Hi, nearly all boundaries in Athens, Greece, suddenly disappeared from the Mapnik map layer. It seems that the new method for rendering administrative boundaries seem to have forgotten relation-based boundaries.

What is the fate for the relation-based boundary standard as opposed to tag-based boundaries?

A lot of OSM-related things are in my head, so I should put them here in case anyone wants to help:

1. Roll out route_master relations to London bus routes (Routes 21, 30 and 277 are starter conversions, for instructions see osm.wiki/Bus_routes_in_London).
2. If the Central London Cycling Grid (CLG) gets introduced, then it’s bye bye to the LCN for the area where the CLG will run… once the signs are up (source: http://www.tfl.gov.uk/roadusers/cycling/29172.aspx).
3. Is the UK eligible for Humanitarian OSM Team attention given the recent events?
4. Make my local area the densest in the world.

I recently removed a node in De Beauvoir Town that advertised a flat payable with bitcoins and litecoins. I did a search on Google about the tag and it seems that there may be an overall problem about the use of the tag. Then someone mentioned about people adding their businesses just so that they show up in a website called CoinMap.

To reiterate, the OSM policy regarding places of interests is that we map what we see, or have something that we can verify: that node did not have a shopfront or any visible advert, or a reliable listing as far as I can tell, hence ineligible for inclusion for now.

What is the current status on the issue?

Thanks.

Reference: https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/talk/2013-December/068740.html

Update: I have since been able to verify the location as part of a another, and improvements were made: the problem that rose suspicions was it was initially poorly named and poorly located, however, I have struggled to verify a marketing business near Finsbury Park.

This is a follow-up to my post from 21 December 2012

Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jaggers/10591173574 (Flickr)

London, the birthplace of OpenStreetMap, is already the largest city in the world to have lots of street light data. When I accepted the contributor terms a year ago today, it didn’t have much.

This is the state of street lights, one year on – probably worthy of a mention on the weekly summary, but how do I get older snapshots of the OSM maps so I can compare it?

Happy Diwali everyone.

You may have noticed a major scandal involving the United States surveillance of telephone records and internet servers.

May the OpenStreetMap Foundation please reassure all users over the situation. I understand that all of our servers are in the UK as far as I know, and I assume that the OSMF does not knowingly give out details to the PRISM programme.

You might also want to entice UK users to help US users speak out as well. Bilateral relations aren’t always politics.

Thanks.

Summary

Amaroussi is working around the clock to resolve Greece’s road classification nightmare.

OpenStreetMap users and editors may be aware that I am trying to solve a major issue regarding road numbers and classification in Greece, following my visit to the country last year. Additionally, I have discovered a very old government document regarding the classification of Greece’s Provincial Roads.

The problem

At present, many of the National and Provincial roads are unnumbered, and I have been trying to introduce numbers based on interpolation and the 1963 list of national roads. As an interim measure, secondary roads had refs based on their destinations, whereas the Leonidos-Sparta road had ref=Leo-Spa (in Greek).

Last weekend I stumbled upon SkyscraperCity’s forum topic on Greek highways and it appears that the road numbering system is very patchy.

Firstly, According to user ea1969, new numbers were added without proper consideration for the growing motorway network. Motorways then completely replaced National Roads without considering prohibited traffic.

Secondly, there is a provincial road numbering system and there is a pilot of the scheme at Alexandras Avenue since this morning using ref=EΠ8, based on the position it appeared for the entry regarding Attica’s provincial roads. The problem is that it dates from 1956. Yes, 1956 - it has not been updated since.

This means that there going to be roads between towns and strategic municipality-maintained roads without the recently-discovered EΠ numbers, which makes the situation complex.

The solution (?)

The objective of OpenStreetMap is to be as useful to cyclists and pedestrians as much as motorists. In the UK, we know very well that road numbers are very useful and I hope to make it useful to our Greek users as well.

… See full entry

I plan to tweak the Mapnik code in the middle-term to see how I can make the map visually better.

I am nearly reaching six months with OpenStreetMap. In over 1,250 changesets, I have:

1. Introduced street light and sidewalk data to London
2. Added the London Congestion Charge
3. Rebuilt junctions such as the one at Bricklayers Arms
4. Restored missing roads in Greece and repaired the “refs” that give them the road numbers.
5. Improved London bus routes such as Route 38

While we have different styles of editing, it has come to my attention that some of such data are mysteriously disappearing, not because of a very short-lived error with ITO’s maps, but some users are confused about how to do certain tasks. Our editors have put a herculean effort to get this far, and my fear is that some good-faith edits may be confused for malicious editing, and it still happens occasionally.

Issue 1: No explanation

Firstly, please provide an explanation for every changeset if you are replacing or deleting data, otherwise other users may mistaken the changeset for malicious editing. Malicious editing still occurs occasionally, and I have recently reported one.

Issue 2: “Too much data!”

Next, some users have been deleting or curtailing attributes from ways because they think that there is too much data. On OpenStreetMap, however, there is no such thing as too much attributes (practically). Therefore, please do not delete attributes unless you are certain that they are obvious vandalism, completely unused (e.g. an untagged way with no visual purpose), out of date (e.g. bus stop relocated), clearly illogical (speed limits on a footpath) or erroneous (e.g. I recently dealt with a building that was accidentally uploaded over 9,000 times larger than its original size). Again, please provide an explanation for every changeset.

Issue 3: Modifying ways for relation routing

… See full entry

After over 1,000 changesets, I have begun using JOSM - one of my first uses for this program is to correctly order all the bus and railway routes. That would please the OSM Inspector, which reports that many of the London routes are not ordered correctly…

Hold on a minute, that data hasn’t been updated since 27 February 2013. What is going on?

Two things: just before the April Fools’ Day time runs out (UK time) I’d like to inform OSM that the Foundation plans to expand to Mars, allowing users to create the first ever Free Wiki World map for Mars.

Secondly, and on a more serious note: the congestion charge zone is done. Now it is time for me to do the clean-up of the rejected prototypes.

Right, I’m outta here, ta!

In the 8 years of OpenStreetMap, it is extraordinary that London’s Congestion Charging zone has not been properly mapped. Some road navigation systems are now using OpenStreetMap - the absence of the Congestion Charging zone on OSM means that some drivers are accidentally driving into the zone without being aware of the £10-a-day cost.

To bridge the gap, I am gradually adding “toll=yes” to affected roads as an interim measure, but in the long term we will need a dedicated standard tag to indicate the Congestion Charge zone because the Congestion Charge does not apply to pedestrians, cyclists, taxis, TfL buses and motorcyclists. I feel that a dedicated tag is necessary because I note that there are similar schemes in the world, including Milan, Singapore, Stockholm and Durham.

Contributors are invited to [discuss the future of mapping the Congestion Charge] (osm.wiki/London_Congestion_Charge) on OpenStreetMap. I think that OpenStreetMap is no longer a map just for cyclists and pedestrians, but for just about everyone.

Farewell to the Bricklayers Arms Subway - South Subway by myself on Flickr

… See full entry

Surely this area can’t be part of the N17 postcode area: it’s N7 instead! Additionally, searching for N1 doesn’t return a postcode centroid for N1.

What is causing all the problems?

Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jaggers/8293753440 (Flickr)

We are 100% certain that today is NOT the end of the world: certainly not when 99% of all trunk roads within the M25 now have lighting data. To make it even better, the Southall and Mildmay areas have a lot more detail than when I first joined OpenStreetMap in late-October.

Here are a summary of improvements:

London

99% of the trunk roads and motorways within the M25 London have street light data. The next phase of this project is to extend such data to 99% of primary, secondary and tertiary roads. These roads are all-purpose, meaning that cyclists and pedestrians will use it.

Southall

… See full entry

Streetlights affect how you plan a safe road journey at night - another thing Google Maps cannot do. Recently, Transport for London has removed the lights from the Hammersmith Flyover (A4) and parts of the Westway (A40), and this means that drivers need to take extra care at night.

Mapping the streetlights on London’s roads is one of OpenStreetMap’s aims, and recently I have added relevant data for many London roads, including the A4 and the aforementioned sections that TfL have removed the streetlights.

Did you know that you can drive from London to Newbury using only roads with streetlights? You obviously cannot use the M4 (unlit between Junctions 8/9-10 and 12-13), but the A4 instead (except for the detour to avoid the Hammersmith flyover).

Addendum: I should also point out that you can also drive to Southend using only roads with streetlights, by following the A13.

Addendum II: I should also also point out that most of my data came from driving trips over the last two years, as well as recent public transport trips within the M25. I respect the privacy of the drivers given the current problems with cyber-bullying on the internet, but thanks.

Hello cartographers, I would like to introduce myself as a mapper for the Canonbury and Mildmay Park area in North London. OpenStreetMap Users who visit this area often will notice that I have either added or improved many new features in the area because I live around there.

Key improvements include more bus routes, gates and pedestrian paths: for example, it is possible to walk from Mildmay Avenue to Mildmay Park without using Balls Pond Road.

Remember, making OpenStreetMap better than Google maps in terms of quality is dependent on contributions from local people like you. Therefore, if you know a lot about your local area, please join in: Phyllis Pearsall did not use the GPS when she created the original A-Z.