All public authorities in Wales have a statutory duty to maintain and enhance biodiversity on their land. Under the terms of Section Six of the Environment (Wales) Act 2016, public sector organisations, including health boards and health trusts, are required to consider their impact on ecosystems and publish a plan explaining what they will do to maintain and enhance biodiversity and promote resilience.

Faced with this responsibility, two hospital groups in Wales, Powys Teaching Health Board and Aneurin Bevan University Health Board, asked Mott MacDonald to survey their estates and provide nature enhancement recommendations. This was a huge undertaking because, across the two organisations, there were 14 separate hospital sites, of different ages and sizes, ranging from vast general hospitals to small mental health facilities.

Mott MacDonald is an established and experienced user of Esri’s ArcGIS technology.  It has a single, global ArcGIS platform, through which it makes advanced geospatial tools and data accessible to all of its global employees. Right from the outset, it was clear that ArcGIS would play a central role in the biodiversity project for Powys Teaching Health Board and Aneurin Bevan University Health Board.

First, Mott MacDonald created base maps for the project with Ordnance Survey MasterMap data. It used ArcGIS Pro and FME software, accessed via the ArcGIS Data Interoperability Suite, to carry out a pre-classification process and assign likely habitat types to each parcel of land, across the 14 sites, according to the UK Habitat Classification System.

These base maps, showing probable habitats, were then used as the foundation data layer in a mobile data collection app, built with ArcGIS Field Maps. Ecologists from Mott MacDonald’s Cardiff office used this solution to survey each of the 14 sites, verifying the habitat types, collecting evidence of species, recording locations for habitat improvements and taking photos. “The pre-classification process proved highly valuable as it meant that ecologists weren’t starting from scratch in the field,” explains Matthew Law, GIS Consultant, Mott MacDonald. “They could edit areas and amend habitat classifications but didn’t have to draw everything, which saved time and improved accuracy.”

Once every site had been surveyed, Mott MacDonald used ArcGIS Pro and FME as part of the process for creating 28 high-quality, map-based plans, two for each site, showing which habitats exist and opportunities for enhancements, such as hedgehog boxes and orchard restoration. The organisation used ArcGIS Pro to set up symbology and layout templates, to ensure consistency across all sites. The plans were then produced as hard copy, full-colour, A3 visuals, providing an attractive and easy-to-understand overview of the full ecology reports.

As an extension to the project, Mott MacDonald created a web map for one of the hospital boards, enabling it to explore its biodiversity data, add more data and make comparisons over time. Created with ArcGIS Online, this web app was made available to the hospital board using Esri’s AEC Project Delivery mechanism, a subscription service that enables professional service companies to share their internal GIS content securely with their clients.

Consistent, accurate survey method
ArcGIS Field Maps provided an effective way for ecologists to collect baseline habitat and biodiversity data in the field, while retaining the accurate geometry of features. At the same time, Mott MacDonald could ensure that the data was recorded in the same way, at every location. “ArcGIS Field Maps enabled us to collect consistent, geographically accurate data,” says Law. “This was especially important in a project of this size, in which we had to collect data in a standardised way across 14 sites.”

Fast, high-quality project delivery
Taking advantage of ArcGIS tools enabled Mott MacDonald to deliver this client project very efficiently and deliver the final reports and visualisations on schedule. In particular, the use of ArcGIS Pro helped to minimise post-survey data cleansing, and processes that could easily have taken days only took a few hours. Anthony Fenn, Head of Technical Services at Powys Teaching Health Board, testified that “The project has been accomplished and delivered on time, on budget and above and beyond the expectations of the project brief.”

Clear visualisations of biodiversity plans
Mott MacDonald was able to take advantage of the sophisticated cartography tools in ArcGIS to present fairly complex plans, incorporating maps, aerial imagery, text boxes and symbology, in a clear and attractive way. The organisation’s GIS team produced 28 plans of 14 sites in under a month, and Lorraine Woolley, Ecology Team Lead at Mott MacDonald, was delighted with the results. “We had a meeting with the clients and they were extremely excited about the plans, which are beautiful, engaging and informative,” she related.

Effective management of biodiversity improvements
The ArcGIS Online web app, developed for Powys Teaching Health Board, provides a platform that this client can use to manage biodiversity enhancements effectively. It can view, analyse and update the baseline biodiversity data collected by Mott MacDonald’s ecologists and explore the recommendations in the reports and plans in more detail. The health board can also add more information over time, to build up a record of how it is meeting the statutory regulations and achieving biodiversity improvement.