The Improvement Service and Geoxphere have launched a mapping tool that will help Scottish Community Councils and other community interest groups to map what is important to them and to use these insights to have more of a say in what happens in their local area.

Already used widely across the parish communities in England and Wales, the mapping tool has been adapted for Scotland and will be useful in enabling communities to create Local Place Plans, a legislative mechanism to have their views considered for councils’ Local Development Plans.

Community Councils and community interest groups can sign up using the code cms12. This will give them 12 months of free access to the software.

It incorporates many useful and interesting datasets about the environment, pollution, planning, transport and community features, and will also enable anyone to look at how far they can travel from any point in their neighbourhood in 5, 10 or 15 minutes by different modes of transport. This is of interest as the Scottish Government looks to promote the 20-minute neighbourhood.

It could also be useful for community groups to engage with their citizens and highlight specific areas of interest or concern in their local area.

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