Guardian Cities and Greenspace Information for Greater London CIC (GiGL) have created the first comprehensive map of pseudo-public spaces in the UK capital. We’re looking for your help to make it better

In collaboration with Greenspace Information for Greater London CIC (GiGL), the capital’s environmental records centre, Guardian Cities has identified approximately 50 sites in London that meet our relatively narrow criteria for pseudo-public space: namely outdoor, open and publicly accessible locations that are owned and maintained by private developers or other private companies.

Quick guide Pseudo-public spaces Show Hide What is a pseudo-public space? Pseudo-public spaces are large squares, parks and thoroughfares that appear to be public but are actually owned and controlled by developers and corporations. They are on the rise in London and many other British cities, as local authorities argue they cannot afford to create or maintain such spaces themselves.

What access do members of the public have?

Although they are seemingly accessible to members of the public and have the look and feel of public land, these sites – also known as privately owned public spaces or “Pops” – are not subject to ordinary local authority bylaws but rather governed by restrictions drawn up the landowner and usually enforced by private security companies. What rules govern them? Under existing laws, public access to pseudo-public spaces remains at the discretion of landowners who are allowed to draw up their own rules for “acceptable behaviour” on their sites and alter them at will. They are not obliged to make these rules public.

They include major areas of open land around Paddington Station (encompassing both Merchant Square and Paddington Central), nearly seven acres of open space owned by Arsenal Football Club in Islington, busy shopping and dining plazas in Covent Garden and Victoria, and the pseudo-public area around one of London’s most iconic attractions, the London Eye.

The dataset behind the map has been made public, and can be accessed on the GiGL website. You can see the full list in the table below.

This is the first comprehensive map of pseudo-public spaces in London. Julie Cox, partnership manager at GiGL, says the organisation is keen to hear of any omissions and inconsistencies in the map as it plans to update and expand this dataset in future.

“It’s something we’d definitely like to keep updating as part of the suite of datasets we are responsible for, and ideally something members of the public can contribute to as well,” says Cox. Reach GiGL here or email cities@theguardian.com