[Talk-GB] Authorities, boundaries and admin-levels

[Peter Childs]

2009/6/13 Peter Miller <peter.miller at itoworld.com>:
>
> On 13 Jun 2009, at 09:30, Peter Childs wrote:
>
> 2009/6/11 Ed Loach <ed at loach.me.uk>:
>
> And here is the current OSM guidance:-
>
> http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:admin_level#admin_level
>
> In order to tie in with NUTS and with guidance for other
>
> countries
>
> within OSM we might want to do the following for England
>
> (Scotland
>
> and Wales would be similar but would skip some levels):-
>
> UK (admin_level=2)
>
> England/Wales/Scotland (admin_level=4)
>
> English regions (North East, East of England etc) (also
>
> admin_level=4
>
> as per NUTS)
>
> Ceremonial counties - where they exist (admin_level= 5)
>
> County Councils/Unitary Authorities (admin-level=6)
>
> Districts  (admin-level=8)  districts / London boroughs /
>
> metropolitan
>
> boroughs.
>
>
> Whats the simplest way of adding a boundary? I notice that Medway does
> not have one, I know ruthley where it should be, but have no idea of
> how to go about adding the relevant relation/way. I'm fine adding
> Roads and smaller stuff but the boundary stuff just throws me.
>
> It is better to use a relation for the boundary rather than way tags which
> used to be the only way to do it. Add the appropriate existing ways
> (rivers/roads etc) to a new relation. You may need to split roads/rivers
> where the boundary diverges. For some sections of the boundary you will need
> to add new ways (where it goes across fields). I just add a
> 'note=administrative boundary' tag to those ways.
> The only source of data we can legally use for the boundary to by knowledge
> is the NPE maps base which shows boundaries as a dotted line if you are
> lucky and if they have not moved in the past 50 years. I also check
> wikipedia as a cross check

Given that Medway is less than 50 years old that could be a problem.....

> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:EnglandMedway.png) and then the official
> council website to see if there is general agreement on the shape and
> extent.
> It isn't perfect - to be perfect our democratic government will need to
> persuade the OS to give its citizens the boundaries by which it is governed.
> Until now lets do the best we can and when people say they are wrong we will
> ask them to provide the information to correct it!
> Btw, OSM and the UK Boundaries project got a mention on the Guardians data
> blog yesterday.
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2009/jun/11/opensourc
>