On OpenStreetMap, we map based on on-the-ground facts and community consensus, not your individual beliefs.
Instead of addressing the substantial criticism you’ve garnered, you’ve been insistently repeating that the OSM community should cater to your demands. This shows to me that you aren’t interested in a productive discussion.
Mods, please lock this thread. (Edit: or move it to the Colombia subforum, as above.)
Thank you for your answer.
I have an idea.
Create circular ways for both 12nm territorial sea boundaries for Bajo Nuevo Bank and Serranilla Bank, which includes a “type=boundary” relation with the following tags:
For Bajo Nuevo Bank:
boundary=administrative,
admin_level=2,
maritime=yes,
border_type=territorial,
name-en=Bajo Nuevo Bank
name-es=Cayo Bajo Nuevo
country=Colombia
disputed_by=United States Of America, Honduras, Jamaica,
source=ICJ Judgement 2012
For Serranilla Bank:
boundary=administrative,
admin_level=2,
maritime=yes,
border_type=territorial,
name-en=Serranilla Bank,
name-es=Cayo Serranilla
country=Colombia
disputed_by=United States Of America, Honduras, Jamaica,
source=ICJ Judgement 2012
I mean, the boundaries are already on the basemap. Why are they not in the Nominatim database? Please add these to the database! I really don’t want to go through the hassle of making my own map.
Why do you start a new thread on this?
(as explanation: these two posts were posted to a separate thread and were merged into this one)
At this point, we must be very careful and respect the chronology. There is a treaty signed in 1972 between the government of Colombia and the government of the United States:
‘The Government of the United States of America hereby renounces all claims of sovereignty over Quitasueño, Roncador and Serrana.’
Was there any formal claim made by the United States government after 1972?
Or Is it based solely on the aforementioned database, ignoring subsequent treaties?
If so, we must remember that there are Spanish Royal Decrees that predate by several centuries the aforementioned list of United States Minor Overseas Islands. Additionally, Colombia has its own 19th-century database where Panama, Venezuela, Ecuador, and large areas of the current Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Brazil, and Peru are still part of Gran Colombia, and the later Republic of New Granada and Republic of Colombia.
No.
This case is a perfect example of why such claims need to be discussed first before cracking open the editor.
The USA “claim”, as I understand it, is only based on someone forgetting to mention everything in the 1972 treaty, and before that (and I am not making this shit up) the Guano Islands Act. The USA claim is in no way verifiable and does not belong in OSM. The geometry of the boundaries that are allegedly disputed are already in OSM, and anyone who wants to make a map pretending that the USA controls these two little bunches of land could do so, as I described earlier.
Edit: Formatting
Andy, please forgive my misunderstanding: I had thought the reefs were PRESENTLY tagged as though they were USA, but they have been tagged Columbian for some time (at least a year). And the advice I gave about editing them was from a perspective of “if they are tagged USA, please tag them Columbia, and fiddle the 12-mile circle with the particulars that the Columbian government / navy says are correct.” But they ARE ALREADY (presently) tagged “Columbia.”
I believe what the present “request” is would be for the 12-mile nautical boundaries (for Bajo Nuevo, start with way/1022517875 and “work your way up” the several relations it is part of, for Serranilla, likewise start with way/1022517877) to be “named” using a certain methodology by the OP. It seems several of us are not sure what, exactly is being asked for, but it is clear s/he is too eager, noob, lazy or gimme-gimme to “make my own map.”
My knowledge of these reefs are from keeping the USA admin_level wiki tidy. To be as up-to-date as possible, I have “cleaned up” this wiki (the footnote there regarding these) to read from “are” to “were once” (part of the USA) and included a final sentence of “To be clear, this is mentioned here for historical purposes to address the dispute, as it is believed that these Caribbean reefs / islands are not US territory, but are administered by Colombia; their present tagging in OSM reflects that.”
This statement is quite questionable, and you know it. They have been part of Spanish cartography since the 16th century (records of the House of Trade of Seville). Additionally, they appear in the Royal Decree of 1511 and the Royal Decree of 1803, In this decree, the Spanish Crown transferred the administration of the Mosquito Coast and adjacent islands (which included the banks of the archipelago) from the Captaincy General of Guatemala to the Viceroyalty of New Granada.
They were never part of the United States of America, Basically, the story unfolded as follows: After the disorder caused by the wars of independence in South America, a period followed in which attempts were made to organize what existed. During that period, an American ship arrived at the aforementioned islands and someone said= “I claim this island for the USA”.
Or can you point to a historical document transferring ownership from the Spanish Crown to the United States government? Any Royal Decree? Anything other than the list of Minor Overseas Islands. It doesn’t exist. Therefore, they have never been the property of the United States of America.
Any past or present U.S. claims on the guano islands are mere historical curiosities. I don’t think there’s much interest among the U.S. community in pressing this point. This matters more to Colombia than it does to the U.S. (as long as no one tells Washington).
Adjudicating historical territorial claims is really out of scope for OSM. OHM covers some even more fanciful claims by both Spain and the U.S. over the centuries, including claims made over territory that these countries had yet to visit. In some cases, the claims don’t even add up geographically. I don’t think the OSM community really wants to dive into this rabbit hole.
What I mean is that the 1972 Treaty was not a transfer of ownership or assignment of property rights. The treaty emphasizes the renunciation of the claim of sovereignty on a territory that already had an owner.
In simple terms, my mother (Spain) passed away and left me and my siblings (South America) a large piece of land and a large number of islands. While my siblings and I were legally organizing to see what each of us was entitled to, a third party came along and claimed ownership rights over a portion of my inheritance.
Felipe, the precise wording in the wiki (only, the map disavows any US sovereignty over Bajo Nuevo and Serranilla) about these two reefs / islands is that they “were once also considered (by the US) uninhabited unincorporated unorganized territories of the US based on a claim under the Guano Islands Act, as these were disputed.”
I don’t think THOSE facts are disputed, and it clearly is “past tense” (from the present perspective), meaning that they might have at one time been CLAIMED by USA (under the Guano Islands Act, an odd law if there ever was one, in my opinion) but no strong claim is made in our wiki that they ever “were once” part of the USA. They were claimed to be, that was resolved by ICJ in 2012. Meanwhile, countries, lists, tabulations of inclusions on USA’s statistical grouping of “Minor Outlying Islands,” maps and people are (still) “catching up with that fact” 14 years later. AND, we (in OSM) wish to document all of that accurately. I think “so far, so good.”
If you have a problem with the current wiki wording, I’m certainly open to hearing proposed wording for our wiki that would sharpen focus even more. AND, we’re talking about documenting a historic fact (for completeness and clarity) in our wiki: importantly, the map’s data are correct.
The point I brought up earlier is that the U.S. wasn’t a party to the ICJ ruling. So it seems that from a U.S. perspective it’s technically still claimed and disputed, whereas from Nicaragua and Colombia’s perspective it’s a settled matter. 
Not that any of this should matter for OSM.
Thanks, Minh. In fact, the penultimate sentence (as I added the final sentence beginning “To be clear” above) is:
“In 2012, a claim for Serranilla Bank and Bajo Nuevo Bank was resolved in favor of Colombia by the UN International Court of Justice, though it is not clear the US recognizes the jurisdiction of this court in this case.”
I’m happy to leave things (both USA’s admin_level footnote and importantly, OSM’s map data themselves) as they are right now, but I continue to listen if others think we need more clarity.
So let me get this straight… you don’t think you should add the new data for Bajo Nuevo Bank or Serranilla Bank? How unfortunate.
Please be clear about what data you are talking about. Being familiar with what the Colombian government (or perhaps navy?) actually names these would be the authoritative values for these name=* tags. Not a preference by a new OSM mapper unfamiliar with such things.
I (and this community) can cut you some slack for being uninformed that we use canonical / authoritative naming conventions, but we will not for your disdain (“how unfortunate”) that we follow our own rules (not your personal whims).
I apologize if I was annoying. My opinions and points of view are always related to seeing the problem from both perspectives. I simply wanted to present a completely different point of view, one that was entirely foreign to the American perspective. Just because the other truth or point of view is not mentioned does not mean it does not exist.
Here’s Google’s official ansewer:
“Bajo Nuevo Bank is officially referred to as Bajo Nuevo or sometimes Islas Petrel. Serranilla Bank is referred to as Banco Serranilla or Isla Serranilla.”
Ah, after some deep thought and careful parsing of the OP’s request, I think I understand what s/he wants, and how adding it isn’t incorrect.
What @Chananiah wants is for Nominatim to include atype=boundary result. Currently, searching Nominatim for “bajo nuevo” yields a type place=natural_reef and place=islet, but no type=boundary relation. Similarly, a Nominatim search for “serranilla” yields a (singular, correct) result (among others) of OSM’s natural=reef data, but again, no type=boundary relation.
I don’t think it’s a big ask to get the type=boundaryrelations added to OSM, but given @Chananiah’s poor “gimme gimme” attitude, I have no strong desire to add these myself.
@afgb1977 Felipe, apology accepted, though I don’t feel it is necessary on your behalf. Yes, I have an “American perspective,” but I concur with your conclusions about these two “cays” (reefs, islands…) as exclusively Colombian. With that in mind, I ask you (or anybody else following this thread) to properly add the originally requested (by the OP) two type=boundary relations to OSM. (You might even use the tags most recently suggested by @Chananiah , as they don’t appear incorrect). And everybody is happy.
@Chananiah , welcome to OSM. But do be aware we have certain ways to do things, we don’t like it when people are demanding as they appear unwilling to learn and apply new skills and please, don’t insult us in this online community as you wish for your opinion to be the only driver of consensus. One of the most important skills in this project is to listen to others. Thank you.
Noted. Guess I’ll do it myself.