  We have obtained Johnson V and Gunn i photometry for a large number of Local
Group galaxies using the Isaac Newton Telescope Wide Field Camera (INT WFC).
The majority of these galaxies are members of the M31 subgroup and the
observations are deep enough to study the top few magnitudes of the red giant
branch in each system. We previously measured the location of the tip of the
red giant branch (TRGB) for Andromeda I, Andromeda II and M33 to within
systematic uncertainties of typically < 0.05 mags (McConnachie et al. 2004). As
the TRGB acts as a standard candle in old, metal poor stellar populations, we
were able to derive distances to each of these galaxies. Here we derive TRGB
distances to the giant spiral galaxy M31 and 13 additional dwarf galaxies -
NGC205, NGC185, NGC147, Pegasus, WLM, LGS3, Cetus, Aquarius, AndIII, AndV,
AndVI, AndVII and the newly discovered dwarf spheroidal AndIX. The observations
for each of the dwarf galaxies were intentionally taken in photometric
conditions. In addition to the distances, we also self-consistently derive the
median metallicity of each system from the colour of their red giant branches.
This allows us to take into account the small metallicity variation of the
absolute I magnitude of the TRGB. The homogeneous nature of our data and the
identical analysis applied to each of the 17 Local Group galaxies ensures that
these estimates form a reliable set of distance and metallicity determinations
that are ideal for comparative studies of Local Group galaxy properties.
