[Talk-GB] Non-intuitive addresses

[Andrew Hain]

Does the name sign for the street say Boat Lane?

--
Andrew
________________________________
From: Mark Goodge <mark at good-stuff.co.uk>
Sent: 12 February 2022 11:32
To: Talk-GB <talk-gb at openstreetmap.org>
Subject: [Talk-GB] Non-intuitive addresses

With all the discussion of addresses that's going on at the moment, I
thought I'd take a look at some near me. And, in the process, found a
whole set of oddities that are currently mapped incorrectly, but where
there's no obvious way to get the right data other than the fact that I
just happen to know. So, before I go making wholesale changes, I thought
I'd throw it out here for discussion.

Firstly, this way:

https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/28456255

This is currently tagged as name=Abbots Walk. That's objectively wrong,
and can be shown to be wrong from open sources (eg, OS OpenNames and OS
OpenRoads). The reality is that Boat Lane (way 307184331) extends all
the way to the junction with Merstow Green (way 23642664). There is no
street in Evesham named Abbots Walk.

But... the four residential units on that part of Boat Lane have an
address in the form of [1-4] Abbots Walk, not Boat Lane. That's because
[1-4] Boat Lane already existed when that block was constructed, so, to
avoid confusion, the block itself was given the name Abbots Walk and the
units in it numbered accordingly. This is obviously why someone has, in
the past, given the way the wrong name, because they've assumed that the
postal address of the houses reflects the name of the street.

So the first question here is how do we map this? Obviously the way can,
and should, be renamed to Boat Lane. But then, and without tagging for
the render, what's the best way to apply the name "Abbots Walk" to the
block itself?

Also, once the way is renamed, what's the best way to ensure that the
addr:street tags of the individual houses stay as Abbots Walk, and don't
get changed to Boat Lane by some enthusiastic armchair mapper trying to
clean up what he or she perceives to be an error? Would it, maybe, be
better to convert them all to addr:terrace and leave addr:street blank?
Or is this going to create a whole new set of problems?

This is particularly problematic given that I can't point to any open
data source for the actual address. There is a nameplate on the block,
which may help in this respect, but then, how do we prevent people
mistaking this for a street name sign and changing the name of that part
of Boat Lane back to Abbots Walk?

Moving a bit further down Boat Lane, there's a set of houses numbered
from 20 to 32:

https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/306397310
https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/306397332

All of these have an addr:street tag of Boat Lane. But, in this case,
that's wrong. The street is, indeed, Boat Lane, but these houses are
part of the Huxleys Way development and have a postal address of Huxleys
Way. So the addr:street value should be Huxleys Way. The addr:postcode
of these houses is also wrong - they've been mapped as WR11 4BP, which
is Boat Lane, whereas the correct postcode is WR11 4BU, Huxleys Way.

Fixing this is going to be even harder than Abbots Walk, though, because
not only is there no open data source of the address details but in this
case there's no indication on the ground either that these houses are
Huxleys Way rather than Boat Lane. And it doesn't help that the highest
numbered house that really is in Boat Lane is, entirely coincidentally,
number 19. So a lot of people would assume that number 20 is simply the
next house in the Boat Lane sequence, rather than following on from 19
Huxleys Way. I can, of course, put local knowledge as my source in the
changeset, but that's a little vague - I'd rather have something a bit
more authoritative.

Any suggestions on these? What have people done in other situations
where they've had to map non-intuitive addresses?

Mark

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