[talk-au] New to mapping in Perth, WA

[Andrew Gregory]

I originally unintentionally replied directly to Arie, who also  
unintentionally replied directly to me! I must watch those Reply-To's more  
carefully!

For the list, here is my response to his original question, his reponse to  
that, then my reponse to *that*. Whew! :)



I'm fairly new to OSM myself, having discovered it in June. I live NOR and
have been filling in empty parts of the map near to me. In fact, pretty
much all the grey roads you see in the northern suburbs around Joondalup
I've traced in from the Yahoo photos. I'm currently surveying my way
through all that. Last week a did Mullaloo east of Dampier Drive. The week
before was Kallaroo.

I try to get all the street names (of course), plus any phone boxes, post
boxes, schools, bus stops, parks. I take particular interest in walkways
and footpaths that join roads (as opposed to those that run alongside
roads). I don't think there's any other map that shows those and they are
very useful for walkers and bike riders. My own suburb in particular had
already been surveyed (it had all the street names), but no walkways. Not
any more :)

On Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:35:49 +0800, Arie Paap <wildmyron at gmail.com> wrote:

> I'm wondering is it worth adding source:name=survey to the roads I've  
> named. And in general is it worth trying to remedy the lack of source  
> information.

If you've surveyed something, it's always a good idea to document that. It
shows that someone has been there and looked. I don't worry about
unsourced roads, although if I go there and make a GPS track, then I might
tweak the road if necessary and add a source=survey.

> I've read through some pages on the wiki (in particular: Map Features,  
> the Australian tagging guidelines and the Western Australia specific  
> page - which seems very out of date) and I'm struggling to see a clear  
> path. I've also read quite a few threads on this list and the main talk  
> list and it's apparent that there isn't a consensus about consistent  
> tagging, but I would like to know what other people on this list are  
> doing, particularly in WA.

I've been focusing on the Map Features page, and paying less attention to
the Aus/WA pages (but not ignoring them). For areas where there have been
confusion, I've tried to match what other people have mapped before me,
but really there's no way to go wrong. So long as someone can go to where
you've surveyed and agree with what your tags say, then I don't see a
problem. If someone decides all my highway=footway;foot=yes should be
highway=path;foot=yes then there are automatic tools around to make that
change. I just try to be consistent.



Arie later replied to me, clearly intending it to be sent to the list,  
which appears not to have happened:



That does help, I've had a look at some of the suburbs where you've been  
editing and I like the result. I'm mostly collecting data / info while  
driving though so footpaths and bus stops etc can be a bit tricky. Some  
things that I haven't settled on which I'd appreciate comments on (from  
anyone who cares to respond!) are:

1) Tagging roads residential in commercial areas - there doesn't seem to  
be a better option and this is how roads have been tagged in Osbourne Park  
(as an example).

2) Lots of roads that are dual carriage way (like Ocean Reef Road) aren't  
at the moment, but making them dual carriageway is tricky with junctions.

3) Flares at intersection - in particular tagging with name= on all the  
different ways that make up the road looks really messy. Can someone point  
to a good example of this?

4) Tagging roundabouts with name= . I've seen this in quite a few places  
on the map but I'm sure I read advice to not do so somewhere - can't  
remember where. Map Features and the Aus tagging guidelines are  
non-committal on this.

5) Postcodes - I understand this is an ongoing project. As an example, see  
http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=-31.9192&lon=116.1059&zoom=14  
Darlington's postcode shows up, but Mahogony Creek's doesn't even though  
the Administrative boundaries for both suburbs are part of relations  
specifying the postcode.

While writhing this I just discovered  
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Using_JOSM which has some advice  
relating to the above points. Several of the sections on that page don't  
seem specific to JOSM.

I've just surveyed and uploaded roads for the area around the Ocean Reef  
Road extension. I still need to add names and classify roads but I'd  
appreciate comments on other obvious problems.



My reply:



1. IMO highway=residential is the best option. It most closely matches the  
sort of road it is, for Australia anyway. My personal opinion is that  
highway=residential as a tag was a mistake, but I believe there is (or has  
been) considerable controversy about it anyway. Of all the highway  
classifications, it is the only one that appears to be related to a  
quality of the adjacent landuse, rather than a quality of the road itself.  
highway=local (as in, for local traffic only) sounds a whole lot better to  
me. I'm quite certain I don't want to know how hard it would be to make  
that sort of change.

2. I would just examine how someone has done that sort of thing before. I  
would also think about it from a topological point of view, rather than a  
strictly physical point of view. For example, joining roads need to cross  
and join both paths of the dual carriageway. Unless they don't, of course!

3. I would name the turning lanes. There's a phrase for this that you'll  
hear frequently in OSM. "Don't tag for the renderer." IMO, turning lanes  
are part of the road, and share the name. If they look ugly, that's a  
rendering problem that should be fixed by the renderer.

4. Yes, there is conflicting advice here. My view is to name the  
roundabout. Consider a residence with driveway access from the roundabout.  
They won't be on an un-named road! I use my best judgement to use the name  
of the most important road. Watch the path direction as roundabouts  
default to oneway.

5. I don't know how postcodes work. I'm more than happy to leave that sort  
of thing to people who do know. There's plenty of other things to keep me  
busy mapping...

What you've done (assuming that's you at the very east end of Ocean Reef  
Road) looks fine to me.

I do have some comments in relation to mapping that was done before I  
started:

* There are a lot of mini_roundabouts that should be full-blown  
junction=roundabout. In fact, I don't think I've seen anything that would  
qualify as an actual mini_roundabout. I fix those as I come to them.
* When it comes to drawing roundabouts, I draw a diamond/square shape.  
JOSM is easier than Potlatch due to zooming. Afterwards, I use Potlatch to  
tidy that diamond/square into a nice circle.
* There are quite a few highway=living_street tags. I'm not so sure that  
they really do qualify as living streets. Fancy, narrow, brick-paved  
surfaces as found in new stylish subdivisions, are still just  
highway=residential to me.

-- 
Andrew