[Talk-us-massachusetts] Why Barnstable is such a mess, and other MADness (Wayne Emerson, Jr.)
Wayne Emerson, Jr.
ibemerson at verizon.net
Mon May 6 14:33:48 UTC 2019
On 5/5/2019 7:52 PM, Greg Troxel wrote:
> "Wayne Emerson, Jr. via Talk-us-massachusetts"
> <talk-us-massachusetts at openstreetmap.org> writes:
>
>> be snipped out and incorporated into the OSM map. In reading over the
>> MassGIS descriptions I believe it said that in that in these 11
>> communities a valid address would need to include the name of the
>> "Community"
The document I had previously linked:
https://www.mass.gov/files/documents/2018/12/03/Municipal_Address_Standard.pdf
on page 27 has the info I was referencing above:
4.3.1.
"A community name, as defined in 3.5, is a required component of
every address. There are 193 different Elm Streets in Massachusetts
- obviously, you need to know which Elm Street is meant. This is the
purpose of the zip code, place name, or what we refer to in this
standard as the community name. Most people don't realize how
frequently a geographically incorrect community name is used,
because postal place names are often the same as, and are confused
with, community names. Or postal names may not be the same as
community names at all. The key point is that postal place names and
associated zip codes aren???t officially mapped and don't refer to
fixed geographic areas. In fact, zip codes may be updated to reflect
changes in how the USPS delivers mail. Community boundaries are
authoritative and much more stable - which is why we use those
rather than postal place names to determine which "Elm Street" we
are referring to. Figure 8 illustrates the kinds of confusion
between postal place name and community name that we are trying to
avoid."
Of course the fact that postal place names will exists side-by-side with
MSAG community names will only add to the confusion. In these 11
communities the postal borders don???t line up with the e-911 borders so
your postal address could be Centerville while your 911 address is
Hyannis. Will a 90 year old widow having a heart attack be able to keep
that straight while calling 911? Other place names like Cummaquid or
Hyannisport don???t exist in the MAD.
So it seems that we have 3 overlapping addressing concepts of
place-names: Historical village names; postal place names; and e-911
(MSAG) communities. As Bill Ricker wrote it seems the post office
ignores the village name and goes by the zip code. We could map the zip
code boundaries in these towns
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:boundary%3Dpostal_code
http://download.massgis.digital.mass.gov/shapefiles/state/zipcodes_nt.zip
Then we could leave the addr:postcode and addr:city fields blank on each
individual building and let each application derive postal addresses
from the zip code boundary.
Regardless of how we format the addresses of our letters, The
cities/towns of Barnstable and Boston, etc., have legally defined
borders that should be admin level 8. These e-911 address-groups are a
new thing. They also have officially defined borders:
http://download.massgis.digital.mass.gov/shapefiles/state/msagcomm.zip
Some data consumers are going to need to know these borders.
There is a lot of OSM nomenclature that aggravates Americans, but the
wiki at
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:addr#For_countries_using_hamlet.2C_subdistrict.2C_district.2C_province.2C_state
next to addr:suburb says: *"If an address exists several times in a
city. You have to add the name of the settlement."*
They are using the Australian definition of suburb which they map to
admin level 9 or 10
I???m not sure how a lot of this works, but if the borders of these e-911
address-communities were mapped in OSM as admin 9 borders, would this
obviate the need to enter the addr:suburb on each house? So if an
application wants a postal address it pulls data from postal boundary,
and if an application wants an e-911 address it pulls from admin 9 boundary?
Otherwise, it seems that according to the wiki at
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:addr:suburb we have to put
addr:suburb on both the duplicately-addressed buildings as well the
duplicate streets. So it sounds like not every building in the village
needs the addr:suburb, just the duplicates? Hard to tell as it seems the
wiki article was written by a non-English speaking person.
We may not like the terminology used in OSM but what other choice do we
have? I don???t like tagging duplexes as building=semi but if that is the
standard then that is what I do, begrudgingly. Simply making an admin 9
boundary would be agnostic as to whether it???s called a suburb or a
village. It would be up to an application to assign the border type name.
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/United_States_admin_level
says Massachusetts uses Admin 9&10; for wards & precincts. But I don???t
see these in actual use in the OSM map. These borders change every 10
years. The address communities are usually physically larger than wards
& precincts. So if they were mapped as admin 9, wards & precincts could
be admin 10, if some future sadists find the stomach to map them.
In thinking of how to handle this, it might be better to focus on how
this will work in Boston, which already has the boundary=neighborhood 's
mapped out. These are not admin boundaries. But I think this would be
more of an aesthetic concern as to how it would look if a map rendered
both of these borders together.
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:boundary%3Dadministrative
*"Note that in some cases borders may overlap without making it an
incorrect tagging."* So a border for Devens shouldn???t be a problem?
-Wayne
On 5/5/2019 7:52 PM, Greg Troxel wrote:
> "Wayne Emerson, Jr. via Talk-us-massachusetts"
> <talk-us-massachusetts at openstreetmap.org> writes:
>
>> be snipped out and incorporated into the OSM map. In reading over the
>> MassGIS descriptions I believe it said that in that in these 11
>> communities a valid address would need to include the name of the
>> "Community"
> Do you read this as:
>
> in these places, the thing that goes where people expect town name is,
> is one of these community names
>
> or
>
> in these places, addresses include the community name and the actual
> town name
>
> WHich is the difference between
>
> option 1:
>
> 123 Main Street
> Hyannis, MA
>
> and
>
> option 2:
>
> 123 Main Street
> Hyannis, Barnstable, MA
>
> In my experience, option 1 is how it is written and option 2 seems
> seriously bizarre.
>
> Part of why I say that is that I think if you asked 100 Mass residents
> "Is Hyannis a town or city, like Belmont or Framingham", almost all of
> them would say yes. I think it is really not understood that it is
> named sub-town of Barnstable, and that in terms of addressing and
> navigation, nobody has any idea that it is like that, and everything
> works because the addresses are written exactly as if it were a real
> town.
>
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