[Geocoding] Gazetteer usability

[Andy Allan]

2010/7/2 Nicolás Lichtmaier <nico.lichtmaier at gmail.com>:
> Hi! I have set up a local gazetteer instalation. I've downloaded a subset of
> OpenStreetMap: Chicago.
>
> However, the results so far are very disappointint. I've been learning about
> OpenStreet map and found that the coverage for resolving house numbers is
> nearly non-existing! The number of "ways" tagged with addr:interpolation is
> just 14 in all Chicago, and the number of addr:housenumber is 71! Am I doing
> something wrong? Is it posible to expect gazetteer to resolve addresses in
> cities?
>
> Do anyone know other alternatives?

I don't know Chicago specifically, but I would expect there to be very
little addressing data in OpenStreetMap for there. If you start adding
some addressing to OpenStreetMap (say, for your local neighborhood),
then you'll see things start improving. After that, you'll need to get
lots of mappers active across the city to get a good level of
addressing data.

It's not really possible to expect the gazatteer to resolve the
addresses without the information being put into OpenStreetMap, and in
most areas there is fairly patchy coverage.

Cheers,
Andy