I have blogged previously about how rare it is to find a single shared database containing all the utility infrastructure (water, sanitary and storm sewers, electric power, telecommunications, gas, and heating) geospatial data for a community.  I blogged about a few databases of utility geospatial data I’ve come across in Penang, Sarajevo, Calgary, Edmonton, Jalisco, UK, Japan, Bahrain, Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo, 

At the annual conference of the Pacific Northwest Chapter of the Geospatial Information and Technology Association (GITA) in Whistler, British Columbia, I heard about a remarkable common shared database of utility geospatial data as well as cadastral data for an entire province.

Ken Rigler of the Integrated Cadastral Information Society (ICIS) gave an overview of the unique approach adopted by ICIS to sharing geospatial information, including utility infrastructure and parcel fabric (real estate).  It also includes geospatial data for taxation jurisdictions, conservation districts, and the agricultural land reserve.

ICIS is a non-governmental and non-profit organization that is supported entirely by its members including telecommunications and utility companies (BC Hydro, FortisBC, Kinder Morgan Canada, Shaw, Spectra Energy, and TELUS), local governments, First Nations, and the Provincial Government of BC. It also has associate members which include Federal Government departments such as Agriculture Canada, the Department of National Defence, and the RCMP; Pacific Northern Gas; Vancouver Fraser Port Authority; Teck Coal Limited; Vancouver Island Health Authority; and private surveying companies.

Membership is entirely voluntary, there are no “sticks” such as legislative or regulatory requirements to force companies to participate and share their data. The benefits of having access a shared database of utility and cadastral geospatial data for the entire province appears to be the primary motivation for participation.  ICIS is a data aggregator and does not make changes to content.  It does provide grants to local governments to help them improve the quality of their data and will pass on errors detected and reported by users to the appropriate data custodian.

Utility members and the Provincial Government pay an annual membership fee which is in proportion to their data use.  Membership is free for local governments and First Nations.  The Board of directors is comprised of five members from the Province of BC, five from local government and First Nations, and five from the utility sector.

Contributing data

Organizations contribute their digital data in its native format and data model.  ICIS takes responsibility for converting the data to a common ICIS data model, using Safe Software’s FME.  ICIS is in the process of automating this process so that updated data can be “autoloaded” monthly.

Acessing and using data

Members can access raw geospatial data and download it in whatever format they prefer, again using FME to convert it to their preferred format.  Data use is subject to a Data Sharing and License Agreement that restricts users to using the data for internal purposes only and explicitly excludes commercial exploitation.