[Talk-us] Tagging National Forests

[Charlotte Wolter]

Folks,

         This whole discussion going back more than a year ago has
been dominated by very European concepts of what is a forest.
I live in the dry, high western United States, where forests are
very different from those in Europe (not leafy!) but are no less
forests. How would you tag the pinon-juniper forests all over the
Southwest, where no trees are taller than 15 feet? Or the chapparal
of Southern California or the Jashua Tree stands of the
California desert or the Great Sage Plain with sage 10 feet tall?
         And, Christoph, the forests are divided into subunits because
that's how they are administered and because many national forests
are made up of physically separate subunits. They can be as much as
100 miles apart. For example, the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest
has five such units. If you want information or a permit, you have to
go to the local subunit. So, no, they should not be combined into one
multipolygon, because, in reality, they are not a single multipolygon.
         So, while mapping principles are important, so are the physical,
natural and administrative realities of a place.

Charlotte


At 08:14 AM 8/17/2015, you wrote:
>On Monday 17 August 2015, Martijn van Exel wrote:
> > I removed the landuse=forest from the national forest relations in
> > Utah:
>http://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/33392465.
>
>To find further occurances you can use:
>http://overpass-turbo.eu/s/aZs
>You will also see there that many national forests are mapped as
>multiple separate areas each with tags and the same name - like
>http://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/2658152 
>http://www.openstreetmap.org/way/30268500 
>http://www.openstreetmap.org/way/30268493
>It would be a good idea to consolidate those into one multipolygon
>relation so someone searching for a national forest, for example,
>will find the whole forest and not only the largest subarea.
>
> > The map will look very white :( but at least it's not wrong anymore.
>It will also encourage mapping of actual forested areas as well as
>other vegetation and natural features.
>
>-- Christoph Hormann
><http://www.imagico.de>http://www.imagico.de
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>
>

Charlotte Wolter
927 18th Street Suite A
Santa Monica, California
90403
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