Re: [Talk-us] armchair mappers putting errors back into the map

[Nick Bolten]

Absolutely! I may have miscommunicated.

I want the exact same thing: for it to be easier to tag "missing"
infrastructure.

I'm just remembering my many attempts to evaluate sidewalk network
completeness (that's highway=footway objects), and it's not easy. But I
don't want to launch another discussion about pedestrian tagging standard!
I'm just saying that having a dedicated way or point that says, "this thing
does not exist here" can be useful, but there are no current standards for
doing so that I'm aware of.

It's subtle: sidewalk=no/none on a road says, "this road does not have
sidewalks", whereas a dedicated way for a sidewalk (footway=sidewalk) that
said, "this sidewalk does not exist" displaces the expected location of a
sidewalk. The latter has its own (big) issues, but I think the problem is
worth exploring. For the sidewalk case: how can we related metadata of one
thing (in this case, a street) to another (a sidewalk) help mappers create
consistent and accurate data? For the nonexistent street case: how can we
specify that this piece of infrastructure does *not* exist when there is no
metadata from which to guess (as we had in the case of sidewalks) and the
current appropriate schema is, "this is a blank area of the map with no
data".

On Sun, Mar 3, 2019 at 11:22 AM Andy Townsend  wrote:

> On 03/03/2019 18:43, Nick Bolten wrote:
> > As I mentioned, I'm aware of hacks regarding sidewalks
>
> I wouldn't describe sidewalk=none as a hack - speaking as someone who
> walks a lot, any verifiable tag that says "you're allowed to, but you
> probably don't want to walk down this road" is really useful.
>
> Best Regards,
>
> Andy
>
> PS: I'm not trying to make any point about how to map the presence of
> sidewalks here (we don't need to dredge that up again) I'm just saying
> that mapping the absence of them is useful too.
>
>
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Re: [Talk-us] armchair mappers putting errors back into the map

[Nick Bolten]

> Also for me - in my opinion it is not a hack, it is a well working
solution.

I want to use this exact info to figure out which areas need more mapping
of sidewalks - and I plan to do so eventually. But it's not easy!

Here's a friendly and annoying challenge: tell me which sidewalks need to
be mapped (because they are separate geometries, I mean highway=footway,
footway=sidewalk) in Graz, Austria. We will ignore thinking about stale
road way information. Use any tools you'd like! Graz is very well-mapped
and was chosen to be, theoretically, one of the easier places from which to
ask this question.

As an example, I've written up the overpass queries to get the appropriate
street ways, but now we have to find the separate geometries - that's no
fun for anyone, and especially not non-experts trying to find things to
map. This will pop up any time a feature requires a separate geometry but
its presence/absence would be expected by context. Another example is
street crossings: sometimes it's illegal or dangerous to cross a street
somewhere, but there's no tag for creating a crossing way that shouldn't be
used (and the idea of drawing nonexistent things ostensibly violates best
practices in tagging). How do we know a street crossing doesn't exist /
should not exist vs. someone forgot to map it? It'd be nice to have a
strategy for "I reviewed this area and the thing you think should exist at
this exact place, does not".

On Sun, Mar 3, 2019 at 11:33 AM Mateusz Konieczny 
wrote:

>
>
>
> Mar 3, 2019, 8:20 PM by ajt1...@gmail.com:
>
> On 03/03/2019 18:43, Nick Bolten wrote:
>
> As I mentioned, I'm aware of hacks regarding sidewalks
>
>
> I wouldn't describe sidewalk=none as a hack - speaking as someone who
> walks a lot, any verifiable tag that says "you're allowed to, but you
> probably don't want to walk down this road" is really useful.
>
> Also for me - in my opinion it is not a hack, it is a well working
> solution.
>
> Something even better would be interesting, but I consider it very
> unlikely that it can be improved.
>
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Re: [Talk-us] armchair mappers putting errors back into the map

[Nick Bolten]

As I mentioned, I'm aware of hacks regarding sidewalks - though I can
absolutely guarantee that strategy is insufficient, particularly when the
issue is, "this non-expert mapper needs to know what work has been done
more easily" (I've tried using those tags many, many times). This issue
will occur any time someone might expect to map X feature and can't tell
whether it doesn't exist or isn't mapped.

On Sun, Mar 3, 2019 at 10:32 AM Mateusz Konieczny 
wrote:

>
>
>
> Mar 3, 2019, 7:26 PM by nbol...@gmail.com:
>
> You can't differentiate between "nobody has attempted to add the sidewalks
> to this block" from "there are no sidewalks on this block" without
> worldwide manual reviews
>
> sidewalk=none, 270k uses worldwide
> https://taginfo.openstreetmap.org/tags/sidewalk=none
>
> In general this difference appears far often in context of StreetComplete
> (a quite unusual
> and interesting editor).
>
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Re: [Talk-us] armchair mappers putting errors back into the map

[Nick Bolten]

I like the idea of having information indicating the lack of certain
features, when necessary - such as the geometry with a note on it about
what not to map. It would be great if it could be done more formally, for
purposes of QA, such as how the construction tags work for buildings,
streets, etc - the tags say "this thing will exist, but it doesn't right
now, so don't map anything else in it".

I run into similar issues with pedestrian paths and wonder whether a more
formalized "this feature does not exist" tagging strategy (beyond free-form
text) could be useful. Example from personal experience: how do we know
which areas are in need of having "X feature" added, where the feature
requires a new geometry (like a sidewalk line)? You can't differentiate
between "nobody has attempted to add the sidewalks to this block" from
"there are no sidewalks on this block" without worldwide manual reviews -
but you could if there was a tag called "highway:exists=no" (e.g.). I know
that there are some potential hacks for sidewalks in particular, but it's
part of a general issue of the determining nonexistence vs "unmapped" for
features requiring their own geometry.

This is also something that could be helped via editors if there were a
"find similar historical" API to the OSM backend so that users could tell
if they were replicating / negating historical changes. For the case of the
driveway, it should (theoretically) be possible to ask, "has there been a
similarly-located + shaped geometry with similar tags been added here in
the past?" and show the results + changesets.

Apologies for the potential derailing.

Best,

Nick

On Sun, Mar 3, 2019 at 8:49 AM Mateusz Konieczny 
wrote:

> Mar 3, 2019, 5:09 PM by rwe...@averillpark.net:
>
> we've talked about this before, i guess we will never stop talking about
> it.
>
> i recently noticed in my OSMAnd display that an error got put back
> into the map about 1 mile from where i live. a short dead end
> was put in as a residential road (it's really an unnamed driveway)
> based on NYS GIS data. i removed it years ago (it was in tiger 2007).
>
> (...)
>
>
> what can/should we be doing about this sort of stuff? i'm really
> at a bit of a loss here.
>
> When I remove things visible in aerial images or other high quality sources
> I often leave geometry with note.
>
> For example on removed power tower (I made edit as crane lowered it,
> I just happened to be looking at it outside window) I changed
>
> power=tower node
>
> to
>
> note="power tower visible on aerial images was removed on "
> survey_date=
>
> to keep people from remapping it based on high quality aerial images
> available for my area.
>
> ---
>
> I also don't make risky armchair edit in areas with active local mappers.
>
> ---
>
> Is "NYS GIS data" something that can be considered nearly error free? If
> not then
> it should not be used for edits without verification with at least
> high-quality aerial imaged
> and this mapper should be reminded about it.
>
> If yes then leaving geometry with note is a good idea.
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Re: [Talk-us] NC sidewalk data import

[Nick Bolten]

I'd like to second this! Also, hi Melanie!

In case it adds useful context, I'd like to give my own recommendations:
(1) get practice in mapping sidewalks yourself and (2) create an IP,
metadata, work, verification, and upkeep plan for the import.

For (1), the goal is to become familiar with the complexities and pitfalls
of mapping the information you want, as it's not actually only sidewalks,
but also intersections, curb ramps, etc, and these are often inconsistent
block-to-block and not well-captured by public data. Many folks have
trouble seeing the need for certain styles of pedestrian mapping until you
give them the task of mapping a neighborhood's sidewalks, curb ramps,
crosswalks, etc, such that routing software could route a wheelchair user
(and everyone else) accurately. Example: in my neighborhood, a very busy
intersection has some curb ramps that are quite a bit 'upstream' of the
intersection, which means I had to map two separate paths: the
directly-across-the-street path for most pedestrians and the
use-the-curb-ramp path for others.

For (2), I'll split it into sections:

a) You'll want to get familiar with the import standards docs:
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Import/Guidelines. The first thing to
figure out is the IP situation, since that can prevent the import entirely.
Is your data public domain / otherwise compatible with OSM's license? If
not, you'll want to get the process of requesting a relicensing ASAP.

b) In my experience, it is often faster to draw from aerial imagery
(particularly the new Mapbox Satellite imagery) + Bing Streetside in JOSM
than it is to import sidewalks due to the number of adjustments that need
to be made. However, if you're bringing in valuable metadata with the
sidewalks and/or crosswalks, that would shift the balance. For example, if
you have high-quality surface data (concrete, asphalt, etc) or a
relationship with agencies such that you could add a dataset ID for
maintenance purposes, that would make all the difference. Is there any
'extra', useful data you could bring in as part of an import?

c) You'll want a work plan: how will the import happen? Using the OSM
Tasking Manager has worked pretty well for us in the past and I believe you
should be able to use the OSM US one (I can help if you don't have
privileges). The primary issue there is to identify your work units (a
single block? Intersections?), because you should ideally map sidewalks and
intersections simultaneously, as the intersections will connect your work
in progress to the rest of the network. If you have the resources, I've
really wanted to add some dependency functionality to the tasking manager
to manage an 'associated intersections first then sidewalks' mapping
strategy. Maybe we could collaborate.

d) Verification is an important step and you'll get it nearly for free if
you use the tasking manager, especially if you work with your local OSM
groups to have some expertise doing reviews. Just keep it in mind.

e) Having a plan for upkeep can save you a lot of time later on. It could
mean engaging with or organizing local OSM communities, having a plan for
structured OSM contributions in your implementation of AccessMap, or a
strategy for triggering suggested edits based on changes in the upstream
dataset.

Hope this helps!

Nick

On Mon, Jan 28, 2019 at 2:48 AM Rihards  wrote:

> On 27.01.19 21:41, Melanie Mazanec wrote:
> > Hello,
> >
> > I'm a front end dev for a city government working on a side project to
> > fork and add to AccessMap  for North Carolina
> > cities.
> >
> > In order to make this happen, I want to import North Carolina city
> > sidewalk data into OSM.  I have no prior OSM experience, so I'm
> > following the suggested wiki protocol and reaching out here before
> > attempting an import.
> >
> > Does anyone have advice about tutorials or where to start?  Are there
> > any NC OSM communities or enthusiasts I can connect with?  Also, it
> > seems like there are two competing sidewalk data formats.  Is there a
> > preferred standard now?
>
> Hi, that's really great news - welcome to OSM.
> It would be useful if you would try some basic mapping first to get
> familiar with OSM data structure. Try to map something near your
> workplace or home.
> That doesn't stop you from working on the import, of course. Any
> questions on OSM are welcome on the IRC channel #osm (
> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/IRC ), or any other OSM
> communication channel.
>
> > Thanks,
> > Melanie Mazanec--
>  Rihards
>
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[Talk-us] Senseless Sidewalks Part 2: Crisis Averted

[Nick Bolten]

Hello everyone! This is Nick Bolten with the OpenSidewalks group. By some
oversight, I wasn't subscribed to talk-us, and since the system is based on
mailing lists (in 2018) that means I can't jump into the previous thread to
help clear things up, so I'm making a new post.

First, the title: Frederik Ramm noticed that 9 ways, representing a total
of 18 nodes, in Austin, Texas were untagged, and they should've been tagged
as sidewalks (footways). I fixed them. It took less than two minutes as I
also cleaned up the area a bit to add some crossings, curb ramps, and
fixmes.

Those edits were made by a collaborator of mine, and I'll look into why we
didn't see the changeset comments to fix the data errors earlier. If in
doubt, you can always contact me about these issues, but I know that's not
going to be widely advertised and is a bit of a hassle - so we'll fix our
end.

As for the rest of the comments: I am very confused as to why a fairly
small number of data errors (ignoring the massive data contributions) seems
to result in an existential crisis on OSM mailing lists. I don't mean that
noticing and pointing out data errors is bad, just that the response is
completely disproportionate, full of contempt for others, and leads to
pointless infighting. As a community project that depends on volunteer
efforts, these forums should be much more welcoming and seek to build
consensus with constructive feedback. All I need to know is that there was
a data error and I'll fix it / have someone fix it.

Specifically, I unfortunately feel I must address Frederik directly: this
is not the first time you've addressed the OpenSidewalks project with open
contempt. In fact, receiving baseless and speculative contempt from
Frederik was one of our very first experiences reaching out to the
community. Luckily, our team was and is invested in creating high-quality
pedestrian data in OpenStreetMap, and this did not impact the project
itself - though it did make about half the team upset for half a day. I'm
addressing you specifically, Frederik, not because I want to pick on you or
create yet more email drama, but because your type of feedback in these
situations is both uncalled for, completely unproductive, and leads to
these massive wastes of time, and it would be good for everyone if it
stopped. Examples of comments that waste time, are needlessly negative and
speculative, or both:

> I really wonder what the purpose of this is. At least they're all tagged
with "project=OpenSidewalks" which makes it easier to delete them once the
project has run out...

> What pisses me off is when bumbling newbiedom goes hand in hand with
bigmouthed web sites about how the so-and-so project is making the world a
better place, and then I look at what the project with the cool "store
front" actually does in OSM and see rubbish.

> So my impression is, there's a project here that has invested a
significant part of their time into convincing third parties that they're
doing a great thing (maybe even convincing third parties that they're worth
funding), but they treat OSM with much less diligence than they spend on
their store front.

> If OSM was anything valuable to them, anything worth caring for, and not
just a vehicle to piggyback their project on, then they would provide
better training and supervision to their students so that mistakes like the
ones I randomly stumbled across either do not happen, or are corrected.

I'd like to remind everyone reading that this is in response to ways using
a total of 18 nodes that I fixed in less than two minutes. I'd also like to
interject and point to the thousands and thousands of high-quality
pedestrian ways that we've added, certainly to the Seattle, Washington
region, an area I've mapped large portions of by hand. Frederik is not
familiar with our work, nor has he done the research to understand it, nor
has he reached out to us: he is being speculative (frankly, dishonest) and
demeaning.

So, Frederik, in the future, please try to take more care with what you
write, and how you address contributors and others. As an American who
speaks German and has many German friends, I know this is neither a
language nor cultural issue, and is a matter of individual tact. Please
take this under advisement in future conversations.

Best,

Nick
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