1. The Parks and Gardens database project
The Parks & Gardens UK (P&GUK) database ("us", "we", or "our") formerly known as Parks and Gardens Data Services Ltd, is hosted by the Hestercombe Gardens Trust (charity number 1060000) on a not-for-profit basis. Parks & Gardens UK was set up to stimulate interest in, and understanding of, historic designed landscapes and green spaces. Our main instruments to achieve this are the database which we maintain and the website which gives access to it.
2. These contract terms
These are the terms on which we allow access to the database (whether or not through the website) and the terms on which we are pleased to accept contributions of data for the database. They are important to protect both the project and our data contributors from misuse of data. In consideration of our allowing access to the database for these purposes we therefore require your express agreement to be bound by these terms. Access to the database is not permitted to any person save following such agreement. In these terms "data" means all data of every kind including words, pictures, graphics and numerical data whether in digital or visible form.
3. Copyright
All data of any kind in the database, on our website or in any other publication of ours are copyright protected and can be used by you only in accordance with these terms. Copyright in much of it is owned by this company. Copyright in the rest belongs to our many data contributors, who licence it to us (see section 8 below) and allow us to licence it on to you as follows.
4. Usage of our data
4.1. You may access, download, reproduce and use the copyright data, as follows but only as follows:
- freely, for any purpose, so long as you are a private individual and you do not re-publish any data to any person or make any commercial use of it
- freely, including for re-publication, so long as only for purposes of not-for-profit education, research or promotion in historic designed landscapes and green spaces
- otherwise, only with our express prior written consent.
4.2. If you re-publish any copyright data as permitted above, you must acknowledge copyright and you must place an absolute ban on further re-publication. Your copyright acknowledgement must state "© parksandgardens.org" or, if our database credits the author or owner of the data by name, "© [name of author/copyright owner]".
4.3. Our permission, as above, to use copyright data does not extend to any person, nor any usage, which breaches these terms. We reserve the right to request reasonable evidence at any time of your use of our materials. We also reserve the right to withdraw consent to any usage or reproduction of data, or to any person using data, at our discretion.
5. Data standards
5.1. We aim only to make data available to users:
- if it is accurate and reliable
- if we have the permission of any owner of copyright in that data
- where the land is privately owned and the data is not public knowledge, only if we have the landowner's permission.
If you believe that we have failed to meet these conditions, in any respect, please let us know at once so that we can put matters right.
5.2. Our database has no official standing for purposes such as planning, statutory designation and the like and, whilst we make data available in good faith, we do not plan to, nor have the resources to, verify independently all data supplied. We therefore give no guarantee that any data is accurate or complete or reliable. If you use our data you must do so at your own risk, and so indemnify us against any loss, damage or liability which may result for us or our data contributors.
6. Data protection laws
6.1. All personal data supplied to us is held in accordance with the Data Protection Act 2018. We do not sell or otherwise transfer personal data to any third parties without consent, or unless permitted by law.
6.2. Our policy is to:
- comply with data protection laws at all times
- hold personal information on our database only to the extent relevant to achieving the purposes of the database (see section 1 above)
- make personal information available for public access on the database only when we have that person's express permission, and
- use it only for the purposes for which we have permission.
If you believe that we are in breach of that policy in any way please let us know at once.
7. Our website
7.1. The website is available at our discretion and we may alter its content, or close it for periods, at our discretion. We do not guarantee its availability.
7.2. We welcome hyperlinks to our website if they promote our objectives (see section 1 above). Please tell us if you hyper-link to the site and please link in terms which make clear to users that they are leaving your site and entering ours. (We reserve the right to block any links which breach that requirement or are unsuitable in our opinion.) Naturally, we do not take responsibility for the content or availability of any sites other than our own.
7.3. Currently users do not have to register or provide any personal information in order to use our website. No personal data is stored by the site, or captured through it, without users' prior knowledge and consent. On occasions we may ask for some personal information to participate in project services. This may include name, title, affiliation, address, telephone number and e-mail address. It may be stored electronically or manually. Any personal information that is provided will be used only for the purpose stated at the time we request it. All personal data supplied is held in accordance with the Data Protection Act 2018. We will not sell or otherwise transfer personal data to any third parties without consent, unless legally obliged.
7.4. Our web servers build logs of activity including a log of users' IP addresses. This is done to gather demographic and other statistical information about user behaviour to measure the popularity and effectiveness of our site. Based on log information, we will occasionally share anonymous aggregate statistics about our web site visitors and traffic with third parties.
7.5. We also use cookies. A cookie is a small file that is stored on your computer when you visit a website. If you visit the website again, the cookie allows us to recognise you as a repeat visitor. The cookie contains no personal data, only a unique number. It cannot be used to identify you on websites of third parties. Your browser can be configured to refuse cookies, or to tell you when a cookie is being used. See your browser's help menu for how to do this.
7.6. We run the usual risks of any website as to possible infection by viruses and the like, and improper use by third parties of data. In contributing data to, or in using the facilities of, our website you recognise those risks, understand that we cannot accept responsibility for them, and agree to indemnify us against any liability we may incur to yourselves in that regard.
8. Data contributors
8.1. Our database is compiled entirely from contributions generously made available by volunteer contributors to all of whom we are profoundly grateful. We welcome all contributions. Please contact us by email to contribute, or write to us.
8.2. Our policy is only to use data which:
- is accurate, fair and not defamatory
- has full copyright consent: please state expressly if any material which you contribute has been created other than by you personally; please state if you have explicit permission from that person, or give that person's contact details so that we can seek permission
- has landowner consent where appropriate (see section 9.1): please state the precise address and, if possible, name of landowner for all data concerning privately owned land; please state if the data is from a publicly available source
8.3. Please tell us if you think this policy has been breached in any respect.
8.4. If you contribute data it is on the express understanding that, in consideration of our evaluating it for possible inclusion in the database, you agree with us as follows as a contractually binding commitment on each part. You licence us to make any use we reasonably choose of that data, whether or not in the form you supplied it, for the project purposes (section 1 above), including by sub-licence as described in section 4.1, for the full term of your copyright in the data. You also undertake to us, as a legally binding obligation, that:
- the data you supply is, in your reasonable opinion, accurate, fair and not defamatory
- you have supplied all information to us as to copyright consent and landowner details requested in section 8.2 above, or have clearly indicated any area of uncertainty as to that information, and
- we can utilise the data as above without breach of any trade mark, copyright, registered design right, database right or the like, of any person, not covered by this licence.
9. Landowners
9.1. Our policy is always to get explicit permission from the landowner before placing any information about a site on our database, unless the site is open to the public or the information is clearly from a publicly available source. Please let us know if you think we are in any way failing in this.
9.2. Our preference, in the interests of the project, is for suitable data to be publicly available on our database. However we recognise that landowners may wish to keep certain data confidential and we encourage that where public availability might create security concerns. Our hope is that landowners will consent to such data being on our database for posterity, but in its private section. Data in the private section will not be accessible by web search at all and will not be disclosed to any person outside our staff without the landowner's written permission at the time.
9.3. Our formal privacy policy is available here.
10. Visiting sites
Many of the landowners who, to support our project, allow information about a site to be available on-line are private individuals owning private property. Their having kindly allowed the data to be public does not mean their gardens are public. Please do not attempt to visit any private site, or photograph it in an intrusive way or from a non-public vantage point, unless you have the owner's express permission to do so. On all sites, including public ones, please respect any applicable rules of access and behave with consideration. Not to do so would harm our work.
11. These terms
11.1. These terms set out our entire agreement with you. You confirm that you have not been induced to agree them by any statement by us, or understanding with us, not expressly stated in these terms
11.2. We may assign the benefit of our agreement with you to any successor body formed for the same principal purposes. Save for that, no right or obligation under these terms can be assigned.
11.3. Our agreement in these terms is for the benefit of us and of any data contributors or landowners who may be harmed by your breach of these terms. It is enforceable against you accordingly
11.4. No delay or forbearance on our part in enforcing any of these terms is to be treated as in any way waiving or compromising our full legal rights.
11.5. Our contractual relations with you on these terms will be governed by English law and any issue about their meaning or enforcement will be referred to the English courts unless it can be resolved consensually.