[Talk-nz] Making the LINZ NZ Building Outlines available in RapiD

[Timothée Duhamel]

Hi everyone,

I'm an Auckland based OSM contributor (username CoyKoi), and I've been
looking at ways to improve building coverage. Initially I was doing a lot
of my own additions through manual tracing, but I've slowed down on that as
it feels like unnecessary work, knowing that there are high quality
building outline datasets available. Many of you would have been involved
in the previous imports of building outlines, which are in various stages
of completion, and no longer active. For example, much of Auckland was
never completed. I've been following the changes in data and technology
available, and I believe there's an opportunity to begin a new building
outline import.

So I am getting in touch with the NZ-OSM mailing list seeking the
community's support to have the LINZ building outline dataset made
available on RapiD. I have already made a quick query on the Maptime
Oceania slack channel, where I received support. Daniel Silk from LINZ has
been instrumental in working with the RapiD team to have the dataset
preprocessed, ready for inclusion.

Please review the dataset, wiki page and FAQ below and let me know what you
think. I look forward to hearing feedback, discussion and hopefully your
support to proceed with the project.

This is the original* NZ Building Outlines* dataset, on LINZ Data Service:
https://data.linz.govt.nz/layer/101290-nz-building-outlines/
Here is the dataset processed ready for community review, before being
enabled in RapiD:
https://www.arcgis.com/home/webmap/viewer.html?useExisting=1&layers=ef9136b079e24bbfb432be9bbdd246ff

A *wiki page* for this project has been created,  with plenty of
information at
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Import/New_Zealand_Buildings

*What is RapiD?*
RapiD is a special version of the standard iD web editor which offers
suggested features to the user. The user can select the features and choose
to include them in their changeset. Or they can choose to ignore a feature,
for example if they know a building doesn't exist, or would rather draw it
themselves. This means that the data is being added with a high degree of
oversight, compared to other import processes, and users are restricted to
adding only 50 features per changeset. There is also a JOSM plugin
available.

*How does it work?*
I would suggest trying RapiD hands-on, to see how the suggestions work. I
have been testing it in Australia, where they have had Microsoft Buildings
available in RapiD since October. (I would note that the LINZ building
outlines are of higher quality than the Microsoft data available in
Australia)
Try RapiD here: https://mapwith.ai/rapid
Or the JOSM plugin instructions are here:
https://josm.openstreetmap.de/wiki/Help/Plugin/MapWithAI

*Will this undo all my hard work drawing buildings already on OSM?*
*No *- RapiD only suggests features where there is no existing feature
already. Areas that are already well mapped will show very few, if any,
suggestions.

*Is this an import?*
This is not a systematic bulk import like previous LINZ data imports, but
yes essentially this is enabling users to perform small, manual imports.
Having said that, I'm sure that a tasking manager project could be set up
to have a more systematic approach to reviewing and importing the data.

*Any risks?*
The building outlines were generated from imagery up to 8 years old in some
areas, so in those places there will be buildings suggested which have
since been demolished. Correctly identifying and ignoring these features
will depend on users having local knowledge or consulting more recent
imagery when manually adding the buildings. Also there are false-positives
where caravans, shade sails, canopies have been digitised as buildings -
again these could be picked up by the user when manually reviewing the
buildings.
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