[Tagging] Mapping cave tunnels passable by human

[Chris Hoess]

Sent from my iPad

> On Aug 14, 2014, at 7:49 AM, SomeoneElse <lists at mail.atownsend.org.uk> wrote:
> 
>> On 14/08/2014 12:18, Dan S wrote:
>> 2014-08-14 12:01 GMT+01:00 Friedrich Volkmann <bsd at volki.at>:
>>> ...
>>> I am not sure about English terminology. In German, we call natural cavities
>>> "Höhlen" (caves), and artificial cavities "Stollen" (adits?). A straight
>>> "Stollen" with an entrance on each end is a "Tunnel" (tunnel). I think that
>>> the meaning of the English word "tunnel" is just the same as in German. In
>>> that case, tunnels and caves are mutually exclusive.
>> Not in my native opinion, but let's see what other natives think too.
> 
> Sometimes I think that it's a real shame that OSM didn't start in Germany - it'd much easier to be _precise_ about some things.
> 
> The word "adit" is rarely if ever used in common parlance - locally to me (Derbyshire, England) it's usually used to describe mineworking drainage tunnels.  Wikipedia (1) suggests a more general use for horizontal shafts (for e.g. into a drift mine) but I'm not familiar with that usage (and there are many mineworkings very local to me, including one major former drift mine).  It certainly doesn't refer to all artificial cavities.

In my experience (en-US), adits are always associated with mining, almost always with drainage--I think drifts and stopes are the proper terms for other horizontal passages. (Well, stopes can be large and hollowed-out, but I digress.)

While "tunnel" might be used colloquially for anything you can move through underground, I think the commonly used and more correct term for a natural underground corridor is "passage" or "passageway". (e.g., "unusual features can be seen in the passage between the Crystal Room and Room Five".)

-- 
Chris