The EU Member States are making visible progress with regard to their Open Data transformation journey, with many Open Data initiatives as well as portals being launched each year. However in order to ensure such data infrastructures remain relevant over time, a series of aspects should be considered and embedded in the design stages of any Open Data portal. Portals play an essential role in the promotion of Open Data practices across within each country and region, as they represent central points to publish and access datasets. Their development however can be seen as a spill-over of the

Over the years, bicycle touring has been becoming an increasingly popular alternative for tourists who are visiting different cities in Europe. More and more European cities offer bike rental services allowing tourists to discover the city in an environmental-friendly and healthy way. Open Data can provide a further stimulus to the use of bicycles in general and more specifically to bicycle tourism. For instance, the European Data Portal provides 255 search results for "bicycle" and offers a variety of datasets what can be used for the development of applications in this field The Spanish city

The Connecting Europe Facility programme supports a Digital Service Infrastructure on Open Data €4.5 M available in a call for proposals for generating value through the re-use of Public Sector Information. Proposals can be submitted until 19/1/2016. The European Union launched on 30/10/2015 a call for proposals making EU funding available under the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) through grants to improve the interoperability and interconnectivity of the European digital service ecosystem. To further extend the content and facilitate access to and reuse of datasets held and made public by

"Data is the new oil" is a quote for example from Neelie Kroes, former Vice-President of the European Commission responsible for the Digital Agenda, Intel's CEO Brian Krzanich or the Economist. The analogy of data and oil stems from the British mathematician Clive Humby and is based on the fact that both data and oil need a certain amount of effort before their full potential can be leveraged. Oil needs to be refined and data needs to be processed to gain maximum value. Besides this, data and oil do not have much in common. Indeed, data is the basis for the technologies that are increasingly

The European Data Portal (EDP) initiative does research on current topics related to open data and publishes the findings, for example, in form of analytical reports. The analytical report no 11 focuses on the challenges of PSI re-use in the public sector and gives recommendations on how to support and realise successful PSI re-use in the public sector. We thank the research participants, who substantially enriched, challenged and shaped our research and the findings by participating in the interviews and the workshop on PSI re-use in the public sector. Abstract of the analytical report no 11

Introducing the European Data Portal Join us in celebrating three years of open data on the European Data Portal (EDP). Thank you to all open data enthusiast, publishers and re-users for creating impact with open data! Thanks also to our readers and subscribers for following our news, events, articles and reports and for sharing your valuable experiences, insights and opinions with us. The EDP is an initiative launched by the European Commission to harness the potential of open data to drive economic and societal development across Europe and beyond. The portal serves as a gateway to open data

Clean air is crucial for us, however, the significance of it will rise in the future Air is essential for our daily survival - it is more important than food or water for us. As urbanisation processes, more and more people and industries are moving into the cities, which has an impact on urban air quality. Forecasts predict that the world population will increase from seven billion to almost ten million by 2050 of which almost seventy percent will live in cities. This clearly shows the increased importance to focus on air quality in urban areas. Actually, the air quality is already low in many

Digitisation makes cities smart Service orientation becomes more and more important - also for cities. Digital urban solutions are increasingly demanded. Emerging technologies offer new services to cities and its citizens. Smart Cities are no future scenario anymore but describe cities that use innovative technologies to create added value for the population and the economy. The leading Smart City Governments in Europe, for example, London, Helsinki or Barcelona, already excel in implementing digitised solutions to let the city be at the citizens' services. Open Government in Barcelona The

What is data driven journalism? " The goal is to explain the news and tell the stories in the most attractive, accurate and simple way as possible." Jaime Serra, Data Journalist, La Vanguardia. Data journalists are professionals with a sense for news and the ability to write compelling stories using data. Data can be a source of information for data journalists and it can be used to compare, analyse or aggregate information How the digitisation of media led the way to data driven journalism With the course of the digitisation of media, the gatekeeper to information was superseded. Publishing

The mechanisms of value of Open Data operate on multiple levels. Multiple Open Data benefits can be outlined, including transparency, increased government effectiveness and efficiency, increased participation and engagement and the release of social and commercial value through innovation. Regarding the latter, Open Data is increasingly connected to the creation of new products and services, as well as to helping businesses derive new insights and knowledge. Although Open Data innovation takes place in organisations of all sizes and maturity levels, entrepreneurs and start-up businesses are