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SeaZone Hydrospatial

Introduction

SeaZone Hydrospatial was launched in November 2005 as the first true digital marine geographic information product. Much of the data is re-engineered from data captured by UKHO (United Kingdom Hydrographic Office) from paper charts for the production of ENCs (Electronic Navigational Charts). However this has been enriched with new data sets, such as information about wrecks and the digital seafloor elevation data. The product will continue to grow in both detail and in the wealth of content types. Further information on Hydrospatial Data and how to use it is available to registered users within the service.

Content and Scale

The data is split into 7 Topic Layers:

  • Bathymetry & Elevation (BE): Contains data which describe the natural shape of the Earth's surface on land and under the sea, this includes depth and height contours, and digital elevation models.
  • Natural & Physical Features (NP): Contains information including seabed, water column and coastal landforms, biota, habitats, fish spawning and nursery areas and current streams, rocks. Some human impacts are included such as dams, canals & dykes.
  • Structures & Obstructions (SO): Contains features ranging from wind turbines and pipelines to those of a more general socio-economic purpose e.g. buoyage. Wrecks, obstructions and offshore installations are included in this layer.
  • Socio-Economic & Marine Use (SE): Contains largely non-physical human boundaries defining areas or zones such as military areas, oil and gas or wind farm licence areas, navigation zones, dredging areas, fishing areas and national boundary limits.
  • Conservation & Environment (CE): These are boundaries including SSSI, SAC, archaeological sites, shellfish beds and monitoring and assessment points.
  • Climate & Oceanography (CO): Contains data relating to climate, weather and tides. This varies from locations where measurement and monitoring is or has been known to occur to predicted tidal currents.
  • Metafeatures & Cartography (MC): Contains data which relates to the metadata and other miscellaneous features. These are often cartographic i.e. have no real-world feature to represent for example, compass rose.

The seven Topic Layers and sometimes individual Feature Types have been collected at various scales. The Topic Layers comprise a combination of scale independent source data and best or largest scale charted data available.

Data Format

Hydrospatial data is supplied as either ESRI Shapefiles of MapInfo TAB files for ease of use in GIS software. Gridded Bathymetry data is supplied as either ESRI Grids, ASCII grids (.asc) or MapInfo Grids (.mig). Style files are also supplied for use in ESRI software and font files are also provided for both ESRI and MapInfo software to display the data correctly.

Coordinate System

SeaZone Hydrospatial is supplied as standard in WGS84. Help can be provided on how to project the data with Ordnance Survey Data.