[Tagging] amenity=kennel

Alberto albertoferraris at fastwebnet.it
Fri Sep 14 02:12:48 BST 2012


Ok, because according to English native speakers there isn't a single word
that indicates "a facility where animals are kept and the staff feeds them
and cares of them", I propose to change from "amenity=kennel" to
"amenity=animal_shelter".
In Italy there are centers for dogs only, cats  only, dogs and cats, wild
animals in general, wild sea animals only, wild birds only and so on. Any
combination is potentially allowed, so adding a tag "dog=yes", "cat=yes",
"wild_animals=yes", "wild_birds=yes" and so on is useful.

"pet_keeping" is not used according to taginfo and it is too restrictive:
there are facilities that don't held pets but wild animals.

"building=asylum" is not intuitive and it's not used according to taginfo.
Moreover the key "building" is too restrictive for a center that can include
buildings, meadows, courtyards.

"Amenity=animal_boarding" is too restrictive: there are kennels that take
stray dogs, catteries for stray cats, rescue centers for wounded wild
animals.

On the other hand "amenity=animal_shelter" is intuitive and already in use
according to taginfo. Also "animal=shelter" is already in use: in the wiki
animal page it's suggested to use it, but on what basis? There isn't any
proposal page and it hasn't been voted.
Ultimately I think we have to unify "amenity=animal_shelter" and
"animal=shelter" in one tag, refine and officialize it. I think that with a
feature page and with a preset in editors, one of these could become an
universally used tag.
Then we can refine it and add one or more additional tags for the purpose of
the facility.
I prefer "amenity=animal_shelter" to "animal=shelter" because according to
wiki "amenities are an assortment of community facilities" and an animal
shelter is one of them.
On the other hand the key "animal" is not defined on the wiki and according
to taginfo it's often used to indicate a species of animal or simply
"animal=yes".
We have already "amenity=veterinary" and not "animal=veterinary", so why not
"amenity=animal_shelter"?
Alberto




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