European Location Framework Unites Mapping and Cadastral Agencies

An industry consortium is building the new European Location Framework (ELF). This three-year project brings together 30 consortium members combining national mapping and cadastral agencies across Europe, geospatial technology providers and application software developers to provide up-to-date, authoritative, reference geoinformation for use by the European public and private sectors.

This versatile cloud-based service will provide INSPIRE-compliant geoinformation, harmonised at a cross-border and pan-European level.

The project, co-funded by the European Commission, represents a total investment of EUR13 million which will aim to enable the creation of innovative value-added services building on the foundations of INSPIRE data.

In addition to UK-based Europa Technologies, the consortium features a number of other UK organisations including Ordnance Survey, 1Spatial, Snowflake Software and Netrius. The project will develop pilot applications in the sectors of health statistics, emergency mapping, real estate and insurance but will also extend to many other application areas as more application developers start using the new ELF platform.

The consortium is committed to continue to provide the ELF platform beyond the end of the project, thus enabling growth in the use and re-use of trustworthy, accurate and re-usable reference data.