1.30pm 15th September 2009

Aim of the Workshop

The aim of this seminar was to present a number of innovative developments in visualisation methods and technology which can enhance interpretation of geodemographic classification. This seminar was aimed at both a professional and academic audiences and will be interest to all users of geodemographics.

Geodemographic classification simplify the complex characteristics of neighbourhoods into an understandable and easy to interpret typology. Much of this effectiveness is attributable to the use of visualisation accompanying the classification in the form of text, images, maps, videos and graphs. However, possible visualisation tools and methods extend far beyond those currently used by commercial and non-commercial geodemographic classification providers. In this workshop we will explore a number of new innovations in this area and present a case for richer communication.

The OAC User Group would like to thank all those who participated in visualisation event; slides from the talk are available below.

Programme

13.30 – 14.00 – Registration
14.00 – 14.10 – Introduction
14.10 – 14.35 – I’nt Maps Brilliant (Dan Vickers, University of Sheffield)
14.35 – 15.00 – Effective Communication (Laura Edwards, Local Futures)
15.00 – 15.25 – Geographic Visualisation (Alex Singleton, University College London)
15.25 – 15.50 – Visualising OAC (Aidan Slingsby, City University)
15.50 – 14.15 – 3-D Visualisation (Duncan Smith, University College London)
16.15 – 16.30 – Discussion

Links

Also, as promised, here are the links to the websites and software discussed in the talks:

Websites:

• www.maptube.org
• www.publicprofiler.org/streetview
• http://atlas.publicprofiler.org/
• www.education.publicprofiler.org – forthcoming
• www.localfutures.com
• www.areaprofiles.blogspot.com
• www.londonprofiler.org
• http://www.soi.city.ac.uk/organisation/is/research/giCentre/courses/index.html

Software:

• http://www.processing.org/
• http://mapnik.org/
• http://openlayers.org/
• http://www.openstreetmap.org/

Also, if you would like to ask further questions about specific aspects of the talks, then feel free to drop the presenters and email:

Dan – d.vickers@sheffield.ac.uk

Laura – Laura.Edwards@localfutures.com

Alex – a.singleton@ucl.ac.uk

Aidan – a.slingsby@soi.city.ac.uk

Duncan – duncan.a.smith@ucl.ac.uk

Flyer

A Flyer is available to download [here].

Full Titles and Abstracts

I’nt Maps Brilliant: Understanding Data Through Visualisation

Effective Communication: Visualising OAC for Local Government Policy Users This talk will discuss the different ways of visualising OAC built into the Local Futures Group’s Local Knowledge system. The system allows policy users to analyse their areas using OAC, the main policy context for this being the need to demonstrate an understanding of local communities. The talk will focus on the current tools and how they aid this understanding. It will also cover the next steps required for improving the visualisation of OAC through the re-development of Local Knowledge.

Visualising OAC using rectangular hierarchical cartograms (Aidan Slingsby, City University London)
Many social data are hierarchical and can be mapped into a spatial hierarchy. OAC is an example of a hierarchical classification scheme that classifies population by some of its economic and social characteristics into 7 supergroups, 21 groups and 52 subgroups by Output Area. This talk will demonstrate the use of hierarchical cartograms (spatially-arranged
treemaps) for showing population in its OAC category hierarchy and its spatial hierarchy (using the widely familiar postcode hierarchy of postcode area, district, sector and unit). Examples will illustrate how these graphics can be used to assess the relationship between OAC and population, the spatial granularity at which these vary and the wider applicability of these techniques.

Geographic Visualisation: Neogeography and Area Classification (Alex Singleton, University College London)
In this talk the technical developments in web mapping technology and spatial data infrastructures which have fundamentally changed how users collect, share and interact with information online will be reviewed. Specific reference will be made to how the new tools for Neogeography can aid in disseminating and visualising area classification.

3D Visualisation: Linking Built Environment Models to Geodemographic Datasets (Duncan Smith, University College London)
Recent improvements in Geographic Information (GI) technologies have enabled the development of built environment models, providing detailed analysis of urban form, function and building characteristics such as residential housing types. Through address matching techniques these models can be linked to geodemographic data, and relationships between the built environment and demographic patterns can be explored. This approach is useful for analysing the geography of housing markets and investigating how urban form influences demographic segregation. Built environment models can also be used for the 3D visualisation of geodemographic data, adding a ‘sense of place’ to the exploration of urban patterns. Challenges and applications for these techniques will be
discussed.

Registration

The meeting took at the Royal Statistical Society headquarters, 12 Errol Street, London, EC1Y 8LX. There was no charge for this event but pre-registration was required, with early booking recommended and by 10 September at the latest: please email martin.robson@lbhf.gov.uk to book and please let us know your company or organisation affiliation which will help us pitch the event correctly for the audience.
For any other information or queries about the seminar please contact Martin Robson by email on martin.robson@lbhf.gov.uk.

An OACUG course specially designed to provide a hands on introduction to organising data and analysis by OAC in all user sectors will be held on 24 March 2009 in London. The full day course is an updated version of the one successfully held in June 2008. It is ideal for those embarking on work where area classification will be used.

The course will be given by Martin Callingham, Visiting Professor at the School of Geography, Birkbeck College, London University, and Dr Tom Smith, Director, Oxford Consultants on Social Inclusion.

There is a fee of £125 for the course which includes refreshments and a comprehensive range of material to retain. Reservations for places, or expressions of interest, may be made now. Details and how to book

Planning is at an early stage for further half day events free of charge.

Innovation in geodemography May/June 2009

An event featuring the latest innovation in geodemography, with emphasis on visualisation and uses for wider public audiences.

OACUG Seminar September 2009

The emphasis will be on applications, including OAC coded data in ONS surveys.

OACUG Seminar and other events in 2010

The September seminar is planned to have the theme of ‘OAC 2011′ – a new version when the Census results emerge, and further events will aim to serve the emerging needs and interests of OAC users.

Contributing to events

The OACUG steering group would welcome offers of presentation for these events, including material for our website, and would also be very happy to arrange presentations on OAC elsewhere. Please contact Martin Robson [martin.robson@lbhf.gov.uk].

Getting Value out of OAC – course notification.

A hands-on training course on how to use and get value from the Office of National Statistics geodemographic Output Area Classification (OAC), now freely available in the public domain, is offered to OAC User Group members.

The courses will be run by Martin Callingham, Visiting Professor at the School of Geography, Birkbeck College, London University.

The first one day course was held at the Royal Statistical Society, 12 Errol Street, EC1Y 8LX on Thursday 12 June 2008. It was being arranged in conjunction with the RSS Statistics Users Forum (SUF), to which the User Group is affiliated.

The usual fee for the course would be £250, but after further discussions with the RSS, a discount of 50% is now offered to those on the OACUG mailing list (which can be joined before booking ‘joining the group’), which brings it down to £125 – no VAT charged – and any surplus income will go to help SUF.

Hands-on training

A limit of ten places will allow an intensive and practical approach. Participants will be asked to bring a laptop with Excel and Access installed (an alternative to Access would be SPSS or some other software which will enable records from separate files to be joined through a common variable). It would also be an advantage if participants had a GIS installed, together with the Census Output Area (OA) boundary files. Participants would also be encouraged to bring their own postcoded data files, though this is not a necessary requirement.

The training will cover all the basic requirements of the software to achieve value from the use of OAC, though it would be expected that most of the participants would have familiarity with at least Excel.

Course objectives

Specific objectives are:

• understand what OAC is, its advantages and disadvantages over proprietary systems.
• be able to profile people post-coded files, calculate indices (relative propensity) and chart.
• use a market research or social survey table to estimate absolute propensities for OAC groups.
• be able to estimate behavioural or characterising values (e.g. income) for a people group, e.g. users of a library.
• be able to profile a bespoke geographical area (e.g. a Local Authority) and model behavioural estimates or resource demands for it (either relative or absolute).
• be able to map behavioural or resource estimates and debate the relative merits of using different ways of expressing the values.
• understand the opportunities of accessing an open geodemographic system (making ones own systems, further analysis, etc).

• use of the OAC variable database.

Material supplied with the course

The following data will be supplied as part of the course, and may be retained by participants for further use:

• postcode to OA look-up file (GB)- OA to OAC file (GB) with resident and household counts
• customer profiles of three newspapers (Sun, Telegraph and Guardian)
• the OAs that comprise the urban areas of Luton and Bath- a reduced London OA file containing OAC, residents and household counts and output area areas (hectares)

In addition, two PowerPoint presentations will be given and copies provided:

• what are geodemographics and OAC in particular?
• the advantages of an open geodemographic system

together with a detailed set of course notes.

Generous help from the Demographic User Group

The design of this course was originally funded by the Demographic User Group who is offering it to support the use of OAC in the wider community.

Bookings are NOT yet being taken for future one day courses until but if you are interested please contact the OAC administrator Martin Robson by email: martin.robson@lbhf.gov.uk

The main outcome of the exchange was priorities for activity by the User Group (UG) which will help application of OAC. More on the background and aims of the event

Outcome – priorities for the User Group

• Naming of the Groups and Sub-Groups – through the setting up of a small group of UG members to work through names that are appropriate for similar areas across the UK.
• Refreshing the photographs used to illustrate categories in the OAC hierarchy and making existing photographs easier to find on the OAC website – UG members will be invited to send in new photographs of identified locations.
• Publicising Use/Case Studies to provide UG members with examples of best practice.
• Providing advice on the use of OAC with non-standard geographies.
• Encouraging the coding of survey data with OAC.

The UG steering group will be considering how to implement activity to meet these priorities and more news will follow.

Participants

Some 35 UG members registered interest in attending the Information Exchange and 26 were able to make it on the day. There was a broad representation of the wider UG membership; from central government, the health sector, the commercial sector and from the academic and research communities, including:

Berkshire Public Health Network, Big Lottery Fund, Birkbeck College, Communities and Local Government, Demographic Decisions, Geofutures, Information Centre for Health and Social Care (IC), Institute of Education, Leeds University, London Borough of City of London, London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham, London Borough of Newham, Manchester Diocese Church & Society Department, Milton Keynes Council, ONS, Pebbleshore, Sheffield University, Southwark Primary Care Trust, Steer Davies Gleave, University College London, University of Surrey, Woolworths, Worcestershire County Council, WSP Development and Transportation

The exchange

Keith Dugmore introduced the exchange and Chris Denham set out its main aims, then the participants split into two initial discussion groups to find out more about backgrounds and experiences with OAC to help identify themes for the afternoon‘s main discussion. The first group’s discussion was facilitated by Dan Vickers and Oliver Duke-Williams. The second group’s discussion was facilitated by Martin Callingham and Tony Duckenfield.

Finding priorities

Points raised in the first group included the suggestion of better photographs to illustrate OAC categories after it was pointed out that more user friendly illustrations were required by UG members to present the OAC to their colleagues and other non-specialists. Members of this group said they had used or hoped to use the OAC in the following areas of interest: change over time, land use, retail catchment profiles, health and deprivation, epidemiology, rural/urban migration, voluntary groups performance, diversity studies, pupil performance, energy/resource use, resource allocation. Most thought of themselves as novice users of OAC and of those using OAC three or four thought their use was medium and one thought their use of the OAC was heavy.

In the second group non standard geographies, naming of groups and sub-groups and the linking of surveys with the OAC emerged as priorities. Members of this group said they had used or hoped to use OAC in the following areas of interest: housing, health, area-based profiling, customer profiling, and workforce an analysis. This group also discussed lack of time, money and support restricting their opportunities to use OAC, as well as the benefits of using the higher level ONS area classifications (such as Local Authority) when appropriate.

At the end of the first part of the exchange each discussion group’s key points were presented to a short plenary session to choose broad themes for discussion in the main session.

Focus on the priorities

It was decided to have one group focused around ‘getting started with OAC’ facilitated by Dan Vickers and Chris Denham and a second group ‘more experienced with OAC’ facilitated by Martin Callingham and Tony Duckenfield.The ‘getting started with OAC’ group discussed:

• How to increase understanding of the basic concepts of Output Areas, the Census data underlying OAC, and the methodology for creating OAC,
• How to choose the appropriate level of geography for analysis
• How OAC compared with other classifications
• How to choose the right hierarchical level of OAC; Super-Groups, Groups, Sub-Groups – for analyses
• How to be confident that a use of OAC is sound and legitimate.

The ‘more experienced with the OAC’ group discussed:

• Application of OAC with non-standard geographies such as GP practice catchments, Primary Care Trust boundaries (where they do not match local authority boundaries), parish boundaries, local housing estates, or new deal areas.
• How to combine higher levels of geography with the small area precision of OAC for example in analysing patterns of deprivation in Lower level Super Output Areas (LSOAs) categorized by the Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD).
• How to present OAC using colour ‘codes’ in graphics and maps or when using group names
• Modelling and how to extrapolate surveys with small sample sizes using OAC to bring out further patterns from the survey data.

Conclusion

Keith Dugmore closed the event by summarising key points, thanking everyone for participating, saying that further feedback would be very helpful to the UG and that a report of the afternoon would be put on the UG website and members notified.

Download Presentations:

‘Open Geodemograhics: the creation of the Output Area classification‘, Dr Dan Vickers, University of Sheffield
‘Visualising area classifications‘, Alan Smith (April) Alistair Calder (Nov), ONS
‘The application and development of OAC‘, Professor Martin Callingham, Birkbeck College.

A full list of other documents relating to this event can be found on the RSS website here.

Conference details:

Royal Statistical Society: Social Statistics Section and Statistics Users Forum
EXPLORING THE USE AND VALUE OF THE ONS OUTPUT AREA CLASSIFICATION

An afternoon seminar about using the area classification to
understand the UK at small area level

A repeat of the seminar held on 2 November 2006

Monday 2 April 2007

The Output Area classification (OAC) distills key results from the 2001 Census to provide a simple measure of the character, and
the similarities and differences of local areas across the UK. It was created with the same well established methods as the
related ONS classifications of local authorities and wards. Like those it is freely available for all to use, and complements
commercially available classifications. The seminar brings together experts to help those in the public and private sectors who use or would like to use OAC for profiling populations, structuring other data, or targeting resources. There will be an emphasis on practical steps and support for applications.

It was first held on 2 November 2006, and, after support from the participants, an OAC User Group was inaugurated. The
November seminar was, however, quite heavily over subscribed, and is being repeated to give those who were unable to obtain
places an opportunity to attend, along with all others with an interest

Programme, speakers, and background information

Themes for the afternoon will be

• creating the classification: objectives
• presentation: visualisation and access
• uses: effective applications
• issues and solutions
• getting involved with the OAC User Group

Speakers include Dr Dan Vickers (University of Sheffield) who developed OAC whilst at the University of Leeds, Professor
Martin Callingham of Birkbeck College, and Alan Smith from ONS Geography.

The seminar programme is below.

A brief introduction to area classifications, OAC, and the OAC User Group follows the seminar programme below. IT is recommended for those new or relatively new to area classification or OAC, as speakers will assume that participants have an initial familiarity with the subject.

Date and time
Monday 2 April 2007, starting at 14.00 (registration and coffee from 13.30) and finishing around 16.30.

Place
Royal Statistical Society, 12 Errol Street, London EC1Y BLX

Directions to the RSS are on the About RSS > Discover More >
Finding Errol Street page
http://www.rss.org.uk/main.asp?page=1759

Bookings
The seminar is free of charge, but places are limited and you should register as soon as possible: please email
Martin.Robson@lbhf.gov.uk who will confirm your place.

Further information
Please contact: Chris Denham chrisdenham@waitrose.com
or telephone 92392 413766. The seminar will not cover the details of the statistical methods of area classification, but the
organisers would welcome interest in a further seminar on methods.

Programme

13.30 Registration and coffee
14.00 Chair’s introduction – opportunities with OAC – Chris Denham
14.20 ‘Open geodemograhics: the creation of the Output Area classification’, Dr Dan Vickers, University of Sheffield
15.00 ‘Visualising area classifications’, Alistair Calder, ONS
15.30 ‘The application and development of OAC’, Professor Martin Callingham, Birkbeck College
16.00 Speakers panel – questions and discussion – The OAC User Group – what it does, and getting involved
16.30 (approximately) Close of seminar – room remains available for informal discussion.

Copies of slide presentations will be available on the Web after the seminar.

Speakers: information
Chris Denham – formerly Head of 2001 Census Output and Geography, co-author of the report on the 1991 classification of
local authorities, and advisor on OAC.

Dr Dan Vickers – lecturer in Social and Spatial Inequalities at the Department of Geography, University of Sheffield. He created
OAC on behalf of ONS. More information on Dan’s research interests:
http://www.sheffield.ac.uk/geography/staff/vickers_dan/index.html

Alan Smith – Geographical Information (GI) Strategy Manager ONS, has a special interest in data visualisation using animation
and interactivity, for example through the use of SVG (scaleable vector graphics) to make the ONS area classifications
accessible. More information on geography at ONS: http://www.statistics.gov.uk/geography/default.asp

Professor Martin Callingham – has used geodemographic systems for over 25 years. Formerly the Research Director of
Whitbread, he is currently a Visiting Professor at Birkbeck College, University of London, where he is researching new
ways of classifying areas.