Local business listing page project proposal

Communities India
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1

Inspiration: Node: ‪Sukho Thai Spa‬ (‪6620924567‬) | OpenStreetMap
This POI is a nice example of a local business’s details and contact info tagged properly on OSM.

Sharing a project idea (I’m starved for time so will suck at implementing; this would be great for someone looking for a project to take up) :

Project Idea

  1. Create a Local business listings website
  2. Where user has to zoom into to a map region, and a query is made to OSM with search params like: shop=* and contact:email=* for the bounding box
  3. Results show up on map and in a tabular listing that user can download in a click
  4. Advanced search, filter options (Differentiator from other places like google maps)
  5. The website gives clear instructions and references for getting your business listed here (ie, map it on OSM)

What I’m hoping this will achieve:

  1. The site spreads and becomes one more go-to place for people to find local businesses
  2. Create a PULL factor for businesses to map themselves onto OSM, as a free platform for getting visibility for their busines (the same reason why they want to show up on google maps)
  3. In the process they put in detailed addresses, building names, road names etc
  4. … All of which can contribute to improving places searches on OSM
  5. They may even properly map the roads to their business and other landmarks in the process
  6. Businesses with very specific offerings will put rich tag details to ensure they are found

Technical details

  1. Pure frontend HTML + JS page can do all this, it can be hosted for free on github pages or under a community website etc
  2. I’ve done similar work here: https://server.nikhilvj.co.in/pmgsy , github source so there’s code ready that can be copied from
  3. Can leverage OSM’s tags to make this site a place to do high precision searches - which will differentiate it from google maps etc.