https://www.jidanni.org/geo/house_numbering/index.html#fearoffour

“Perhaps the whole country’s addressing is purposely disorganized, for National Defense purposes?” - that sounds familiar in Ireland. :)

1. Before Eircodes over 35% of addresses in Ireland were non-unique, where there is no house name or number. This primarily applied to rural areas and smaller towns.

2. During World War 2, all directional signage was removed from roads. There was a strong suspicion that many were put back in the wrong place, until they were finally all replaced in the 2000s.

So that’s why we have The Avenue, The Close, The Court, The Crescent, The Green, The Grove, The Haven, The Lawn, The Mews, The Rise, The Road, The Square, etc. as actual names within a named estate (instead of Ballymore Avenue, Ballymore Close, Ballymore Court, Ballymore Crescent, etc.)

Presumably estate agents don’t want to sell house number 13, as they think people won’t buy it.

Developers don’t want to spend load of money on signs, so they get standard signs instead of custom signs.

I think access to technology and education may be barriers. While basic mapping on OSM may not be difficult, it will be difficult to some who have, e.g. literacy difficulties or don’t know how to tell one type of building from another. And while many will have smart phones, mapping is easier on a computer with a full-sized keyboard and screen.

Another factor will be the number of Points of Interest (POIs) in an area. In suburban areas, there are simply fewer POIs in deprived residential areas than in affluent residential areas. That’s a problem with society, not OSM.

I tend to map what: * I know about and/or have an interest in technically, e.g. power network, speed limits, bus networks. * I know about and/or have an interest in geographically, i.e. where I live and visit. * I am capable of mapping. I don’t know how to map most types of relations. Mapping houses in housing estates bores me.