[OSM-talk] Map Co-ordinates for towns, etc in UK

mick bareman at tpg.com.au
Sat Mar 3 23:54:24 GMT 2012


On Sat, 03 Mar 2012 08:15:00 -0600
"John F. Eldredge" <john at jfeldredge.com> wrote:

> mick <bareman at tpg.com.au> wrote:
> 
> > 
> > My original interest was if there was a specific point that said 'this
> > is Sometown', where distances to adjacent towns were measured from,
> > similar to the Australian convention where the "Zero Point" was set along
> > the roadside, at the Post Office which was usually next door to or
> > across the road from a 'coaching inn'.
> > 
> > This point rarely had anything to do with the geographic centre of
> > town but served only as a survey benchmark.
> > 
> > As Phillip, yourself and a few other people have pointed out these
> > points have little remaining relevance in current times, especially
> > for routing.
> > 
> > The only place where I've found this concept still in use is
> > Queensland Rail's Brisbane suburban network, where the track at
> > stations is marked with the distance to Central Station and the
> > markings are maintained.
> > 
> > mick
> > 
> 
> Here in the USA, highways commonly have signs stating the distance to the next major town.  Are such distance signs no longer used in Australia?
> 
Prior to metric conversion in 1976 Australia used white concrete posts about 1 yard tall with town initials & distances each way as in http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a4/Milestone_Batemans_Bay_NSW_18.JPG/90px-Milestone_Batemans_Bay_NSW_18.JPG

After conversion they were replaced with "International Standard" metal shields on an 8ft metal post every 5KM. With the change they no longer marked the "Zero Point".

mick



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