LONDON, February 25 /PRNewswire/ --     The vision of a national address database that accurately pinpoints every
property type including land and buildings without postal addresses, is now a
reality as Birmingham City Council became the last Local Authority to sign up
to a process initiated in 1999. Since that time the government's Improvement
and Development Agency, Intelligent Addressing Ltd and Local Government
address managers have been working in partnership to produce a definitive
index of all land parcels and buildings, including those in multiple
occupation, with a nationally Unique Property Reference Number (UPRN).

With Birmingham on board, all councils with a statutory responsibility
for Street Naming and Numbering are now submitting updates to the National
Land and Property Gazetteer (NLPG) central hub. With over 29 million unique
addresses the NLPG is set to take its place as the de facto addressing
standard for England and Wales and through linkage with the National
Gazetteer for Scotland, the Scottish addressing initiative, the whole of
Britain.

The NLPG, defined by BS7666 is rapidly gaining in maturity. In 2007 it
was chosen to underpin the new FiReControl project and is used increasingly
by Police forces as the best source of address information. The constituent
parts, the Local Land and Property Gazetteers (LLPGs), are already deeply
integrated into the systems and processes of Local Authorities. Maintaining a
single address database for referencing everything from Council Tax to
planning applications introduces dramatic efficiencies and opportunities for
joined up government and improved service delivery.

A recent report by CEBR estimated that GBP55 million per annum could be
saved as a result of using gazetteers in those councils responsible for
creating and maintaining them. It is suspected that many hundreds of millions
of pounds more could be saved with the introduction of the NLPG across the
public sector as part of the need to transform the way government interacts
with people and businesses.

"Until recently there wasn't a single definitive list of all the
addresses for the country, meaning that many government and private services
have not been sure if addresses from differing sources refer to the same or
different properties," said Michael Nicholson, Managing Director of
Intelligent Addressing. "There has always been an understanding that the NLPG
could not ultimately succeed unless every authority within England and Wales
was signed up to the process. The success of the initiative is however there
for all to see with new applications and processes coming to light every
day," continued Nicholson.

http://www.intelligent-addressing.co.uk

http://www.nlpg.org.uk