A Local-State Government Spatial Data Sharing Partnership

Chapter 6 – Results of Partnership Case Studies at Local Government Level
Table 6.2 Largest, smallest and median size of LGAs in survey
State Victoria Queensland Tasmania
N = 43 47 13
Smallest LGA 4200 1500 3000
Largest LGA 128000 400000 26000
Median 27500 10300 9800
The largest local government to respond was Brisbane City Council, which has
approximately 400,000 properties in its local government area. The smallest LGA to
respond was also from Queensland, Nebo Shire Council, which has approximately 1500
properties, but spread over an area of almost 10,000 square kilometres.
ICT Infrastructure Capacity
The Information and Communication Technology (ICT) capacity of LGAs was examined
to identify potential relationships between the size of LGAs and their spatial information
capacity. Given the diversity of LGAs it was initially surprising to find 96% of LGA
respondents rated their ICT infrastructure as adequate or better. The remaining 4%
indicated that their infrastructure was poor, with all of these LGAs located in remote areas
of Queensland (see Figure 6.1). The correlation between LGA size and ICT capacity was
found to be significant (r = 0.315 at 0.01 level of significance).
Percent
60.0%
50.0%
40.0%
30.0%
20.0%
10.0%
0.0%
Excellent
Good
Adequate
ICT Capacity
161
Poor
Figure 6.1 ICT capacity self assessment
A number of local governments in Queensland have limited ICT and GIS capacity due to
their remoteness and lack of accessibility. This is illustrated more clearly in Figure 6.2
which maps Australia using the Accessibility/Remoteness Index. The map shows that
large areas of Queensland have a high accessibility/remoteness index (>5) which indicates
poor access to communication infrastructure and services. The accessibility of ICT to
State
QLD
TAS
VIC