Sharing our data and expertise

Supported by the Economic and Social Research Council and the University of Glasgow, the Urban Big Data Centre is a dynamic national research hub and data service, championing the use of smart data to inform policymaking and enhance the quality of urban life.

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Transport and mobility

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Housing and property

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Labour market

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Environment

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Access the power of smart data

With a growing selection of both licenced data and freely available open data, you can access the transformative power of smart data through our extensive data catalogue. We can also provide a range of tools to enhance your ability to collect or analyse smart data.

Data Catalogue

Data Services

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News

Keep informed with the latest updates from UBDC.

Urban Big Data Centre celebrates its 10th anniversary

The Urban Big Data Centre (UBDC) celebrated its 10th anniversary on 29 January 2024. Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and the University of Glasgow, UBDC is a dynamic research hub and national data service, championing the use of smart data to inform policymaking and enhance the quality of urban life.

DataCivil’s lead discusses Disaster Risk Reduction

DataCivil’s principal investigator, Philipp Ulbrich participated in a panel discussion for the launch of the Municipal Plan for Disaster Risk Reduction in Niterói, Rio de Janeiro state.

The Glasgow CCTV Object Detection project

The Glasgow CCTV Object Detection platform aims to improve public understanding of mobility and traffic patterns across Glasgow.

Centre of research excellence

From our base at the University of Glasgow, we capture, process and analyse vast amounts of smart data to inform our own research publications and to produce reliable and meaningful outputs on behalf of stakeholders and policymakers.

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Our key milestones

January 2014

UK government announces a £14 million investment in the creation of the Urban Big Data Centre and two other data services, forming part of their Big Data Network. Founding Director is Professor Piyushimita (Vonu) Thakuriah.

September 2014

The official opening of UBDC with guest speaker Sir Alan Wilson, Professor of Urban Regional Systems in the Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis, UCL.

September 2015

We welcome our first students to our new MSc Urban Transport programme.

January 2016

In collaboration with Innovate UK and TravelAI, we develop the CATCH! project (Citizens at the City’s Heart) enabling people to collect and share their own data with local authorities to improve transport planning.

August 2017

UBDC’s partnership with property website Zoopla commences, providing access to data from sales and rentals for the whole of Britain.

April 2018

Professor Nick Bailey takes over as Director of UBDC.

November 2018

‘Shaping Cities through Urban Analytics' conference brings together senior stakeholders from academia, Government, industry and the third sector to celebrate UBDC’s achievements in its first 4 years.

September 2019

We welcome our first students to our new MSc Urban Analytics Programme.

September 2019

UBDC and Glasgow City Council pilot system to make anonymised counts of pedestrians and traffic from the city’s public safety CCTV system

March 2021

UBDC’s partnership with Huq starts, providing academics with access to mobile phone app data with high spatial and temporal resolution.

March 2021

UBDC’s partnership with Adzuna starts, providing access to data on millions of job listings data for the whole UK.

October 2022

The IDEAMAPS participatory data-modelling project secures over $1.5m funding from the Gates Foundation. The project will co-design and develop a participatory data-modelling ecosystem to support local stakeholders and policymakers in lower middle-income countries.

November 2023

The ‘Waterproofing Data’ project, led by Professor João Porto de Albuquerque, wins the prestigious ESRC Celebrating Impact Prize. The project combines citizen-generated data with official sources, to increase community resilience in flood-prone areas.

January 2024

UBDC celebrates its 10th anniversary!

Strategic Partners

Upcoming events

We run a rich and varied calendar of events to providing information on our services, delivering training, and sharing outcomes from our research.

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Global influence and impact

Our shared research and datasets have material impact in the UK and globally. Explore our impact stories for an insight into UBDC's practical reach and influence.

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Masters programmes and PhD opportunities

Our respected Masters programmes in Urban Analytics and Urban Transport will prepare you for fulfilling careers in a wide variety of data-related roles. We also run a substantial PhD programme, supervising students from across the world with interests in diverse applications of urban analytics methods and smart data.

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Sharing our data and expertise