignore them.
Another site I have uploade tracks to is http://www.giscover.com It is in Italian but has and English version and lots of tracks in NZ.
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| Started by | Honora |
| On | 14 August 2009 |
| Replies | 16 |
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