OpenStreetMap
Cheltenham is a town of 116,000 people in south-west England. During the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns, I spent lots of time collecting addresses in the town and adding them to the map.
Cheltenham is now better mapped than parts of London and many other cities and towns. If I can do it, you can do it too—and better still, you can learn from my experience and mistakes.
Why?
Address coverage in OpenStreetMap is still poor in many places. Good coverage is needed for better geocoding, which many users view as an integral part of a modern map.
During lockdown, many people relied on deliveries. Even now, a huge amount of time is wasted not so much in “last mile” delivery issues but “last few hundred metres” ones.
UK address data is not open, so addresses have to be surveyed or collected on the ground. This is tedious and repetitive, but there are some upsides. You’ll uncover mistakes in places which haven’t been touched on OpenStreetMap for years, and you’ll have the opportunity to improve geometry and alignment with the far better imagery now available.
Walking around your town or city is a great way of discovering new places and learning more about local history. Like many people, I’d heard of the mass trespass of Kinder Scout and how it ultimately led to greater access to the countryside. But I was unaware of earlier agitations here in Cheltenham over access to Leckhampton Hill. The hill is now part of the Cotswold Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, crossed by the Cotswold Way National Trail which passes a memorial tree for one of the rioters.
Approach
I started collecting addresses in earnest in mid-April 2020, continuing to August 2021. I collected addresses at least once per week but usually more. I’d walk for anywhere from 30 minutes to four hours at a time.
This is one I came across in Wexford, while I was surveying for benchmarks.
