[Talk-GB] The OSM UK map

David Woolley forums at david-woolley.me.uk
Mon Oct 30 12:44:34 UTC 2017


On 30/10/17 12:05, Lester Caine wrote:
> Yep ... fixmystreet is not working with the right authorities and is a
> pain to find the right location anyway. Looking to overlay the website
> location map with the sort of facilities a parish council looks after.
> 

I'm not aware that any of the council alternatives use any more council 
specific mapping, although I know that some councils do have online 
mapping of land maintained at public expense (which I don't think they 
use for their fly tip reporting systems).  (One of the problems with fly 
tip reporting is that the general public doesn't understand that 
councils are not responsible for clearing back alleys and the parts of 
the pavement that are really unfenced private forecourts of shops.  Not 
that you can expect these to be mapped well on OSM, as I've come across 
people who won't allow private alley's to be marked private unless 
explicitly signed or gated.)

(Note "maintained at public expense" is not the same as access=yes.)

FMS does direct reports, according to the category, to the relevant 
level of council (or sometimes both).  That does depend on people 
getting the right category, which they often don't do, but that is a 
consequence of the relatively free format input.

I think one of the other issues that councils have with FMS is the libel 
one, and evidence being tainted by being published.  My council use 
lovecleanstreets but don't allow any of the reports to be public.  They 
definitely make it clear that they don't want evidence in the public 
domain, as it can make prosecutions difficult (e.g. finding independent 
witnesses), and I think they are also concerned about people accusing 
identifiable people of crime, or stereotyping communities.



More information about the Talk-GB mailing list