D Compendium. Sintesy of the major project results. De Zorzi Stefania. Provision of interoperable datasets to open GI to EU communities

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1 Provision of interoperable datasets to open GI to EU communities D Compendium Sintesy of the major project results De Zorzi Stefania econtentplus This project is funded under the econtentplus programme a multiannual Community programme to make digital content in Europe more accessible, usable and exploitable.

2 RESUME TITLE GIS4EU - COMPENDIUM WP TO REFERS WP 8 DOCUMENT CODE D 8.5 CREATOR RESPONSIBLE PARTNER Stefania De Zorzi CORILA CREATION DATE 17/06/2010 SUBJECT STATUS PUBLISHER TYPE DESCRIPTION CONTRIBUTOR FORMAT SOURCE This document report some of the main articles provide to the public during the GIS4EU project activities to present and describe the results of the project Approved Repository Deliverable This deliverable resume some of the most interesting article provided during the GIS4EU project All project participants document format:.doc,.pdf, Gis4Eu Project activities VERSION 1.0 DISSEMINATION LEVEL Pubblic ( FILE NAMER KEYWORDS LANGUAGE RELATION D_8.5_compendium.doc Gis4eu, articles, Inpire, metadata, data model, harmonization process. English/Italian All project deliverables Table 1 - Document classification resume Pag. 2/212 D 8.5 Compendium

3 INDEX 1 SUMMARY 6 2 DOCUMENT SCOPE 6 3 ARTICLES ARTICLES DISTRIBUTION WITH SPATIAL DATA INFRASTRUCTURES NATURE CONSERVATION ASPECTS OF INSPIRE TRANSPORT NETWORKS THEME: HARMONISATION OF GIS4EU DATA PROVIDERS DATASET ON TRANSPORT NETWORKS FROM MAPS TO VIRTUAL REALITY A SPECIFIC ENVIRONMENT; THE VENICE LAGOON FROM SOURCE TO TARGET DATA HARMONISATION EXPERIENCES WITH INTERNATIONAL STANDARDS FOR DATA MODELS & WS IMPLEMENTATION OF THE INSPIRE DIRECTIVE IN CROATIA: OPPORTUNITY FOR STARTING A MASS LAND VALUATION SYSTEM? 65 ABSTRACT TRANSPORT NETWORKS THEME: COMPARISON OF GIS4EU DATA PROVIDERS DATASETS WITH INSPIRE PROPOSED DATA MODEL GEOPACK: A JAVA WRAPPER FOR GEO-GRAPHIC WEB SERVICES COMMON TOOLS FOR DISCOVERY, DISTRI-BUTION AND INTEGRATION OF GEOSPATIAL DATA IN SLOVAK NSDI GIS4EU: HARMONISATION KNOW-HOW TRANSPORT NETWORKS THEME: HARMONISATION OF GIS4EU DATA PROVIDERS DATASET ON TRANSPORT NETWORKS DATA HARMONISATION STEP BY STEP CONTRIBUTION TO THE GIS4EU WORKSHOP ON DATA HARMONISATION AT THE GSDI GIS4EU ANALYSIS OF THE INSPIRE ADMINISTRATIVE UNITS DATA SPECIFICATION TRANSFORMING GIS4EU DATA MODELS INTO THE INSPIRE DATA MODEL: THE CASE OF HYDROGRAPHY MODELING RULES FOR INTEGRATING HETEROGENEOUS GEOGRAPHIC DATASETS ARTICLE IN EU LANGUAGES DA VENEZIA ALL'EUROPA, RICERCHE FINANZIATE DAI PROGRAMMI EUROPEI LA PARTECIPAZIONE DELLA REGIONE LIGURIA AL PROGETTO GIS4EU 127 D 8.5 GIS4EU Compendium Pag. 3 of 212

4 4.3 IL COMUNE DI GENOVA E LA CONDIVISIONE DELLE INFORMAZIONI LA PROGRAMMAZIONE EUROPEA ED IL VALORE DELLA CONDIVISIONE DELLE INFORMAZIONI GEOGRAFICHE: IL PROGETTO GIS4EU IL MODELLO DATI COME PUNTO CRITICO PER UNA EVOLUZIONE DELL INFORMAZIONE TERRITORIALE EGIS DELLA REGIONE UMBRIA: MODELLO ORGANIZZATIVO E SCELTE TECNOLOGICHE L INTEROPERABILITÀ NELLE STRATEGIE DI DIFFUSIONE DEI DATI SPAZIALI DELLA REGIONE ABRUZZO COSTRUZIONE DI UN MODELLO DATI EUROPEO E SUCCESSIVA AGGREGAZIONE DEI DATI: I PASSI TECNICI PER UNA MAGGIORE OPERATIVITÀ NELLA PUBBLICA AMMINISTRAZIONE PROBLEMATICHE INCONTRATE NELL APPLICAZIONE A GRANDE SCALA DEI MODELLI DATI DELLA DIRETTIVA, DATA PROVIDER LOCALE: LA PECULIARITÀ DI UN AMBIENTE PARTICOLARE COME LA LAGUNA DI VENEZIA LA PUBBLICA AMMINISTRAZIONE LOCALE E LE TEMATICHE TECNICHE DI INSPIRE L'ESPERIENZA DEL PROGETTO GIS4EU INFRASTRUTTURA TECNOLOGICA ADOTTATA IN GIS4EU CREAZIONE DEL MODELLO COMUNE DEI DATI PER IL TEMA DELL ELEVAZIONE DEL TERRENO UTILIZZANDO LA PROCEDURA INDICATA DA INSPIRE CROSS BORDER E CROSS SCALE: GLI ASPETTI AMMINISTRATIVI E NORMATIVI NELLA DEFINIZIONE DEI CONFINI AMMINISTRATIVI LA PROSPETTIVA DEGLI UTENTI SULLE SDI: DALL ANALISI DELLE ESIGENZE ALL UTILIZZO DEI RISULTATI DEL PROGETTO GIS4E 203 Pag. 4/212 D 8.5 Compendium

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6 1 Summary This document is a compendium of almost all produced articles, related to GIS4EU project. In particular they cover the entire history of the project, starting from its beginning, 3 years ago, up to the current state of the art, with the presentation of all the obtained results. The articles contained in this work come from different sources, i.e. the workshops (national and international) organised by GIS4EU project, other workshops which saw the participation of GIS4EU partners, as well as scientific publications and reviews; all of them, however, giving their strong contribution to the explanation of the development of GIS4EU project. So, intention of this document is to be an excursus of all the activities carried out by the partners with the aim of reaching the major objective of the project, i.e. the operational validation of the harmonisation process, as defined within the frame of the INSPIRE Directive. In this document, a considerable contribution can be also visible from the GIS experts belonging to most the European Countries who, with their articles presented during the various GIS4EU workshops organised by the project, took the opportunity to present different approaches and experiences about spatial data infrastructure on a local, regional and national scale. Some of these document are listes in the original produced languages. Some of these documents, articles and contributin were will be selected to produce a book that will be publish as GIS4EU project. 2 Document Scope This document has been realised with the scope of presenting a compendium of all articles produced during the whole activity of GIS4EU project. Through these articles, as a result of various contributions, the progress of the project can be detected, up to the demonstration of the applicability of the INSPIRE Directive, through the data processing. This publication presents itself also as an organised document, which, presenting through these contributions the chronological progress of the project, gives a very easy access to the themes presented and so turns out to be also useful to those non technical people, interested in approaching GIS4EU topics. Pag. 6/212 D 8.5 Compendium

7 3 English articles 3.1 Distribution with Spatial Data Infrastructures Abstract Geographic information is vital to making sound decisions at local, regional, and global levels, and is applicable to several different areas, such as border security, emergency management, infrastructure management, land information management, mapping and cartographic production, public services (e-government). The above areas are just a few examples where decision makers are benefiting from geographic information, coupled with the associated spatial data infrastructure (SDI) that supports information discovery, access, and use of this information in the decision-making process. The components of a SDI include geodata resources, networks, GIS services and standards. From a software technology point of view, services are the heart of the infrastructure. Intergraph s SDI product portfolio facilitates different kinds of services, enabling our customers to participate within a SDI as a node. These services embrace the following areas: Human-interaction Services (Portal Services) Model/Information Services (Data and Catalogue Services) Workflow/Task Services Processing Services System Management Services Communication Services Spatial information, however, is an expensive resource, and for this reason, appropriate information and the resources to fully utilize this spatial information may not always be readily available, particularly in the developing world. Many national, regional, and international programs and projects are working to improve access to available geodata, promote its reuse, and ensure that additional investment in spatial information collection and management results in an ever-growing, readily available and useable pool of spatial information. Also included in such initiatives is an emphasis on harmonizing standards for spatial data capture and exchange, the coordination of data collection and maintenance activities, and the use of common data sets by different agencies. For Europe, the European Commission has recognized that the availability of relevant and standardized geo information is a vital prerequisite for efficient political action. As such, they set up the Infrastructure for Spatial Information in Europe (INSPIRE) initiative D 8.5 GIS4EU Compendium Pag. 7 of 212

8 ( home.html) to coordinate activities to improve utilization of geographic information on a European level. Intergraph has been a pioneer of SDI since 1994 when it co-founded the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC), an international standards organization for geospatial and location based services. Since 2004, Intergraph has been directly involved with the INSPIRE initiative when it established the OGESDI Spatial Data Interest Community (SDIC) and registered experts for INSPIRE Implementing Rules Drafting Teams. This article will highlight Intergraph s SDI philosophy and architecture, review the benefits of it for end-users and provide examples of successfully applied SDI solutions Introduction and background Geographic information is vital to making sound decisions at local, regional, and global levels, and is applicable to several different areas, such as: Border security, primarily at the national government level Emergency management, involving prevention planning, monitoring, and analysis of natural disasters and large public events Infrastructure management for water and wastewater systems, transportation systems, city services (garbage, snow, parks), field equipment, and some utility systems Land information management, including cadastre, forestry, agriculture, Figure 1. Components of a Spatial Data Infrastructure Pag. 8/212 D 8.5 Compendium

9 natural resources, urban planning, environmental protection, and economic development Mapping and cartographic production, primarily at the regional and national government level Public services (e-government), including businesses and citizens purchasing government information, accessing government information, and requesting services The above areas are just a few examples where decision makers are benefiting from geographic information, coupled with the associated spatial data infrastructure (SDI) that supports information discovery, access, and use of this information in the decision-making process. The examples also clearly indicate the importance of collaboration between organizations interoperability for spatial data and publication of spatial information. According to gdi.initative.sachsen, the components of a SDI include: Geospatial data resources as the repository for all spatial-related data Networks as the physical and logical infrastructure component GIS services for communicating the different elements Standards ensuring interoperability The relationship between the different components is shown in Figure 1. From a software technology point of view, services are the heart of the infrastructure. Intergraph s SDI product portfolio facilitates different kinds of services, enabling users to participate within a SDI as a node. These services embrace the following areas: Human-interaction Services (Portal Services) Client services for the management of user interfaces, graphics, multimedia, and presentation of compound documents Model/Information Services (Data and Catalogue Services) Services for the management of the development, manipulation, and storage of metadata, conceptual schemas, and datasets Workflow/Task Services Services supporting specific tasks or work-related activities conducted by humans. These services support the use of resources and product development involving a sequence of activities or steps that may be conducted by different persons. Processing Services Services that perform large-scale computations involving substantial amounts of data System Management Services Services for the management of system D 8.5 GIS4EU Compendium Pag. 9 of 212

10 components, applications, networks, user accounts, and user access privileges Communication Services Services for encoding and transfer of data across communications networks Geospatial information, however, is an expensive resource, and for this reason, appropriate information and the resources to fully utilize this spatial information may not always be readily available, particularly in the developing world. Many national, regional, and international programs and projects are working to improve access to available geospatial data, promote its reuse, and ensure that additional investment in spatial information collection and management results in an ever-growing, readily available and useable pool of geospatial information. Also included in such initiatives is an emphasis on harmonizing standards for spatial data capture and exchange, the coordination of data collection and maintenance activities, and the use of common data sets by different agencies. For Europe, the European Commission has recognized that the availability of relevant and standardized geospatial information is a vital prerequisite for efficient political action. As such, they set up the Infrastructure for Spatial Information in Europe (INSPIRE) initiative ( to coordinate activities to improve utilization of geographic information on a European level. This initiative provides a European legal standard, which, as envisaged, took effect in 2007, and will regulate the structure of a European geospatial data infrastructure (European Spatial Data Infrastructure ESDI) by using the national geospatial data infrastructures of the European Union members. The commission started these measures in 2001 in the European environment area of responsibility and will extend them step-by-step to other relevant areas. This paper will highlight Intergraph s SDI philosophy and architecture, participation in INSPIRE and SDI related European project, and provide examples of successfully applied SDI solutions Philosophy and architecture To become a node in a SDI, organizations must first accomplish several key steps: Identify the related parties and persons Identify and define the process which is to be supported by the infrastructure Identify the spatial resources and empower them with appropriate technology Identify the needs of the infrastructure and outline how to meet those needs Pag. 10/212 D 8.5 Compendium

11 These steps make it clear that applying only software and hardware is not sufficient enough to becoming a node of a SDI. Indeed, becoming a well-respected node requires the implementation of a fully empowered solution covering all different aspects of processes, organization, infrastructure, and software. Becoming a leader in a SDI solution also requires involvement in all necessary standardization bodies and nation or regional SDI initiatives. Consequently, Intergraph actively participates in all major relevant teams, from serving as a principal member of the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC ) to participating in INSPIRE drafting teams and local initiatives like state SDI groups. This active involvement lays the foundation for Intergraph to collect requirements from all different applicable areas and gives our customers a profound basis for realizing the solution. From a technology point of view, being a node in a SDI requires different technologies for: Providing interoperable services Consuming interoperable services Structuring geospatial data according to determined models Publishing/displaying the geospatial data This leads to a principle architecture for storing, reading, writing, and displaying data in a SDI-technology manner, as shown in Figure 2 on the following page. Enterprise GIS includes all Figure 2. Principle Architecture of an SDI Node the existing geospatial software and infrastructure available in this node. The mission from the technical point of view is to set up a SDI technology extension to Intergraph s GeoMedia product portfolio, which gives users a customizable turnkey solution. D 8.5 GIS4EU Compendium Pag. 11 of 212

12 The major objective for this technology extension is to fulfill the core requirements of sustainability, interoperability, and flexibility. Sustainability is important, as it pertains to the upcoming changes in related standards. The solution must be open for users to adapt the new versions in an easy-to-modify manner. Interoperability relates to the usage of standards. Model inherent, SDI is a network theme where different players each have their own role. Interoperability of data and services is reached through the use of standards. Flexibility applies to different solution characteristics. The solution must be easy to integrate into an organization s environment, adopt its security policies, and adapt to its corporate standards. Flexibility and scalability also refer to the needs of different kinds of users. From municipalities to nations or even pan-national organizations, all must realize the node of a SDI in an appropriate scale and manner, each with their different requirements in services and scales. For example, a state or nation SDI node has a strong demand for harmonizing the data provided by services to generate a homogeneous picture of geospatial data, whereas a municipality s needs relate more to acquiring metadata for geospatial data European INSPIRE and SDI/NSDI related projects Since 2004, Intergraph has been developing important activities in INSPIRE framework increasing its presence in the implementation process of the INSPIRE Directives and rules. Intergraph established the OGESDI Spatial Data Intesrest Community (SDIC) proposing professional experts for the INSPIRE Implementing Rule Drafting Teams and testing the INSPIRE specifications and concepts. Intergraph experts has been involved in te Network Service drafting team in charge of the development of the concepts of the INSPIRE architecture and the technical guidelines lying down the INSPIRE Implementing Rules for services. Intergraph experts has been involved in the INSPIRE Thematic Working Group on Administrative Units theme, establishing common model laying down the INSPIRE Implementing Rules for Administrative Units theme, defining the encoding rules for administrative units, defining quality aspects, methodology, portrayal for administrative units. Finally, Intergraph has been developing important activities in European projects with particular attention and focus on the implementation process of the INSPIRE Directive. Intergraph has participated in proposals within the FP6 and FP7 ( Framework Programme 6 & 7) for the development of relevant projects in the context of the GMES (Global Monitoring for Environment and Security) and econtentplus programs summarized below. Pag. 12/212 D 8.5 Compendium

13 3.1.5 esdi-net+ esdi-net+ is a Thematic Network funded by the European Commission (EC) within its econtentplus Programme, aimed at the promotion of cross border dialogue and exchange of best practices on SDI throughout Europe. The three-year EU project started in September The project s main objective is to bring together European providers, users and developers of Spatial Data Infrastructures (SDI). The main goal is to connect people and to foster discussion and knowledge about technical, political, even social-economical challenges and benefits. The network will help to raise awareness of the important role SDIs play in the enrichment and reuse of GI. Intergraph CS in the Czech Republic is one of the project partners responsible for the identification and analysis of SDI Best practices at sub national level in the Czech and Slovak Republic (CR and SR). The esdi-net+ national workshop for the Czech and Slovak Republic (organized in September 2008 in Brno) gave an opportunity to promote SDI best practices from the region to the wider public and exchange experiences and knowledge on the SDI implementation GIS4EU GIS4EU project aim is to provide base cartography datasets (administration units, hydrographic, transportation networks and elevation themes) for Europe and to ensure its cross scale, cross language and cross border interoperability and accessibility according to standards and to requirements of INSPIRE Directive (20007/2/EC). The approach consists in the development of a common data model as well as of harmonization, aggregation and data exposition rules and guidelines in order to enable the access to the consistent and homogenous reference data provided by data providers from different countries and levels (national, regional and local) without building one central database and service. Intergraph Italia, Intergraph Germany and Intergraph Poland are involved into the project and they are the technical partner of reference for the project HUMBOLDT It s one of the most important EU funded project covering the issues and the goals of two main EC initiatives: INSPIRE and GMES. The four-year EU project Humboldt contributes to the implementation of a European Spatial Data Infrastructure (ESDI) that integrates the diversity of spatial data available for a multitude of European organizations. D 8.5 GIS4EU Compendium Pag. 13 of 212

14 The main goal of the Humboldt project is to enable organizations to document, publish and harmonize their spatial information. The software tools and processes created will demonstrate the feasibility and advantages of an Infrastructure for Spatial Information in Europe as planned by the INSPIRE initiative, meeting the goals of Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES). In 2009 Humboldt project contributed to the INSPIRE Data Specification testing process, providing feedback on Hydrographic theme. In addition, the project will be present at the GSDI11 conference planned in June in Rotterdam with a workshop on Data Harmonisation. Intergraph is involved in this project mainly for the development of the core technologies (Humboldt Framework) and it s in charge of the development of a scenario on border security EURADIN The project EURADIN (EURopean ADdresses INfrastructure), aims at constituting a Best Practice Network in order to promote the European Addresses harmonization regarding the definition, registration and access to the European Addresses Data. The emphasis will be put in defining how access to existing address data should be made to ensure the interoperability of existing address data. Working out a strategy on how to build up access services to national or regional addresses infrastructures. The project main results will be the proposal for the European addresses Infrastructure and the implementation, testing, and validation of a pilot European Addresses Infrastructure. The results shall be used as a reference for all European Member States to fulfill the INSPIRE recommendations with respect to addresses. Intergraph Spain is involved in this project as technical partner for the implementation of a pilot of the European Gazetteer Service NATURE-SDIplus Nature-SDIplus is a project submitted by a consortium of 30 partners coordinated by GISIG (our partner located in Genoa, Italy) in the frame of the 2007 econtentplus call for proposal. Nature-SDIplus Network aims, through state-of-the-art methodologies and best practice examples, to improve harmonization of national datasets and make them more accessible and exploitable. The project, officially started at October, 1st 2008, will consider and will contribute to the INSPIRE development process, in particular regarding Data Specification of the INSPIRE Data Themes related to Nature Conservation. About this link with INSPIRE, the project has provided Pag. 14/212 D 8.5 Compendium

15 its contribution to INSPIRE Data Specification testing, regarding the Annex I data theme Protected Sites, one of the proposed themes in the project. The NATURE-SDIplus work plan considers that regarding the Protected Sites data theme, the project will verify the Data Model proposed by the INSPIRE Drafting Team, while for the other data themes included in the Annex III of INSPIRE (Bio-geographical regions, Habitats and biotopes and Species distribution), the project has been invited to participate to the definition of the INSPIRE data models, becoming a reference project for these themes. Nature-SDIplus will participate to the GSDI11 conference in Rotterdam with a presentation into a workshop. Intergraph is involved with Intergraph Italia as the main technological partner, having the leadership of the WP4 Creation of the Nature-SDIplus portal. Uwe Jasnoch - Intergraph Germany Marek Brylski - Intergraph Poland Anette Breu - Intergraph Germany Carmelo Attardo - Intergraph Italia D 8.5 GIS4EU Compendium Pag. 15 of 212

16 3.2 Nature Conservation Aspects of INSPIRE Abstract The main tasks of the National Conservation Information System is to support the work and decision making in the field of the preservation of natural diversity of the living and inanimate world. To fulfill this task there is a number of nature conservation fields on which data are collected and stored within the NCIS. To be user friendly and transparent, the data on these fields are structured into 9 different modules. All data stored in the NCIS are spatially referenced, thus making it possible to easily visualize them in a GIS system as well as to make analysis on them. The NCIS works as a basic application of the state nature conservation administration. The main vizualization output of the NCIS is the Public Relation module which offers interactive Google Earth and other Map services. The Google Earth service has a connection to the Conservation Mapserver in order to show the conservation maps on Google Earth. The other Map services run on ArcIMS and provide information on Protected Areas, Natura 2000 sites, Nature Trails, Visitor Centers and Public Caves. Apart from visualization these services provide a reporting function which enables the end-users to give feed back. The Hungarian model of the Conservation Inspire Themes are fully coherent with the guidelines no. D2.8.I.9 of INSPIRE Data Specification on Protected Sites. The development and implementation of the NCIS may cause a significant increase in process efficiency, and at the same time the subjective decision making procedure will be changed into data driven and almost completely objective decisions. The real challenge for NCIS will be the running of the system with continuous data update since a more complex system will require more work. At the implementation of the system a discrepancy was detected within the NSDI which was caused by a restraint of data availability through high prices. If pricing policies do not turn towards a free and open access in the future, especially regarding data exchange amongst government organisations, the NCIS and other e- government services will not be able to reach the desired effect Introduction The basic task of governmental conservation organisations of Hungary is the preservation of natural diversity of the living and inanimate world. The mission is: to preserve the plants, animals and natural communities that represent the diversity of Life on Earth by protecting the lands and waters they need to Pag. 16/212 D 8.5 Compendium

17 survive; to preserve ecosystem services of our natural heritage and the harmony between the activities of man and nature; to manage the natural heritage on sustainable way to preserve it for the future generations. Conserving natural conditions and processes can be ensured by continuously operated monitoring mechanisms (TERBORGH, 1974). The Conservation Law of Hungary (Act LIII. of 1996) stipulates the operation of a unified information system for nature conservation that is also compliant to international requirements. By the law, the Minister of Environment and Water set up the National Conservation Information System (NCIS) to support the conservation tasks. Prior to NCIS the administrative and professional decisions were based on persons not data with appreciable field experience at the National Park Administrations (rangers, superintendents, researchers etc.) (TAKÁCS SZILÁGYI 2004). Regarding dataflow, since 2005 the decision making process has changed. The tasks are differentiated in time and space. The data collection is a role of the National Park Administrations, but the authority decisions are taken by the Environmental, Conservation and Water Inspectorates (so-called Green Authorities ) Presentation of the treated themes The National Conservation Information System of Hungary supports the conservation activities and management: supports complex information for conservation strategic planning; supports the decision making process of environmental and conservational authority activity; supplies information to evaluate the conservation status of Hungary, to national and international reports, and for attending public demands. The NCIS, as a GIS application, collects, displays, stores and analyzes Geopositioned data (with conservation interest) in a geodatabase (TAKÁCS, 2007). D 8.5 GIS4EU Compendium Pag. 17 of 212

18 Fig 1 - Modules of the NCIS The system combine from modules (functional groups) as follows (Fig 1): Conservation Basic Object Registry System (CBORS) Biotics module Protected values module Realty (Land) register module Trusteeship (Property management) module Forestry module Site usage eventlog (management) module Executive decision support module (it has direct connection to the National Environmental Information Sytem) Public Relation module. Pag. 18/212 D 8.5 Compendium

19 The public relation module of NCIS offers open access to the public with an ArcIMS interactive mapserver ( (Fig 2). The PR module offer intercative services (TAKÁCS - KOTHENCZ 2007): Map Service of the Protected Areas, Natura 2000 sites, Nature Trails, Visitor Centers, Public Caves, Fig 2 - The PR Module of the NCIS Google Earth / Maps link to the Conservation Mapserver, Report function (feed back) from the end-users. The NCIS works as a basic application of the state nature conservation administration, runs on secure govermental IT infrastructure (intranet on National Data Transmission Backbone called EKG ). The most relevant data layers of Hungary are collected in the system to support the spatial related decions (Fig 3) (TAKÁCS, 2007). This integrating feature of the NCIS highlighted conflicts between the elements of the National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI). Data supplied by different data providers have certain common features. The forest border is a typical example for the immanent contradiction. The digital model representing the self-same forest boundary have an average of 5-15 (in some cases even more) meters difference in geometry between the different NSDI sources (Fig 4a and 4b). This discrepancy within the NSDI was caused by a restraint of common data availability through high prices. D 8.5 GIS4EU Compendium Pag. 19 of 212

20 Fig 3 - The elements of the NCIS The NCIS also runs the conservation registers (with uniform data management) from which the Nature Conservation INSPIRE Themes are derived. The article focuses the conservation aspects of the INSPIRE themes. The Hungarian models are fully coherent with the guidelines no. D2.8.I.9 of INSPIRE Data Specification on Protected Sites (INSPIRE TWG 2009) INSPIRE Annex I. Hungarian Protected Sites The register of the NCIS protected areas specified by national and international legal documents (EU directives), generates, stores and registers statistics and their most important features. The module registers the protected objects as follows: 1) Protected natural areas of national importance a) Natural areas protected by specific laws ii) national park (its area divided into: natural, managed, demonstration zone categories Act on Nature Conservation 28. ) iii) landscape protected area Pag. 20/212 D 8.5 Compendium