Tag: open data

ULEZ is a successful policy intervention.

May 1, 2024 / Benjamin Welby / 2 Comments

This entry is part 3 of 5 in the series ULEZ

So, we arrive at Judgement Day for Sadiq Khan’s time as Mayor of London. And we’re being asked to judge him solely on whether we think the Ultra-Low Emissions Zone (ULEZ) is a successful policy intervention or not. His Conservative opponent, Susan Hall, certainly doesn’t think so and has promised to scrap the expanded ULEZ on her first day in office.

I’ve written before about how the Conservative party has weaponised ULEZ instead of seriously thinking about how government and Mayor can work together to achieve the intent behind this policy. Obviously that’s not going to happen but it’s still disappointing to have seen the Mayoral election reduced to a referendum on ULEZ.

Having crunched the data before it is only right to see whether we can gauge the success of ULEZ in terms of its impact on car ownership in London. Fortunately the Department for Transport have published an updated version of the veh9901 dataset (here’s the dataset I used for this post, captured in the Web Archive) that takes us through to September 2023.

And having looked at the data (which includes an 8 month lag don’t forget) it’s such a pity that we spend so much time listening to people having to defend or attack ULEZ rather than recognising ULEZ as a successful policy intervention because its achievements are significant, to the extent that I’m doubting my sums.

The Uxbridge by-election shouldn’t have been about ULEZ expansion

July 22, 2023 / Benjamin Welby / 2 Comments

This entry is part 2 of 5 in the series ULEZ

Last September I got hold of some data from DfT about the potential impact of the Ultra-Low Emissions Zone (ULEZ) expansion. My view was that a lot of the angst towards the policy was overstated with a broadly similar proportion of Outer London drivers being affected as those Inner London households who have been living with ULEZ for many years.

In world of grown up governance the government and the Mayor of London would work together and ULEZ (or something like it) would be part of a wider strategic policy to tackle environmental and health related damage as well as encouraging adoption of less polluting vehicles. We don’t live in a world of grown up governance so the government has decided to weaponise ULEZ rather than to come up with a more positive set of policies. Is it perfect? Obviously not. Is it better than keeping the status quo? Probably. Could we see a more grown up approach to governing in the future? Hopefully.

ULEZ expansion. Who will be affected?

September 26, 2022 / Benjamin Welby / 4 Comments

This entry is part 1 of 5 in the series ULEZ

The Mayor of London’s plan to extend London’s Ultra-Low Emissions Zone (ULEZ) to Outer London is causing great consternation but having looked at the criteria by which vehicles will be charged it seemed to me like the objections are over stating the real impact. Especially after I discovered that our 19 year old Ford Focus will be exempt.

So I wanted to try and understand the impact these proposals would have on car owners in London. To do that I needed to be able to:

count vehicles registered to households according to their London Borough
categorise them according to their fuel
group them according to the year they were registered

I Love #LocalGovCamp

July 15, 2012 / Benjamin Welby / 13 Comments

Yesterday I was at 2012’s LocalGovCamp at Maple House, Birmingham.

I started the day on the wrong foot – way too near the start of introductions line. Even though I knew it was coming I couldn’t marshall my thoughts into giving my single word about why I was there. All I could think of was Nick’s (@psfnick) profane suggestion from the previous night.

The words I should have chosen

Relapse. I didn’t go to UKGovCamp because I’d begun to feel like a fraud. As much as I’d contributed beyond my job title in Hull my roles had never gone hand in glove with unconference conversations. So I’d go along and hear great things, maybe contribute an opinion or two of my own but then return to work and be unable to execute anything. When the next event rolled round I wouldn’t have anything to share, or any progress to report.

There is something recharging about being exposed to a collection of brilliant minds with a blank canvas invited to share and think and plan and do but as much as sectoral camaraderie is a great thing there’s little point if it ends up as talking and not doing. And that’s all my contribution felt like.

Hull’s open data future

May 22, 2012 / Benjamin Welby / 3 Comments

This entry is part 6 of 6 in the series Open data: magic from the inside out?

I recently wrote a series on Open Data. In those posts I mentioned Adam Jennison and the work he has been doing. He’s written up the talk he gave to the Hull Digital Developer Group and added in his hopes for what he thinks could be possible if Hull City Council and the digital talent in the city invest in working together. So, over to Adam.

‘Geek meet and greet’

Underneath the Bridge by Vaidas M

I attend the regular geek meets run by Hull Digital as often as I can, not only to be able to geek out without the usual look of disdain but also to see how people on the ‘outside’ are working, how they are managing and what they see as the future..

Did I not mention that I am on what the media portray as the ‘darkside’? I am a public sector worker.. and worse than that I am a back office public sector worker, I work in ICT supporting front office workers… Yes I know I am lower than a snakes belly etc.. but hear me out for I feel, nay I believe that we can do good and also help local businesses lead the way.

Open data: magic from the inside out

April 27, 2012 / Benjamin Welby / 1 Comment

This entry is part 5 of 6 in the series Open data: magic from the inside out?

Over the last week I’ve been thinking about my experience of seeing an understanding of open data emerge within Hull City Council. Having considered ‘open data’ in part 1; the need to start internally in part 2; the importance of magicians in part 3 and recent developments in Hull in part 4 this concluding post hopes to tie those threads together.

The quantity of data which we have within local government is vast. In Adam’s pitch to the developers of Hull he mentions 150-300 disparate systems within our council, most of which will produce some kind of metrics. Whilst we all want an approach to open data which means the public sector is more transparent and active citizens are able to access that data the National Audit Office has said that attempts so far have been expensive, and haven’t engaged. Continue reading

Open data: winning?

April 27, 2012 / Benjamin Welby / 0 Comments

This entry is part 4 of 6 in the series Open data: magic from the inside out?

This is part 4 in a series thinking about whether the magic of open data in local government might be found from the inside out. Part 1 considered the phrase ‘open data’ and pointed to thoughts elsewhere; part 2 suggested we prioritise internal data over external engagement; part 3 spoke of the need for magicians and now in part 4 I’d like to share why I’ve said those things

Winning?

In order for the engagement around data to be meaningful we need an internal appreciation for that to be understood as more than the Tax Payers’ Alliance rifling through our accounts. It might have taken some time but it seems that within Hull City Council we’ve hit a tipping point and for us open spending data has been the catalyst. Continue reading

Open data: of illusions and conjuring tricks

April 26, 2012 / Benjamin Welby / 2 Comments

This entry is part 3 of 6 in the series Open data: magic from the inside out?

This is part 3 in a series thinking about whether the magic of open data in local government might be found from the inside out. In part 1, I considered the phrase ‘open data’ and pointed to thoughts elsewhere and part 2 suggested we needed to start from inside our organisations. In today’s third part I’m thinking about those who make magic.

Of illusions and conjuring tricks

In the last post I said that thinking about open data needed to start with how it improves what we do within our organisations because then we might understand it, recognise the value people might add to it and therefore properly champion the concept of ‘open data’.

It’s all very well saying that but if the narrative about exposing public data is difficult then an internal conversation which talks about what data could do for us is perhaps going to be thwarted before it gets off the ground anyway.

Part of the issue is that without concrete examples conversations can tend far too often towards the technicalities. The most helpful conversations aren’t comparing SOAP and RESTful APIs or talking about integration, nor will they bring up open standards or this protocol or that data format with the layman. Phil Jewitt recently wrote a couple of blog posts (1, 2) about how those beyond the project team didn’t need to know about SCRUM they just needed to know what was necessary. The most helpful conversations have at their heart somebody enthusiastically committed to sharing the secret of what’s possible.

Arthur C Clarke’s third law of prediction says that

“any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic” Continue reading

Open data: Square One

April 25, 2012 / Benjamin Welby / 3 Comments

This entry is part 2 of 6 in the series Open data: magic from the inside out?

In Part 1 of this series, I considered the phrase ‘open data’ and pointed to thoughts elsewhere about whether it’s an unhelpful phrase, how communities are engaged to use it and how the government approach has been judged thus far. Today, I’m wondering about Square One.

Square One

It is great that the focus around ‘open data’ may be shifting away from simply getting us compliant and pushing data out to instead think about how engagement can be structured around its use. It’s also brilliant to see twitter buzzing about Saturday’s National Hack The Government Day which wouldn’t have been possible without the data that is there already.

I have no doubt at all that the public sector as a whole is sitting on a goldmine of information that can help make democracy flow and services perform better. But I think there’s a danger of being excited about the cart to the forgetting of its horses.

Open data: concepts

April 24, 2012 / Benjamin Welby / 4 Comments

This entry is part 1 of 6 in the series Open data: magic from the inside out?

redkid absolut data by Libertic, from Flickr

My time at Hull City Council has coincided with an emerging Open Data movement leading calls for greater transparency in the public sector. That has raised questions for my organisation and led to a lot of circular conversations. Recently things have started to change in a way that has got me thinking that perhaps the magic of open data is found from the inside out. Hopefully this series of posts will explain what I mean.

‘Open Data’

In some circles these two little words ‘open’ and ‘data’ have prompted much debate and discussion. Touted as making the public sector more accountable. Seen as an opportunity that excites because of tools it might make possible. But in other circles it’s an alien subject and a phrase that can be a little bit obtuse to those outside the choir.

Yes it is a phrase that means everything to the data evangelist but perhaps, as Graham suggests, it’s actually an idea that needs to die?
Continue reading

The words I should have chosen

‘Geek meet and greet’

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