A fish migration data and information resource: The Living North Sea Project Web-GIS

The Living North Sea (LNS) project (www.livingnorthsea.eu) is funded by the European Interreg North Sea Program and seeks to identify key issues and solutions for fish migration. Fifteen partners are working on re-connecting the rivers and deltas around the North Sea region. The project focuses on addressing knowledge gaps about fish populations that depend on free movement between the North Sea and freshwater systems; provision of innovative fish migration measures; collaborating with local water management authorities and policy makers; and creating greater public awareness about the Living North Sea and its aims and future achievements.

Data and information resources are very important to people and organisations ranging from the general public to the environmental manager. Provision and ease of access to such resources is also important. Internet technology has provided rapid and easy access to multiple and a disparate source of information in many different formats including text, images, video, and sound. Much of this information often has a spatial component and can be presented in the form of maps.

Web-GIS provides the opportunity to make spatial information in the form of maps widely available to the public, government, education and commercial organisations. Web-based Geographical Information Systems (GIS) also provide a powerful means to access spatial information with the added functionality to pan, zoom, and query the information. The LNS WebGIS is an ongoing element of the LNS project which will provide a data and information resource for fish migration data from sea to source. Datasets provided by the many partners of the LNS project are being prepared to input to the Web-GIS. The web-based spatial information is currently being developed in a number of different formats using web mapping software such as TimeMap, Mapserver, and Google Earth.

A GIS portal highlights the mapping capability of fish migration in the LNS website. It has been developed to help users quickly and easily access GIS maps, their associated data, and other GIS related information. It is also a one-stop solution for GIS users to access maps related to fish species distribution, migration, river barriers, and migratory patterns in the North Sea region. A key consideration in the development of the Web-GIS will be inclusion of the INSPIRE data directive (http://inspire.jrc.ec.europa.eu/) as a guideline for metadata and the data model to ensure compatibility of the multiple sources of geospatial datasets. This paper presents an overview of the LNS project with a special focus on the development of a web-based GIS.