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Surface area of Plymouth

This Freedom of Information request asks for the surface area of land in Plymouth for each primary land function.

Request for information - Ref No: FOI221076

Request

Thank you for your email of 8 April 2022, requesting information from Ordnance Survey in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) 2000, as set out in the extract below:

“Within your standard FOI time-frame of 20 working days, please can you provide me via email the most up-to-date surface area in square metres of the land inside the boundaries of the City of Plymouth for each of the primary land functions listed below with all the listed filters applied. The Primary Function categories (reported in square metres of land for each): 'Allotments Or Community Growing Spaces', 'Amenity - Residential Or Business', 'Private Garden', 'Public Park Or Garden' filtered down to just the portion of those land areas with secondary functions of: Null, 'Private Garden', Primary Forms of: Null, 'Open Semi-Natural', 'Multi Surface', and Secondary Forms of: Null.”

Our response

I confirm that Ordnance Survey does hold the information that you have requested, however, we are unable to comply with your request and provide the information, as we consider the information to be exempt from disclosure under section 21 (Information reasonably accessible to the applicant by other means) of the FOIA, as explained below:

The requested information is captured in OS Master Map Topography layer, which is one of our premium products and/or Open Greenspace which is a freely available products. You can obtain the requested information by contacting one of our licenced partners and where appropriate paying the relevant fee; section 21(2)(a) states that information may be regarded as reasonably accessible to the applicant even though it is accessible only on payment.

Under the duty to provide information and assistance in accordance with section 16 of the FOIA, all our Partners and their details are listed on our website on our Find a Business Partner page.

Internal review

Your enquiry has been processed according to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) 2000. If you are unhappy with our response, you may request an internal review with our Internal Review Officer by contacting them, within two months of receipt of our final response to your Freedom of Information (FOI) request, as follows:

Internal Review Officer
Customer Service Centre
Ordnance Survey
Adanac Drive
Southampton
SO16 0AS

Contact us via our FoI form

Please include the reference number above. You may request an internal review where you believe Ordnance Survey has:

  • Failed to respond to your request within the time limits (normally 20 working days)
  • Failed to tell you whether or not we hold the information
  • Failed to provide the information you have requested
  • Failed to explain the reasons for refusing a request
  • Failed to correctly apply an exemption or exception

The Internal Review Officer will not have been involved in the original decision. They will conduct an independent internal review and will inform you of the outcome of the review normally within 20 working days, but exceptionally within 40 working days, in line with the Information Commissioner’s guidance.

The Internal Review Officer will either: uphold the original decision, provide an additional explanation of the exemption/s applied or release further information, if it is considered appropriate to do so.

Appeal to Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO)
If, following the outcome of the internal review you remain unhappy with our response, you may raise an appeal, within three months of receiving our response, with the Information Commissioner’s Office.

Further information can be found on the ICO website (ico.org.uk) under ‘Report a concern’ or you may wish to call the ICO helpline on 0303 123 1113.