‘Woods for People’ is an ongoing partnership funded by the Woodland Trust
with support from the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation, the
Forestry Commission
(across GB) and the
Environment and Heritage Service (Northern Ireland) to create
and maintain a UK-wide 'provisional' dataset of accessible woodland.
The partnership appointed
Environment Systems
to undertake this work whose efforts in tracking down data we gratefully
acknowledge.
As a result of the information gathered on accessible woodland the
Woodland Trust has undertaken a major analysis of woodland access
provision and deficit across the UK. This analysis,
Space for People, is
available for free download from this website.
The Woods for People data is gathered from a wide variety of sources
including local authorities, NGOs, statutory agencies, woodland
management companies and private landowners.
Then, using the National Inventory of Woodland and Trees (NIWT)
in Great Britain and the Woodland Vector data in Northern Ireland we
have been able to see where this woodland is situated relative to all
other inaccessible woodland. We can also calculate the proportion of all
woodland that is accessible (results).
Note to contributors
There is already a high level of interest in the Woods for People data.
Use of GIS data follows the guidelines that “data should not be used for
purposes other than which it was originally collected”. Data will not
therefore be made available to third party organisations where its use
is not specifically associated with improving access to woodland. No
contact data, whatsoever, will be passed to third parties. Therefore, as
a by-product of the research the data will be available to organisations
who;
- submitted data to the project, and
- requested the same data returned in either an industry standard GIS
or other industry standard digital format
- have a professional and bona fide interest in woodland access
Data is likely to be of particular interest to statutory agencies,
local authorities, and organisations that submitted data in a paper
format, and are now able to access the same data in a digital map
format, or spreadsheet format, with grid references.
Have you got additional data that would help the project?
If you have information on woods that are open for public access, and your organisation is not on the list of those from which we have received
data, we would be delighted to hear from
you. The Woods for People dataset is
'provisional' - it always will be - as the extent of woodland access
will change. We know there is more information out there.
We have now begun the process of collating Version 4, which we hope will
contain even more information on accessible woodland. The data will be
updated annually to capture any new information sent in. If your
organisation is not listed in the list of
contributors, and you do own or
manage woodland that is permissively open to the public, please take this
opportunity to send your information to us. We do not mind what form you
send it, whether photocopies map, leaflet or as a digital GIS file.
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