[Tagging] Landcover... not again?....!

[Peter Elderson]

I got notice that the latest landcover proposal turned to "inactive".
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/w/index.php?title=Proposed_features/landcover&diff=next&oldid=2124394

Which is correct. But the issue remains!
The landcover key usage count is now 327 995. When I joined, a couple of
years ago, the count was far below 50K
Value percentages: trees 80% grass 10% scrub 3,5%

The idea lives on.

Looking at the proposals, I noticed
1.  that the main incentive for the landcover tags is the use of the
landuse key to tag landcover, while many areas are used for one thing and
at the same time can have different landcovers. And, the same
landcover occurs on or within different  landuse areas.

2. that the proposed values are much more compatible with the natural key,
and in fact already exist there. This according to the now predominant view
that natural= does not say it's nature as opposed to human, but rather
expresses that the element grows or flows by itself, possibly (often)
influenced by humans, but it has a 'life' of its own.

3. the proposers make exceptions for water, sand and scrub, because they do
not think people will ever change those to landcover. I agree.

So my current thinking is:
If such landcovers can exist and be applied massively without problems
within the natural key, then the other proposed landcovers can also exist
in the natural key.

And in fact they already do.

Proposed landcover=sand already exists as natural=sand
Proposed landcover=water already exists as natural=water
Proposed/used landcover=trees is almost equivalent with natural=wood
Proposed/used landcover=grass is almost equivalent with natural=grassland
Proposed/used landcover=scrub is equivalent with natural=scrub

I wouldn't mind support for natural=trees (so natural=wood can be reserved
for the landscape type) and natural=grass (so natural=grassland could be
reserved for the landscape type) but I doubt if that would make any
practical difference.

This would enable taggers to stop using landuse=forest for any small area
with some trees, and landuse=grass for any small patch of grass. Especially
for areas actually having a different landuse, such as military,
industrial, residential.

Peter Elderson
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