Awareness of a cultural and environmental mapping project

Communities United Kingdom
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Dear All,
I’m trying to raise awareness of a cultural and invironmental mapping project we’re running in Wales, involving teaching communities to map rural history, social isolation, and land-memory. I’ll post on Talk GB mailing list, as I feel like that is the better place, and as @trigpoint suggests, not so many people monitor this channel. Is that a fair assumption, or should I start a new topic on here, explaining the project?
Best,
Rupert

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I’m not sure I have said that recently.

A wihile back that was true, but this channel has recently been brought into the OSM community forums so does get a lot more traffic. So is now fine.

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Thanks for responding, Phil. I’m really struggling to respond to messages from the DWG, and keep getting messages to make it clear what we are doing in West Wales. I think there’s a forum I am missing, because I am not getting any responses on here or on Talk GB from Frederik Ramm or (Andy Townsend, I think). I just get edit comments.
Any feedback appreciatecd.

Thanks,

Rupert

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For completeness one of the changeset discussions was https://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/156293926.

PS: The mods have moved this to a new topic so that it doesn’t appear to be part of an 8-year-old previous thread.

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Now that that this topic’s been created, perhaps explain what it is that you’re actually doing? The post above says that it it exists, but not what is being mapped, by whom, from what source, to what end, etc…

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Thanks Andy, I will look for that topic and fill it out.
Rupert

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Hi There,

Thanks so much for your help Andy. I struggled to find the new topic (I’m new to Discourse, and I seemed to get a few “Bad Gateway” responses when following links), but here’s a link to the [Organised Edtiting page](Organised Editing/Activities/Mapio Lleisiau'r Tir/Mapping Land Voices Cymru/Wales - OpenStreetMap Wiki Best,). I shall keep looking.

Meanwhile, in short, I am supporting some local communities in Wales to put their small businesses, history, field names, placenames and rural resources onto OpenStreetMap. We are combining wikimedia_commons with OSM to make a Community Archive of local history, primarily in the Welsh language. I have discussed this with many welsh OSM users, and a few OSM UK users. I thought the conversations were showing on the Talk GB threads, but maybe not.

Thanks,

Rupert

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What’s the difference between this project and the previously discussed “Wales Community Climate Culture Layer”, which appears to use some of the same boilerplate text?

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We are a local community in the uplands of Wales, and we are putting our small businesses, history, field names, placenames and rural resources onto OpenStreetMap. We are combining wikimedia_commons with OSM to make a Community Archive of local history, primarily in the Welsh language.
As I leadc this project, I have discussed this with many welsh OSM users, and a few OSM UK users. I thought the conversations were showing on the Talk GB threads, but maybe not. The Organised Editing link to the project is HERE

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That is a project on Anglesey, which we have helped WISERD to set up (WISERD = Wales Institutre for Social and Economic Research Data). This has a parallel agenda, but focusses on children and young people. @Doctor Frost leads the editing of this project, and manages any data to be added to OSM.
Thanks,
Rupert

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I may be out of touch with the current practice on multilingual names, but I think if there’s a name and a name:en that don’t match then it’s a bit clearer to also duplicate the value of the name tag to name:cy to make it clear what language has been recorded.

At the moment the page just says:

“name=” in Welsh. Then name:en= to add the English language name.

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This has been discussed and agreed in other threads here in Wales and on the talk gb platform.

Thanks,

Rupert

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I understand the value this project has with regards to heritage mapping and preserving local placenames, but what is the ultimate tangible end-goal, if any?

The Wiki page linked above says: “the project aims to tackle social issues: rural depopulation, mental health, ‘brain-drain’ and heritage loss.”

It’s true that these are significant threats to the Welsh language, but ultimately these socio-economic issues have been around for decades, if not longer. Recognising these push factors and what the communities need is one thing, but actually “tackling” these issues and creating pull factors in these places is easier said than done. For example, there are rural schools closing (and some in danger of closing) because there’s not enough pupils, very few teachers, and maintenance is too expensive.

Personally, I’m confused by the HOT tasks as well. Given that there’s a focus on mapping locally, there are quite a few changesets made by some non-local HOT mappers that contain low quality data. These HOT tasking manager pages are also hidden from public view.

I understand you want the building outlines in place in order to make surveying easier, and that’s fair - but why is HOT needed for this?

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Hiya,

“Creating Welsh Spaces” and preserving Welsh language is a central remit of the local support for the project. So, in line with the Mapio Cymru project, the tangible end goal is to populate a community-specific OSM for the area, but much more detailed. Practically-speaking, local businesses are learning the value of using OSM tools as part of this funding, and creating useful bespoke (offline uMap/GIS) map products. These bespoke maps (in English and Welsh) constitute outcomes for the project, and at the same time contribute local detail to be visible on OSM layers. Local people then become empowered to do more community activism/business development through OSM membership/contribution.

Culture/Language Background:

Cultural heritage connects to this, as you pointed out, hence the place-naming of both dwellings and ruins in Wales. These names provide an important ‘toponymic’ window into the landscape/surroundings, because the culture embedded in these names is often occupational. Mapping ruins helps document earlier periods of depopulation (e.g. 1950s), often referencing work-based occupational landuse (e.g. “Gwar Felin”: (water-driven woolen-mills were often re-purposed as micro-hydro plants in our villages). In some cases we are hearing the potential for repopulation by small land-based businesses.

Infrastructure

Socio-economics-wise, bespoke interactive maps of business and community networks highlight community-based assets and interests. The funding aims to skill local people locally, enhance businesses, create awareness of social capital, and profile Welsh language history. Impacts of the closing of schools is something we are specifically looking at alongside public transport, to show evidence of the need for them to be kept open (under the ‘Wellbeing’ agenda in Wales). We managed to make maps of ‘inhospitable bus-stops’ and ‘unreliable timetables’ in a previous project. I think a different (more positive) narrative may be emerging in this case, though (e.g. Rally maps, Aberystwyth-Carmarthen branch line campaign are emerging themes).

I’m sorry if this has been unclear or vague - the project is flexible, in order to accommodate evolution of community-led narratives. Skills, embedded Welsh placenames, and enhancing/profiling local small businesses/community needs (like the impacts of schools closures, depleted public transport etc) are the three central aims of the project.

Tasking Manager methodology:

The reason for using a tasking manager has been to try to keep areas of editing organised. We became aware of low quality editing and so recently limited the use of the tasking manager until we have gone through the validation process.

This may be why you are finding the tasks to be hidden (we made them private), and I realise this lacks transparency (although the narrative is repeated in the Organised Editing wiki). This is not what was intended at all, and we shall look to reset the settings here to restrict bad editing but make sure the task is publicly visible.

Thanks,

Rupert

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For information, looking at changesets since 2nd September (which was the date of this message), we’re seeing these tags

#hotosm-project-17207 #cydnerthedd #resilience #GreenWales  added buildings
#hotosm-project-17207 #cydnerthedd #resilience #GreenWales  added landuses
#hotosm-project-17207 #cydnerthedd #resilience #GreenWales  added some tree rows and adjusted wood line
#hotosm-project-17207 #cydnerthedd #resilience #GreenWales  added woods and tree rows
#hotosm-project-17207 #cydnerthedd #resilience #GreenWales  edited tags and some areas
#hotosm-project-17207 #cydnerthedd #resilience #GreenWales  removed area=yes tags
#hotosm-project-17514 #cydnerthedd #resilience #GreenWales  added buildings
#hotosm-project-17514 #cydnerthedd #resilience #GreenWales  Added placename
#hotosm-project-17514 #cydnerthedd #resilience #GreenWales  Added placename Added trees

by these users

beza208
Grannymeg
GwennieD65
PeteB14
Rhydian Wilson
ricallan
rupertmaesglas
WillFR130

Some of them have replied to changeset comments, others haven’t; and perhaps would benefit from a nudge to do so.

The wiki page doesn’t mention 17514 - is that related or not?

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Thanks Andy.

I’ll get around these and prompt them. Yes, 17514 is a new task only for place names, and I need to add it.

Much appreciated,

Rupert

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The HOT pages are still unlisted as of now (Sep 21, 11:15):

and low quality data is still being added by HOT mappers:

  • ‘Name:cy’ instead of ‘name:cy’ - note the comment here by another mapper.
  • ‘Byrn-glas’ - name misspelt (should be ‘Bryn-glas’ or whatever is on the ground)
  • ‘Holiday let’ - not properly tagged plus given a descriptive name.
  • ‘natural:en’ - what is this? on a building=house?

delwedd
delwedd

Again, what is the goal here? Are these contributions being quality checked? There are more and more HOT users contributing poor quality data here, some of them are ‘new’ to OSM.

The cleanup here will be immense by the time the HOT tasks finish, if I have to be (brutally) honest. This really does need to stop, in my opinion.

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I think that one of those linked contributions was in the last 5 days. Looking at the changeset history of each, I think that they’re all somewhat local - they don’t seem to be “HOT mappers” in the sense that they’re contributing to HOT projects all over the world. There certainly were issues by HOT mappers until the tasks were made invisible - with a DWG hat on I’ve had quite a long conversation with one of those, explaining why a “quality rather than quantity” approach is better for OSM.

Clearly yes, by you :smile: - and that’s the way that that OSM has always worked. I suspect that the creator of these tasks has perhaps underestimated how much they’d have to check on the quality of some of the contributions. Some HOT contributors actually think it’s OK to add poor-quality data (especially after a humanitarian emergency) because they overestimate the value of what they’re adding.

Something like natural:en is just a typing error, as is (assuming the mapping is by someone local) “Byrn-glas”. In that case I’d just say “hello and welcome” on a changeset discussion comment, and ask whether the name really is “Byrn-glas”, given that they’ve already added the Welsh name as the expected “Bryn-glas”. That mapper’s been active for a month; there has been no communication by changeset comments.

The “holiday let” mapper, who’s been mapping for 3 months, hasn’t had the problem explained to them (and to be honest, mapping of these is a bit complicated - I’d have to look at taginfo to check the most popular tagging).

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Ahem - you still haven’t added it :slight_smile:

Actually, if I was you I might revisit the page to reduce some of the “word salad”, say that these projects are no longer being touted to remote HOT mappers and instead describe the contributions from people in the local community (often new to OSM).

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they don’t seem to be “HOT mappers” in the sense that they’re contributing to HOT projects all over the world.

I’m referring to them as “HOT mappers” as they are contributing with #hotosm- hashtags at the end of the day. If they are local users and if quality is improving as a result of hiding the tasks, that’s great to know, especially given this project is aimed at locals. :slight_smile:

As for lack of communication - you’re completely right. I don’t really have much free time (other than weekends) at the moment, personally.