Ricardo-AEA
Scotland’s Soils Website
Willie Towers, Xingyu Xiao, Stuart Sneddon
and many many others
www.ricardo-aea.com
© Ricardo-AEA Ltd
Aim and Objectives
• To develop and test a pilot Scottish soils website (SSDW) with a small group of public
bodies in Scotland.
• The project had several steps:
• Design a pilot website and populate with a small number of datasets
• Hold a stakeholder workshop, analyse the feedback and upgrade site accordingly
(within reason….)
• Establish a User Group to test upgraded version of the site
• Convene a User Group meeting, share experiences and prioritise upgrades (within
reason….)
• Produce enhanced website
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Groups involved in the project
• Steering Group: Scottish Government, SEPA, SNH, Forestry Commission Scotland,
Ricardo-AEA and Macaulay Scientific Consulting
• Editorial Group: Representatives from SEPA, SNH, Macaulay Scientific Consulting
and Ricardo-AEA
• User Group: Range of Stakeholders representing regulators, industry, consultancy,
academia, government and NGOs
Discussions were also held with various potential data providers
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Website: First draft
• Two datasets agreed with Steering Group:
– 1:250,000 national scale soil map
• Underpinned by the Scottish Soils
Knowledge and Information Base
(SSKIB)
– National Soils Inventory
• A grid based point sample across
Scotland, a key component of the full
Scottish Soil Database
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1:250 000 Soil map
Soil map legend
mssg
Association
Association
Map unit
Perterhead
• For both cultivated and
semi-natural soils
• ≈2500 horizons
• ≈ 530 soil Series
• Statistical summaries
• Use of analogues where
data missing
Rowanhill etc
Series
%
code
429
Blackhouse
100
61004
430
Peterhead
100
61006
444
Macmerry
50
71015
Caprington
50
71004
Caprington
100
71004
445
Information
Knowledge
SERIES
Caprington
HORIZON
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DEPTH
pH
CARBON
SUM BASES
Ap
28
6.1
3.8
14.4
Bg
50
6.2
1
10.8
BCg
70
6.1
0.9
12.6
100
6.2
0.96
13.6
Cg
5
(median or mean etc)
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Profile name:
Grid reference:
Surveyor:
Sample date:
Altitude:
Slope description:
Aspect & bearing:
Rocks and boulders:
Vegetation:
Flushing:
Site drainage:
Soil drainage:
Erosion:
Association/ Series:
Parent material:
Major soil subgroup:
Rock type:
Climate:
Land Capability Agriculture
Base of pit:
Bulk samples:
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Scottish soil database:
Each soil profile has up to 100 attributes
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Ap
Bs
C
SYMBOL
DEPTH
COLOUR
MOTTLES
TEXTURE
STRUCTURE
MOISTURE
CONSISTENCE
ROOTS
STONES
BOUNDARY
LABNO
SYMBOL
LOSS ON IGNITION
CALCIUM
MAGNESIUM
SODIUM
POTASSIUM
HYDROGEN
SUM
SATN
pH
CARBON
NITROGEN
OM
TOTP
ACET_P
TOP
BOTTOM
SAND
SILT
CLAY
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Stakeholder workshop – February 2013
• Objectives:
• Introduction to the website
• Identify potential user expectations
• Identify potential additional datasets.
• Around 40 delegates from various constituencies
• A number of presentations including three from potential/actual users with varying
levels of background knowledge in soils and uses of the data
• Consultancy
• Local Authority
• Central Scotland Forest Trust
• 4 breakout groups and a structured questionnaire for completion later
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Stakeholder workshop – February 2013
• Key themes
– Different users preferred different
scales of data dependent on need
– Many users preferred themed or
derived maps, not raw data
– Range of functions requested;
download, options for searching….
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Stakeholder workshop – February 2013
• Need for information about the data at
different levels; metadata,
descriptions, glossary
• Structure straightforward and easy to
navigate
• Contextual information
• Site not just about data
• How much do people want to
know about soil?
• Varied across different types of
user
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Next phase of development
– our Response
• Additional datasets prioritised by Steering Group and added
• a. Topsoil Organic Carbon Content
• b. Available Water Capacity
• c. Land Capability for Agriculture (1:250,000)
• d. Soil Texture (for differentiating within NVZs)
• e. World Reference Base (WRB) classification
• f. Soil carbon richness map (from SNH)
• Additional functions added
• Search by National Grid Reference or Postcode
• Use OS backdrop rather than Bing
• Contextual data radically restructured around State of Soil reporting
• We tried to tell a more coherent ‘story’
• Glossary, FAQs and Library populated with examples to prompt reaction
• User Group established
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• Status of Scotland’s soil
– Key facts
– Soil functions
– Soils and ecosystems
– Soil protection and policy
• What are the issues?
– Threats to soils
– Pressures on soil
– Prospects for Scotland’s soil
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Website User Group
• Established based on volunteers from workshop questionnaire and tapping into
networks
• Good cross-section from across potential user groups
• Tested site over summer 2013 and Group met in late August
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User group – examples of feedback and actions taken
Website pages
General comments
Main themes of feedback
‘Nice and simple, clean, easy
to navigate through, slightly
old fashioned’.
Language and terminology ‘Recognise the difficulty and I
can live with it’
Data
Actions taken
Structure determined by
SEWeb design and retained.
Different versions of some
material e.g. classification
and data descriptions
Requests for a range of other
datasets, including single
attribute maps/plots
Functionality
Glossary
Discussed with Steering
Group, additional datasets
prioritised and added to
website
Map overlay, additional search Implemented according to
facilities, location marker, data priorities and resources
download….
Additional terms suggested.
New terms added and
defined: we welcome more
So the site had developed considerably since conception to birth, and like all websites, is a work in progress
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Web design and structure
• A daughter website to Scotland’s environment
– So required a similar feel to it
– Style Guide provided by Scotland’s environment development team
So over to Stuart…..
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Environmental data management solution
• Information analysis of user groups and stakeholders
of the website and their needs
• Website design to meet the needs
• Development of the future proof IT solution of
environmental data management system
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User groups of the soil website and their needs
The soils of Scotland are an important national resource and the properties and distribution
of different soil types across the country provides essential information to a wide range of
stakeholders
Knowledge
Policy
maker
?
General
public
Information
Soil
scientist
Academic
Farmer
Data
Student
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Environmental
organisations
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Planner
© Ricardo-AEA Ltd
Needs for information from user groups
• Information about soil
– Reports
– Of a location, area
– Relevant resources
– Data in different format:
– What public could be involved
• in tables
– Soil types
• csv,
– Soil physical and chemical properties
• shape files,
– Soil organic matter
• web feature services
– Links to information about soil in rest of
world
– trends, spatial information
– Etc…..
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• Data
• Maps
– Interactive soil maps
– Images
– Web map services
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Needs of data by remote system
– The website is a daughter
website of SEWeb
– The data needs to be
managed locally and
accessible remotely by other
system.
– The service of the data needs
to be standard compliant.
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Stakeholder of the website and their needs
• Data providers
– Enable user to access and use the data in a
scientific manner
• Academic/Educational users
– Carry out the study and publish their
research findings
• Scientific community
– Access the information and identify potential
new data source
• Environmental portal designers(SEWEB)
– Interoperability between the database
component of Scotland’s Soils Website and
SEWEB
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System architecture – hybrid of portal data and distributed
management system
Interactive with SEWeb
via simplified WMS
Store Key
data sets in SS
database
Data from
MSC/SNH/FSC
Scotland’s Soils
Website
Directly access
data from BGS
WSM/WFS
Type 1: User access data via SSDW
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SEWeb
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Air website
3rd Party
provide
datasets by
WMS, or WFS
Type 2: User
access data
from source
website
Water website
AQ data
providers
The data sets in Type 2
can be moved to Type 1
either loaded to the SSDW
database or made it accessible for
SSDW in WMS/WFS in the future
© Ricardo-AEA Ltd
Illustration of the database structure of the Scottish Soil
website and codes lists
Database table
Database
table
user
roles
web map
Role type
web
network content
Function/security
Web
content
User auth
log
NSIS
codes/ soil codes
Data user
Postcode
location
Soil group
Documents
Document category/file type
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Description
Supporting website function
News or report details
Classification of report
Manage news and reports
Control where the report display on the web page
Description
Supporting website function
User account for admin area
User control
User role
type
Set user
with different level of access to admin
Store
navigation
items and structure, metadata
navigation
area
of the page
Store content of each page
Different level of access to admin area
Store
link the navigation item to its content Control
Access
static content
Code lists for NSIS and 1:25,0000 soil map
user access to the admin function
Store
content
of
each
page
content
User log
Monitoring activity
Code
lists for
NSIS
and 1:250,000 soil map User details
Mapping
data
User details
of data
download
of data
download
Postcode
and
spatial
location
Data
search
Soil classification
Content
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System design
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Workflow of data download for data type 1
Simple user register
Confirm the T&S
Download data stored
on SSDD or service
provider
Workflow of data download for data type 2
User view the
signpost
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Divert to 3rd party
data access location
Download data from
the location and local
T&S
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Website front end design
• Structure the website according to most
user’s needs
• The summary information available at top
level, detailed and deeper information
available as links
• User data visualisation whenever it is
possible
• Offer different data access options
http://www.soils-scotland.gov.uk/
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Site launched December 10th 2013
• A larger and more coherent
website
• A more logical and clearer
tab structure
• More internal and external
links
• But we want it to be used
and we welcome feedback
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Potential future developments?
• Additional datasets
– site was designed around three basic types of data: soil maps, point data and
derived data so that additions could be made
• 1:25,000 scale soil maps
• Forestry Commission 1:10,000 scale map
• National Soils Inventory_2 (2007-2009)
• Peat survey data
• BGS urban (Glasgow) and stream sediment data
• Trend data e.g. Countryside Survey or Trends in Pollution in Scottish Soils
(TIPPS)
• Derived data
• Soil leaching potential
• Groundwater vulnerability
• Nitrous oxide emissions from soils
• Metal binding capacity…..
• Contextual information needs periodic review and updating.
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With thanks to:
• Scottish Government for funding
• Steering Group, Editorial Group and User Group for their support
• Colleagues at the James Hutton Institute
• Colleagues at Ricardo-AEA
I hope the website makes you think about land in a
different way and provides the stimulus for you to visit
soils in the field.
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Mr Willie Towers
Macaulay Scientific Consulting Ltd
Dr Xingyu Xiao, Dr Stuart Sneddon
Ricardo-AEA Ltd
T: +44 (0)870 190 6631
E: Xingyu.xiao@ricardo-aea.com, willlie.towers@hutton.ac.uk
W: www.ricardo-aea.com www.hutton.ac.uk
www.ricardo-aea.com
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Back our bid!
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