[Talk-GB] addr:place cleanup process

[Brian Prangle]

It always seems impossible until it's done: Nelson Mandela

On Mon, 31 Jan 2022, 21:52 Rob Nickerson, <rob.j.nickerson at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> Just a quick update on the clean up of the addr:place tag as we end the
> month. As it currently stands Taginfo GB is showing that addr:place is used
> 31,187 times, down from 76,479 in late December. Meanwhile addr:suburb has
> increased from 123,372 to 170,770 uses.
>
> As per my email earlier in the month, I do still feel that it is an uphill
> battle to clean up the misuses of addr:place and as such we should use
> addr:substreet when we want to record a child+parentstreet type
> relationship. This is the advice that has gone into the wiki page albeit
> noting that it wasn't unanimously supported. The drop from 76k to 31k was
> relatively easy, but increasingly the clean up process will become one of
> diminishing returns as some 4,500 uses of addr:place only appear in OSM
> less than 100 times. As in, we have only touched the tip of the iceberg of
> the incorrect uses of addr:place so far!
>
> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Addresses_in_the_United_Kingdom
>
> Thank you,
> *Rob*
>
>
> On Fri, 14 Jan 2022 at 19:24, Rob Nickerson <rob.j.nickerson at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> There has not really been any comments on the process steps in JOSM so I
>> don't know if I should proceed or not. I guess I will wait a bit longer as
>> it's only been a day so far.
>>
>> In the meantime, I was thinking about what other approaches we could use
>> to help with this clean up effort. I realised that there is the OS Open
>> Names data set which includes a list of populated places (i.e.
>> settlements). If these values match an addr:place tag then it is a good
>> indication that the addr:place tag is wrong and should be addr:suburb or
>> addr:city instead.
>>
>> I have therefore made a spreadsheet of all the addr:place tag values
>> (downloaded from TagInfo GB) that match an OS Open Names "populatedPlace"
>> value.
>>
>> I've marked a few  rows as fixed in the spreadsheet based on the edits I
>> made to test the JOSM approach. The spreadsheet is open access so feel free
>> to use this tracker. It is sorted by highest to lowest use of the
>> addr:place tag.
>>
>>
>> https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1BGeIyhlL-UODGOVJK543Iy699guc3C6Z0udFE57tYu0/edit?usp=sharing
>>
>> Thanks,
>> *Rob*
>>
>>
>> On Thu, 13 Jan 2022 at 23:51, Rob Nickerson <rob.j.nickerson at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi all,
>>>
>>> As we learnt the other week, the addr:place tag has often been
>>> incorrectly used here in the UK. The tag addr:place is meant to be used
>>> when the address does *not* reference a street (tagged with
>>> addr:street) at all. This is frequently seen in small villages in
>>> continental Europe which often don't have any street names at all.
>>>
>>> In the UK most cases of addr:place and addr:street being used together
>>> are incorrect and are cases where addr:suburb should have been used instead
>>> of addr:place. You can browse the Nominatim QA
>>> <https://nominatim.org/qa/#map=8.06/53.26/-0.64&layer=addr_place_and_street>
>>> to find examples and help clean these up.
>>>
>>> To help with this clean up effort I have tested an approach in JOSM that
>>> some might consider as captured by the Automated Edits code of conduct. I
>>> therefore wanted to share this process before proceeding.
>>>
>>> Step 1:
>>> Identify a potentially incorrect use of the addr:place tag. To do this I
>>> am looking at the list of values used on TagInfo GB and checking if any of
>>> these are villages/towns. If they are then there is a high chance that the
>>> addr:place tag is incorrect.
>>> https://taginfo.openstreetmap.org.uk/keys/addr%3Aplace#values
>>>
>>> Step 2:
>>> Open the data in JOSM using an overpass query. An example query I am
>>> using to download the data is:
>>>
>>> [out:xml][timeout:90];
>>> {{geocodeArea:England}}->.searchArea;
>>> (
>>>   nwr["addr:place"="Eccleston"](area.searchArea);
>>> );
>>> (._;>;);
>>> out meta;
>>>
>>> Step 3:
>>> Inspect the data in JOSM paying particular attention to other addr:*
>>> tags. To do this I start by doing a Ctrl+F and search for e.g.
>>> "addr:place"="Eccleston". This selects all the features with this tag. I
>>> can then see the full range of addr:* tags used on these features. High use
>>> of addr:street reiterates the incorrect use of addr:place. I can also see
>>> if the addr:suburb tag has been used on any features -> if it has then I go
>>> investigate this separately. I also investigate uses of all other addr tags
>>> except housenumber/name, unit, flats and street.
>>>
>>> Step 4
>>> Change addr:place to add:suburb. I get to this stage quicker if step 3
>>> does not identify any conflicting addr:* tags (e.g. if the only other addr
>>> tags are housenumber/name and street). The more addr:* tags there are the
>>> more I look into individual OSM features before making this change.
>>>
>>> As always, if in doubt then I don't proceed.
>>>
>>> How do you feel about this sort of approach? With proper time spent
>>> carefully looking at the other addr tags that have been used, then I
>>> believe it is a low risk edit.
>>>
>>> P.S. Feel free to check out the results of a couple trials I made. e.g.
>>> https://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/116122672#map=14/53.6500/-2.7281
>>> I'll pause on making more as I realise I should get the discussion going
>>> first.
>>>
>>> Thank you,
>>> *Rob*
>>>
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