[Hidden-tech] Open Streetmaps, and Hidden Tech

[Jim Chevalier]

This might actually a fairly big issue, if I'm understanding you
correctly...
I've been working with Open Street Map data quite a bit while building
CityStrides <http://citystrides.com>, and I've found that there are a lot
of cities that aren't officially/usefully present yet.

For example, Springfield MA is present in a useful way in Open Street Map:
http://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/details.php?place_id=158858662

But on the other hand, Glastonbury CT is not present in any usable way:
http://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/details.php?place_id=533197

The key difference between the two is that Springfield's 'type'
classification is "Type: boundary:administrative". This means that its
boundary has been traced out, and has been categorized at the (hopefully)
correct admin level
<http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Nominatim/Development_overview#Country_to_street_level>
.

When a city is properly present in Open Street Map as an Administrative
type with a Relation ID, *so much more* can be done with it. In my case,
it's the difference between being able to programmatically collect a city's
streets vs having to manually trace out the city borders in a site like
http://extract.bbbike.org/. Effectively: having access to data (that's
present!) or not having access to it.

Unfortunately, the answer to 'How can I create an OSM Relation Area if it
doesn't exist?
<https://help.openstreetmap.org/questions/30758/how-can-i-create-an-osm-relation-area-if-it-doesnt-exist>'
is typically "don't". So, I don't know if/how this can be corrected.

-Jim


On Thu, Oct 9, 2014 at 10:40 PM, Town Websites <townwebsites at gmail.com>
wrote:

>
>
>
>
> Ack, pfft.   I guess it is just an issue of ajax search not kicking in
> without being prompted at least for Hidden Tech towns in MA.  Still maybe a
> modest project enhancement but not needing a collaboration, sorry for the
> bandwidth –
>
>
>
> Charlie
>
>
>
> *From:* Town Websites [mailto:townwebsites at gmail.com]
> *Sent:* Thursday, October 09, 2014 10:35 PM
> *To:* 'Hidden Tech'
> *Subject:* Open Streetmaps, and Hidden Tech
>
>
>
> I notice that Open Streetmaps as conveyed through the popular free Droid
> apps doesn’t know that most of the smaller towns in Hidden Techlandia
> exist.  I suspect this is probably a global problem for small towns but one
> would imagine there would be a solution, and some Hidden Techies might care
> enough to help facilitate getting it incorporated into the popular open
> source data and applications.  Anyone else care enough to fill in with what
> they know and what they’d like to consider collaborating on?  Either on
> list or private email fine.  I’m pretty well occupied but might find time
> for an interesting collaboration.
>
>
>
> Charlie
>
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