Data

New Zealand offers a treasure of high-quality open-source geospatial on a wide array of topics, all available via Land Information New Zealand (LINZ).

Examples of databases available are property ownership, topography data, hydrographic data, nautical data, bathymetric data, geodetic data, elevation data, aerial photography, and base maps. Currently, LINZ is working via the National Elevation Programme to establish full Lidar coverage of the country.

In addition to LINZ, other parties also publish open-source data about the country. The geological survey, GNS Science, hosts a wide array of data on natural resources, natural hazards, and geology, while land cover data is maintained by Land Care New Zealand via the LIRIS Portal. In the socio-economic domain, Statistics New Zealand hosts census data down to the neighborhood level, while property valuation and sales data are maintained by a private company called Yellow.

Coordinate Reference Systems

Since New Zealand is tectonically highly active, the country's landmass moves by 5cm per year on average, raising the need for timely updated coordinate reference systems. New Zealand lies in UTM zones 58-60, with most of the South-Island in zone 59, while most of the North Island lies in zone 60. The top most-used CRS's are New Zealand Transverse Mercator 2000 (NZTM 2000), New Zealand Continental Shelf Lambert Conformal 2000 (NZCS 2000), and New Zealand Vertical Datum 2016 (NZVD2016). More details and recommendations about coordinate reference systems can be found in this blog post by LINZ.

This tag can include questions related to:

• Sourcing Data for New Zealand
• Projections & Datums Specific to New Zealand
• Workarounds for geospatial statutory requirements in New Zealand (With GPS, exact locations etc).