OpenStreetMap
Using LPI information to add street names to Sydney NSW Australia
Posted by Warin61 on 13 December 2015 in English. Last updated on 11 January 2016.{edited Jan 2016} There are a fair number of streets in Sydney missing their names.
‘Cleary’ has negotiated the use of ‘Land and Property Information’ from the NSW government for use in OSM. Yea!!
So I have started to use their base map to add the street names using JOSM. There is a fair amount of information on that map .. house numbers, parks, post offices, police stations, libraries… very usefull.
So .. if you want to help .. instructions; ## Adding LPI imagery to JOSM This is now available on the pull down list. You want AU (for Australia) then LPI NSW Base Map. Go to ‘Imagery’ on the top bar, select imagery preferences, then scroll down to and click on the ‘LPI NSW Base Map’ so it highlights and then click on hte ‘Activate button’. It should now appear in the lower window.
Finding areas with missing street names
Too easy !
http://tools.geofabrik.de/osmi/?view=highways&lon=151.04&lat=-33.8&zoom=11 The above can run a few days behind.
OR
http://qa.poole.ch/?zoom=11&lat=-33.88297&lon=151.1286&layers=TFFFB0 Looks to be running up to 1 hour behind.
Using JOSM to find the streets with missing names
Download from OSM the area you want to edit. Then CNTRL F (‘Find’) and type in ‘type:way highway=* -name=*’ and press enter.. that will select all the ‘highways’ that are ways without names. Includes cycleways, paths etc. Select the NSW LPI Base Map imagery and zoom in on one of the selected (red) highways … select the individual highway and add the name .. and add the source .. I’m using ‘LPI Base Map Jan 2016’ as that identifies what I am using .. if any updates come along then it should be easy to see. Once that one is changes .. CNTRL F and enter to find the remaining ones … if you forget to select an individual highway you will name ALL the highways with missing names… CNTRL Z is your friend to undo the error.
If you want to exclude footpaths then ‘type:way highway=* -name=* -highway=footway’. Same system for cycleway etc…
Yes the attribution and permission of LPI copyright has been done. Thanks once again to ‘cleary’!
There is also an improved resolution satellite view from LPI too … I think it also has less parallax error too. It lacks the names, and other details on the LPI Base Map. Similar instructions to install it in JOSM.
Discussion
Comment from Rhubarb on 14 December 2015 at 05:50
Another handy tool for finding roads with no names is: http://qa.poole.ch/?zoom=11&lat=-33.88297&lon=151.1286&layers=TFFFB0 orange = minor service roads with no name red = roads with no name It takes around 5 minutes to update, and just hit refresh in your web browser after uploading changes.
I’ve been busy adding missing road names around Campbelltown. The NSW LPI is now such a handy resource to use for all those “red” areas around Sydney :)
Comment from maxerickson on 15 December 2015 at 16:00
Custom validator rules are a nice way to save searches that generate a work list. I posted how to add a custom rule file here:
https://help.openstreetmap.org/questions/44148/how-to-check-for-road-completeness-in-josm?page=1&focusedAnswerId=44211#44211
A rule like (untested)
Should flag up roughly the same items as your search.
would limit it to ways, which is probably the right thing.
(The JOSM validator does come with some rules to find unnamed highways, but they don’t seem to apply to all types. I guess it’s also useful to mention the general concept of using the validator to save searches/make work lists.)
Comment from Warin61 on 11 January 2016 at 05:03
There is now a fair reduction in unnamed roads in the Sydney area. When I have been working on this I have noted some missing roads and some that are not there! I have checked on the satellite imagery to confirm and made the appropriate changes. Same with any other notable things, make the changes as I come across them … as I lose them later. As they reduce I am looking further north towards Newcastle.. then inland .. Maitland … there are still a fair number of unnamed roads around.
Comment from Warin61 on 2 February 2016 at 08:53
The majority of Sydney roads are now named, as are those in Maitland. Singleton is now the main area of unnamed roads. Other than that there are small areas with unnamed roads .. and some random roads in country NSW that are unnamed.
So .. I have a fairly high confidence that a search for road that is within NSW OSM data base will be named and therefore findable.
While doing the ‘nameing’ I came across some missing roads. Some of these are on the LPI Base Map .. but not on the Imagery - so I assume they don’t exist on the ground (yet). Some do exit on both - so I added them as I came across them. There are probably a few I missed!
I’ll finish off Singleton and carry out random ‘nameing’ in other place as I notice them.
Comment from Warin61 on 28 April 2016 at 22:22
Well the vast majority of LPI Base map road names are now in the OSM data base, say 95%+. There are a few country lesser roads to be done. Of course there are those roads that are not named in the LPI data base .. they may not have names at all. I usally add a note tag to these to avoid looking at them again with the LPI data.
I’ll target the remaining country roads later, once I have regained my enthusiasm for the task.
So…that is the vast majority of NSW roads named.