[Talk-GB] Traditional Counties and Vice Counties

Tue Jan 12 10:09:51 UTC 2021

I think so too, and it is now, but during the Avon years I'm not sure 
what the situation was


On 12/01/2021 10:03, Nick Whitelegg wrote:
> I thought Bristol was in the "City and County of Bristol" before Avon 
> existed? Not saying I'm right, I just thought this was the case.
>
> Nick
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> *From:* Chris Hodges <chris at c-hodges.co.uk>
> *Sent:* 11 January 2021 12:09
> *To:* talk-gb at openstreetmap.org <talk-gb at openstreetmap.org>
> *Subject:* Re: [Talk-GB] Traditional Counties and Vice Counties
> The problem is each application uses a subtly (or not so subtly)
> different set.
>
>
> While it would be nice to have the boundaries in the data, it would be a
> huge effort to get them in bearing in mind the need to cross reference
> the boundaries that were in force when each use was set up.  And that's
> on top of the complexity of how to represent the data, without too many
> duplicates: is the birding county of Avon exactly  the same as the old
> postal county of Avon? Probably not because postal counties were odd.
> Then there's the cricketing county of Gloucestershire, with the ground
> in Bristol - which was in Gloucestershire when the club was founded,
> before Avon existed.
>
>
>
> On 11/01/2021 11:31, Andrew Black wrote:
> >
> > On 11/01/2021 00:33, Robert Skedgell via Talk-GB wrote:
> >> Another example of a niche use of traditional counties is sport. For
> >> athletics purposes. I was born in Sutton Coldfield, West Midlands and
> >> live in Stratford, London, but can compete in county championships in
> >> Warwickshire or Essex.
> >
> > I think there are loads of similar instances.  I have just joined the
> > ramblers (just before LD3!). The Bromley branch is in Kent not  London.
> >
> > I think there are a number of issues in different parts of country
> >
> > 1. "Middle aged counties" like Avon and Cleveland that have gone but
> > the old regime has not  quite been reinstated.
> >
> > 2. Areas in london that were never part of the London postal district
> > but are now in greater london,  I have given up arguing that Bromley
> > is not in Kent.
> >
> > 3. Possibly similar  issues in metropolitan counties in W midlands, G
> > Manchester, former yorkshire....
> >
> > Not sure there is any easy answer to this.  I recall a discussion
> > about it during August a few years back (remember reading it whilst on
> > holiday!). Can't remember the details
> >
> >
> >
> >> On 08/01/2021 10:59, Chris Hodges wrote:
> >>> Traditional counties (for some value of "traditional", that's not the
> >>> same as ceremonial) are still used for some niche purposes. This is
> >>> particularly obvious to me living in Avon, which is neither 
> current nor
> >>> ceremonial.
> >>>
> >>> One example is wildlife records - here's the British Trust for
> >>> Ornithology's list of counties:
> >>>
> >>> 
> https://www.bto.org/our-science/projects/birdtrack/bird-recording/county-bird-recorders 
>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Whether, and how, we should map these is tricky.  I'm not sure anyone
> >>> else has. I had hoped to find a bird records county map to 
> demonstrate,
> >>> but failed to do so
> >>>
> >>> Chris
> >>>
> >>> On 08/01/2021 10:34, Andy Townsend wrote:
> >>>> On 08/01/2021 09:00, Mark Goodge wrote:
> >>>>> Secondly, there's no such thing as "the" traditional county
> >>>>> boundaries anyway. They were fluid, and subject to change. The
> >>>>> Victorians, in particular, were inveterate tinkerers with local
> >>>>> government and were forever tweaking the boundaries, a little here
> >>>>> and a little there. So any traditional county boundary data can only
> >>>>> ever be a snapshot of what the boundaries were at any particular
> >>>>> point in time. And there's no consensus about which is the most
> >>>>> "correct" snapshot to use. Even the Historic Counties Trust, which
> >>>>> aims to promote awareness of the traditional counties, offers
> >>>>> boundary data in different definitions. We can't possibly 
> include all
> >>>>> of them in OSM, but picking just one of them means making an
> >>>>> editorial view as to the most appropriate snapshot. In the 
> absence of
> >>>>> an agreed traditional county standard for OSM, leaving it up to
> >>>>> individual mappers will inevitably result in inconsistencies.
> >>>>>
> >>>> I think (and I'm guessing a bit here) that the "traditional" ones
> >>>> partly in OSM are the immediately-pre-1974 ones.  Modelling the
> >>>> pre-1974 changes sounds like something best done in 
> OpenHistoricalMap,
> >>>> and to be honest sounds like a nice lockdown project for someone
> >>>> interested in such things.
> >>>>
> >>>> I can also see where you're coming from about whether the traditional
> >>>> ones should be in OSM at all.  In some cases the boundary is
> >>>> signposted (the "traditional East Riding" at Stamford Bridge in
> >>>> Yorkshire certainly is), and in many cases boundaries will follow
> >>>> natural features that haven't moved, but in some cases (e.g. Crayke,
> >>>> formerly a Durham Exclave until some early Victorian tinkering, 
> now in
> >>>> Yorkshire, 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bettss-Crayke-map.png 
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bettss-Crayke-map.png> )
> >>>> I don't think they do.
> >>>>
> >>>> Best Regards,
> >>>>
> >>>> Andy
> >>>>
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