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Technical History 2017‐

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Polly Hudson edited this page Jul 10, 2024 · 3 revisions

PAGE EDITOR: Polly Hudson

The Colouring Cities Research Programmes' code base has been managed by The Alan Turing Institute, the UK's National Institute for Data Science and AI, since 2020. The CCRP's GitHub site and core code repository was originally set up in 2017 at the Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis at University College London for the Colouring London (now Colouring Britain) prototype. The concept of free online building attribute platforms, mapping data by polygon per building,able to bring together comprehensive spatial data on the characteristics, performance and historical evolution of the stock, to support urban sustainability, and do this through multisector knowledge sharing, was first designed and tested at The Building Exploratory charitable trust, London in 1998.

Colouring London's original technical architecture, GitHub repositories and open licences for data and code, were set up by Tom Russell at CASA (2017-19). These addressed content and operational briefs and strategic goals produced by Polly Hudson as part EPSRC funded doctoral research (2014-19- see also CCRP Manual).

  • Colouring London's back-end was initially designed to perform four main technical functions to meet the brief for a free platform able to use restricted OSMM polygons to capture and visualise building attribute data. These were as follows:
  • storing OSMM footprints and source metadata;
  • rendering map tiles from collected data to allow data to be visualised on the platform (in a way that did not compromise Crown copyright restrictions on OSMM geometry or footprint coordinate release);
  • permitting crowdsourcing and public editing of building-attribute data; and facilitating access to open data downloads.

tom2. Image produced by Tom Russell 2017

In 2020 Colouring London's development moved to The Alan Turing Institute where the international Colouring Cities Research Programme was set up. The first forking of code was carried out in 2019 for Colouring Beirut, by the American University of Beirut, and followed in 2020 by collaborations with Bahrain, and Australia. Between 2018 and 2020 significant contributions to the codebase were made by Maciek Ziakowski Between 2021 and 2022, technical work on Colouring London CCRP core code was overseen by Turing's Research Engineering Group (REG) and the code base for a new core colouring repository platform and for Colouring Britain roll out developed. During 2022 Tom Russell, by then based at the ECI, University of Oxford, set up the CCRP's first international RSE meetings as part of a Software Sustainability Institute fellowship. Work also began on Colouring Indonesia. The prototype initial tested bulk uploads of data and cfrowdsourcing approaches. Between 2022 and 2023 50,000 lines of code were written by Mateusz Konieczny for the 'Planning' section to test streaming and visualisation of planning data using APIs as part of a collaboration between the Turing and Loughborough University and the Greater London Authority (winning the 2024 RTPI Excellence in Digital Planning Award).

In January 2023 work was completed at the Turing on the new core colouring GitHub repository. This now allows for co-working on core code across countries- as well as discussions on country specific code-, and for improved synching between international platforms with work beginning work on Colouring Sweden and from the summer Colouring Canada. The new core repository is already resulting in rapid progress with the code base being made. Pooling of knowledge and time also helps maximise efficiency and platform quality and help reduce platform engineering costs for all partners. In addition it allows for the organic development of an ever expanding, friendly, collaborative expert technical group through which engineering advice and experience of the project can freely shared between both existing CCRP partners and new engineers coming on board.

Since 2023 integration of data generated using computational approaches has been increasingly tested - including use of computer vision to extract data from historical maps and aerial imagery, and large-scale inference of one building attribute for another, or others. In 2024 long awaited work on the Showcase/Impact Studies section was begun by Mike Simpson. Concordia University restarted the international RSE group running structured monthly meetings. The technical manual was begun in 2020 as a page on the CCRP Manual. It was created into a manual in its own right in 2024 able to be easily contributed by the CCRP RSE Group in 2024.

Milestones

  • 1998 Colouring London's first iteration as a GIS platform accessed via a local authority intranet, was tested at The Building Exploratory Charitable Trust Hackney. This used OS footprints, satellite imagery, streetview images, and address search and zoom facilities and hdata on performance, characteristics and dynamics. The Exploratory also developed other free tools to engage diverse disciplines and sectors in knowledge sharing relating to the building stock. Age data maps of the London borough of Hackney were also produced by hand.

  • 2010 Sample typology and age data were collected by Polly Hudson and Louis Jobst using OS historical maps, in collaboration with Camden local Authority, London, to explore their value in retrofit targetting

  • 2014 Colouring London design and consultation begins at The Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis, UCL- for free online mapping platform for London providing spatial building attribute data at building level. Age data for 20,000 buildings are manually collected using GIS.

  • 2016 Milestone agreement with UK national mapping agency (Ordnance Survey) to allow Colouring London to use building footprints to visualise age data, and capture and collate age and other types of building attribute data for the first time

  • 2017-19 Development of technical architecture by Tom Russell and launch of Colouring London platform at The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, London, in 2019, as part of UCL's Centenary celebrations

  • 2019 First international reproduction of code by the American University of Beirut

  • 2020 Move to The Alan Turing Institute where the Colouring Cities Research Programme is set up

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