[Talk-GB] place=village/town/city

[Colin Smale]

We are never going to get worldwide consensus on this, so let's stop trying. Just focusing on the UK situation, as has been mentioned many times before, there are multiple definitions of these terms, all equally correct within their own contexts. there is the legal definition, the people's definition, and the definition based on population. If we use population for place=*, how do we get the rendering to correspond to expectations? We will need additional tags I think.


On 12 February 2016 14:52:13 CET, Andy Townsend <ajt1047 at gmail.com> wrote:
>On 12/02/2016 13:15, Colin Smale wrote:
>>
>> According to Wikipedia, ...
>>
>
>... I wouldn't assume that what wikipedia says has any particular 
>relevance with respect to how something is mapped in OSM.  The language
>
>used in the English wikipedia is a mix of American and English (and 
>other) usages, and how things are mapped in OSM doesn't always match 
>"common [British] English usage".
>
>> it is country-dependent.
>>
>
>That, however, is entirely correct.  The Irish, for example have a very
>
>clear idea of what their "cities" are.  It's less clear on this side of
>
>the Irish Sea.
>
>> In the UK of course it is a matter of status to be called a City, and
>
>> there is an unambiguous list of cities. 
>
>That's the legal definition, not the OSM one.  Perhaps you are 
>unfamiliar with the previous discussion, but this has been done to
>death 
>before.  See these threads among others:
>
>https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/talk-gb/2014-February/thread.html#15867
>
>https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/talk-gb/2014-April/thread.html#15982
>
>and particularly this post:
>
>https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/talk-gb/2014-April/015983.html
>
>which makes it clear why using the "legal city definition" might not 
>make sense in OSM _across the board_.  It might in some places (it's 
>essentially what the Irish do, I believe), but I'd argue it doesn't
>here 
>because of e.g. St David's (see below) and Telford, which despite its 
>size doesn't really feel like a city to me - although if someone more 
>local says I'm wrong, I'll believe them.
>
>
>> This list can only be changed by the Crown through parliament. The 
>> smallest city is St Davids in Wales, with a population of 1841 (2011 
>> figure). Any attempt to retag it in OSM to place=village will
>probably 
>> be reverted within 0.1 nanoseconds.... 
>
>I'd be interested to see the history of St David's.  The current node
>
>http://osm.mapki.com/history/node.php?id=3712052604
>
>was only created in August 2015; I wonder what it was before?
>
>
>> .... but it is a point of civic pride for the inhabitants as the 
>> council becomes a Town Council ...
>>
>
>A number of places _call_ themselves a town council, because they can. 
>
>It's pretty irrelevant to status in OSM.  See Jerry's post above (from 
>that for example I'd call Bingham a town and Keyworth not because
>that's 
>what they feel like to me).
>
>What doesn't work with city/town/village classification is someone 
>diving in and making lots of changes without explaining why; what does 
>is a bit of discussion first so that we know that yes, there are still 
>different opinions on this and that of the various options XYZ tagging 
>has the least oponents.
>
>Cheers,
>
>Andy
>
>
>
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