BuitenBuurt helps residents make the neighbourhood more sustainable

Homerus Street

“Why and how can we provide residents of a neighbourhood with access to (validated and actionable) information about their home and local area?”. This question was central to the Land Registry’s innovation challenge at the end of 2019. The Datalap initiative run by the municipality of Apeldoorn took part in this challenge. Datalap’s web application, BuitenBuurt, won, and that is how the project began.

Because an app like that is all well and good, but does it actually work for a neighbourhood? The residents of Homerusstraat were given the chance to find out. The Homerus Energiek initiative was set up in Homerusstraat. The residents are keen to make their homes and their neighbourhood more sustainable. As a result, there was a great deal of enthusiasm in the neighbourhood to take part in this project.

Web application

The BuitenBuurt web application provides local residents with insights into various aspects. These include, for example, air quality, temperature and humidity, as well as energy consumption. A team from the Land Registry developed a dashboard to visualise the data. The residents of the street decided for themselves what the application’s dashboard should look like. In this way, they worked together to create an overview of the neighbourhood based on data.

What next?

The dashboard for Homerusstraat has been finalised since the beginning of July. Everyone involved is keen to take the BuitenBuurt initiative further, on a larger scale. BuitenBuurt offers many opportunities for a neighbourhood. For example, it can be a way for local residents to connect with one another more. Local residents can feel a shared sense of responsibility for their neighbourhood and be more willing to get involved. Furthermore, BuitenBuurt demonstrates that data need not be abstract or complex. With the right tools, data can help provide insight into the local area.