OpenStreetMap
Why no default frequency for powerlines?
Plasing deur Obelixx op 1 Februarie 2012 in German (Deutsch).Why is the frequency value for a new powerline not set by default 50 Hertz for lines in Europe and 60 Hertz for lines in North America? As nearly all lines have this value, it would make sense and the exceptions could be set manually.
Discussion
Kommentaar van Etherg8 op 1 Februarie 2012 om 15:53
Things aren't that simple everywhere. Electricity transmission in Japan is divided for historical reasons into two regions each running at a different frequency. Eastern Japan runs at 50 Hz, while Western Japan runs at 60 Hz.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_in_Japan#Transmission
Kommentaar van Sanderd17 op 1 Februarie 2012 om 16:20
As app, you can implement it that way when it's not tagged.
I don't see the problem here.
Kommentaar van Obelixx op 1 Februarie 2012 om 17:22
Japan is one of the few countries for which this tool is not applicable, but for most countries, it would work well.
Kommentaar van Andy Allan op 2 Februarie 2012 om 09:05
OpenStreetMap generally has the concept of "default" values, to save everyone time and effort. One example would be that if there's no oneway tag on a road, it's assumed to be two-way.
You can take the same approach to frequencies on powerlines. Perhaps life is too short to worry about tagging every powerline in Europe with the frequency - simply tag the (presumably very few) examples where this is not the case. As Sanderd17 said, when people use the data they can set sensible interpretations for when the frequency tag is missing.