<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
</head>
<body text="#000000" bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
<p><br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 28/01/2019 21:56, Colin Smale wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:2c6fe82f855f7d3f0b2d9d5e442f7265@xs4all.nl">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<p>On 2019-01-28 22:22, Chris Hill wrote:</p>
<blockquote type="cite" style="padding: 0 0.4em; border-left:
#1010ff 2px solid; margin: 0">
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace">Post town do not exist, and never have. They are a
fiction invented by Royal Mail for their own internal use
which they persuaded the public into using for the sole
benefit of Royal Mail.</div>
</blockquote>
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace">...and for the benefit of anyone posting a letter and
expecting it to get delivered properly...</div>
</blockquote>
RM used to use postal towns when post was sorted by hand, but as
soon as mechanised sorting based on postcodes took over postal towns
were just a legacy that no one needed any more. In 1976 I posted a
batch of postcodes from my holiday in Norway. As an experiment I
addressed one to my parents as Number 10, HU14 3BA, UK. It arrived
on the same day as all the others because it had a postcode on it.
So post towns were beginning to be obsolete in 1976.<br>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:2c6fe82f855f7d3f0b2d9d5e442f7265@xs4all.nl">
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace"> </div>
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace">In the UK places (as opposed to admin areas) don't
have well-defined borders unfortunately. If you live in the
"no-mans land" between two villages there is in many cases no
way of determining if you are in Village A or Village B.</div>
</blockquote>
Why does a postal town help with this? The postcode is much more
precise than a generalised post town that will cover a wide area -
that was the point of a post town.<br>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:2c6fe82f855f7d3f0b2d9d5e442f7265@xs4all.nl">
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace"> </div>
<blockquote type="cite" style="padding: 0 0.4em; border-left:
#1010ff 2px solid; margin: 0">
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace">Addresses are not maintained by RM, local
authorities are responsible for addresses (which obviously
don't include postal towns), except for the postcode. Most LAs
have a system to request a new postcode from RM when a
planning application gets approved that will need a new
postcode.</div>
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace"> </div>
</blockquote>
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace">The LA is certainly responsible for house
names/numbers and street names. Wouldn't all the rest (not just
the post town) be down to RM?</div>
</blockquote>
No the process is that RM only supply the postcode.<br>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:2c6fe82f855f7d3f0b2d9d5e442f7265@xs4all.nl">
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace"> </div>
<blockquote type="cite" style="padding: 0 0.4em; border-left:
#1010ff 2px solid; margin: 0">
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace">I don't see what purpose adding post towns to OSM
would serve. The ONLY people who ever used it were Royal Mail
as they were the only organisation to have a sorting office
there. I'm sure RM don't need OSM to make deliveries, so who
would we be benefiting by including this? To anyone else
looking for an address the postal town is just confusing.</div>
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace"> </div>
</blockquote>
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace">Are you saying is that there is no point in adding
addresses to OSM? Addresses are also useful for the senders of
letters, or users of navigation systems, so I think that might
be a little controversial.<br>
</div>
</blockquote>
Of course not. Addresses are a fine idea, but real addresses that
actually exist on the ground, not some mythical, out-of-date idea
used by one organisation in the past.<br>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:2c6fe82f855f7d3f0b2d9d5e442f7265@xs4all.nl">
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace"><br>
This document gives loads of examples to aid the interpretation
of PAF fields</div>
<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family:
monospace"><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.royalmail.com/sites/default/files/docs/pdf/programmers_guide_edition_7_v5.pdf">https://www.royalmail.com/sites/default/files/docs/pdf/programmers_guide_edition_7_v5.pdf</a></div>
<br>
</blockquote>
The RM PAF is not the definitive address list for the UK, it is just
the way RM sees it. It is widely used because there is no other
published list of addresses. If we ever see a proper national
address list compiled from the UPRN that local authorities maintain
it will not include any field introduced by a company such as post
town. OSM can help here by not confusing addresses with RM's muddled
postal addresses. <br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
cheers
Chris Hill (chillly)</pre>
</body>
</html>