I’m currently mapping the village i live in (northern Germany). The building outlines and streets where already done by somebody else, so i mainly added the addresses to most buildings in my village and corrected some of the outlines. I did this with Organic Maps and later Vespucci.
Now my question: what other information is important enough to map?
I could go around and map every tree and specify the roof types for the buildings, but that would take ages and I think there are other details that are way more important to map for everyday openstreetmap users.
Is there some wiki page that lists the most important attributes that should be mapped? I searched on the OSM wiki but couldn’t find such a list.
Thanks in advance.
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At a time where shopping local is more important than ever, when I take a walk and pass in front of businesses I take the time to ensure they are properly listed with their current business hours.
POIs POIs POIs, the shops and their opening hours are often outdated. Or you could micromap playgrounds.
My general philosophy for how most people would use the map is “where are things and how do I get there?” With that in mind, I usually focus on adding stores, amenities, and other bits of infrastructure that people are likely to interact with, as well as making sure the roads and sidewalks are accurate.
I don’t always feel like working on these things though, so there are some days where I will just map grass, trees, fences, or whatever else I find interesting at the time.
Whatever you think. I met with mappers who only map rail and related stuff, others only different kind of pipes and manhole covers, some focus on electrical infrastructure, and street cabinets. Some people map anything that has a number or id. My favorite is street parking, lanes and sidewalks.
So map what you enjoy the most, this is not a job, it’s a hobby.
Have they/you seen an interesting rendering (other than editing tools and perhaps Overpass queries) for man_made=manhole? Taginfo lists just one project and that one (Straßenraumkarte Neukölln) seems pretty limited in geographic scope (only Berlin?).
I think you should map what you enjoy mapping.
I map benches because I enjoy benches (444 mapped already.) and entrances that I use in my job.
Shops and services would be most useful along with bus stops and forest footpaths.
Have a look to https://mapcomplete.org/ as well
Things that someone might look for: shops, restaurants, vending machines, benches, trashcans, water fountains.
To make the map appear a lot more beautiful and complete: map parks, playgrounds, dog parks, sports pitches, etc. as areas; map any fences, walls and gates around and within them. Lots of playgrounds are just mapped as nodes, so if you find such cases, fix them.
I second this - things that someone might look for - for a simple reason: OSM will always need more people mapping, and if the maps are useful to more people, more people will use it and recommend it to their friends. And a small portion of those users will eventually become mappers. Some of those will even form or join a local mapping community.
So the more useful info there is, more mappers will come, and the feedback loop will take care of the rest. :)
To me it would probably be “navigational” stuff, like bike/pedestrian crossings, sidewalks and bike paths, one-way streets and illegal turns etc. Plot some test routes for walking/biking/driving and verify the directions make sense. Then the main POIs if not already added, maybe some basic zoning? Also make sure that the features that already exist are properly tagged.
Anyway, I think you shouldn’t focus too much on what “you’re supposed to map” and just map the features that you find useful/interesting. There are a ton of ways OSM can be used, so start with your own use case, and by making it better for you you will make it better for everyone :)
Apart from the basic street layout, any information that’s worth having for everyday life, e.g. bus stops, benches, trash cans, etc.
Also, you could try StreetComplete and see what infos are missing elsewhere.
Thank you all for your answers! I’m overwhelmed with the amount of good tips and suggestions!
I’ll probably test some of them and see if they’re fun to mal and useful for my village.
Points of interest and amenities are probably the next most useful. Things like street lighting and sidewalks quite helpful for pedestrians. It’s more important that you are still enjoying mapping. If there is something that you know is useful but you find tedious it’s ok to skip it and either leave it for someone else or come back to it later
As it sounds like you’re on Android, I’d recommend @streetcomplete for easily adding detail while on the go.
Public toilets are a good info
@shoki
all is importantStreetlamps are important, so are water wells or drinking water etc. Also you can map road surface or surface type
