My target was to finish mapping a patch local to me in Nottingham, bounded (roughly) by The Wells Road, Woodborough Road, Westdale Lane West/East and Carlton Hill. It took 7 months & is now complete.

I’m a careful & thorough kind of chap and thought that I’d done a good job. Nevertheless, I was really pleased to recently come across OSM Inspector, which is provided by Geofabrik Tools to be able to quickly find a whole range of errors. There is a wiki page for it and, naturally, it provides virtually zero help in using the tool. I’ve used it for just a couple of days, so here is…

An Idiot’s Guide to OSM_Inspector

or, OSM Tools Considered Useful After Mapping

1. Open OSM Inspector in a browser of your choice
2. Type your desired map location into the Search box & click search
   (for me “nottingham”)
3. Click on the desired link from the Results box
   (for me, “Nottingham, East Midlands, England, United Kingdom”)
4. You will now dimly see your desired location on the map
   [my view in your browser]
   (there is a slider next to the Base Layer option box which will adjust the contrast of the base map)
5. Click the ‘+’ and/or drag the map until you have the correct territory before you in the screen
6. Click on the View dropdown & choose “Addresses”
   (there are a lot of other options, but that has been my activity all this year)
7. Click the “Buildings” checkbox OFF to allow the errors to be seen
8. Click on an error within the map to show that selection in the RHS selection panel. If you use JOSM & have the RemoteControlPlugin installed (not needed if > v3715) + JOSM is already running, then clicking on the icon will switch JOSM to the current view + load the data (I haven’t tested that yet). Icons are also provided for iD + for Potlatch2.

It was mostly very useful for finding + fixing errors in my mapping. I found only 2 useless aspects:-

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On my final day mapping Porchester Gardens last Tuesday 25 October (the day before my birthday) (67, since you ask) I photographed & recorded the name of a house near the top of Sandford Road. Only long afterwards did the name of the building strike home: “Coronation Villa”.

Porchester Gardens was divided into lots for allotments & houses following it’s purchase on 26 March 1887 (history: [1], [2]). The first house is generally reckoned at 1889, and single houses were built on each square in the Gardens in the 10 years or so that followed purchase†. Odd houses were built throughout the next years, but it was the period between the 2 World Wars (1920s & 1930s) that saw the true spurt of building as gardening allotments were abandoned & houses built on each plot (all except one).

I find it very interesting to track the history of building, but the difficulty is to find the start_date for enough houses (especially the old ones). And that is where the building-name comes in, and exercising little grey cells…

This house can be seen in Google StreetView (it’s the double-fronted detached house with a blue door, but I cannot show that here). Here is the panel-name (not very clear):

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No-one seems to remove spam anymore. Here are the latest turds:

• عمليات طفل الأنبوب و الحقن المجهري في تونس (user: DR Skander Ben Alaya)
  (translation: “operations tube children and ICSI in Tunisia”)
  (spam for a Tunisian-based gynaecological clinic, supposedly from one of it’s doctors)
• Globale Protection (user: Globale Protection)
  (spam for web security company based in the Ivory Coast, Africa)
• Надувной мешок Lamzac от “Junkstore” (user: Junkstore)
  (spam for UA company Junkstore)
  (zero map edits since 5 Oct; pure spam)

Sat 29 Oct update: these 3 removed (thanks)

Here is the Kent Road big brother to the stone/metal guardians that have featured recently ([1],[2],[3],[4]) in these diaries:—

The photo above required digital zoom to be able to show it closely. Here is a more distant shot in better quality:—

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In Mysterious Markers (22 Oct) I showed the following ancient markers from the NCWW:

Really, this was a case of “Nothing to see here, please move on” as they were simply older variations on the modern “Sluice Valve” (SV) & “Fire Hydrant” (H) ‘grave-stone’ wall plates used by Severn Trent elsewhere in Nottingham. As escada pointed out in the comments, both hydrants and sluice-valves can be mapped (though currently shown only on the specialist osmhydrant.org or openfiremap.org). The kicker came in a comment from Andy Mackey, giving a link to a blog post from Chris Hill in 2012. A 2016 comment in that blog post said that the UK authorities consider mapping Fire Hydrants to be a terrorist act (no kidding):

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For those that do not already realise: I appear to be as obsessed with the stone creatures that Nottingham householders use to guard their homes as they are. Here is the latest one from Robinson Road, Porchester Gardens:—

Current values for Porchester Gardens’ houses seem to be somewhere north of £250,000 GBP each (5-bedroom detached houses are common on those slopes). With more than 800 properties in that neighbourhood, the total value is climbing rapidly towards the £billion GBP mark.

Of course, there’s always someone that will let the side down…

The latest survey of Porchester Gardens — just another couple of days surveying before it should be completed — has unearthed more of these lead markers and, possibly, has answered what they are. Here are two pictures from today’s trip [1] [2]:

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Further to the Marshall Hill gargoyles that were featured here in August 2016, today we have 2 rather more distant gargoyles that guard the top of a garage annex. Their distance from the ground, time of day & equipment available to me meant that I had to shoot them against the light. However, I do feel that the Autumn back-light & digital zoom-induced blur actually enhance their menace rather delightfully:

Mapping houses is a very slow business. I’ve done almost nothing else during the last 7 months as a full-time job, and have placed several thousand houses on the OSM map, yet that is less than two postcodes in Nottingham (NG3 + NG4). So, my experience is limited. In spite of this, out of the 2,800 photos (126.1 km) that I’ve uploaded to Mapillary in that time, a good number of them feature garages. Like this recent shot:

The above garages are in a reasonable condition, and that is probably due to them being overlooked from their owner’s houses. Far more often they are incredibly broken down & shoddy. And mostly disused, probably due to them being ideal burglar bait. Car owners prefer to park close to their house, and all the streets that I map on an evening are chock-a-block with cars parked up on the kerb and/or parked on hard-standing which has replaced the house front garden.

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Mysterious Marker #1

Another couple of these very odd markers marked with a capital V (or in this case SV): (MM#2; MM#3). All are stored on the OSM map as a “boundary_marker”, even though I’m certain that they are not. But what are they?

At the corner of Moore Road & Bennett Road; inscription is “SV”, then either “NCWW” or “NGWW”:

At the corner of Dale Avenue & Rowland Avenue; inscription is less clear:

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My father loved a good natter and I was born & grew up in Hull (a major sea-port in the East of England); these are two of my excuses for being able to talk the hind legs off a donkey. I do find it, however, to be a major asset whilst mapping as long as it is married with active listening (as we shall see shortly).

It was perfectly normal in my youth to strike up a conversation with a perfect stranger at a bus-stop. Or rather, normal for Hull. Indeed, on one of my first visits to London as a teenager (late 1960s) I was blanked by someone when I asked for directions, and was so upset by their ignorance that I chased after them & said in a loud voice “EXCUSE ME ..!”. I quickly learnt that such stand-offish behaviour was normal for London.

Nottingham is halfway between Hull & London and is capable of displaying either kind of reaction (warm or cold, with Hull as a warm place & London as most cold) (which makes Nottingham a bit tepid, of course). Nottingham folks have proven to respond very readily to my questions about their neighbourhood and have indulged my nosiness (another vital personal asset) without a qualm once they have settled themselves to my reasons. Intelligence supplied from householders is the very best asset for every mapper.

Today’s small snippet of such intelligence concerns a rockery protected by CC&R (a small bet: that this is the only one like this on the UK map).

CC&R:

Declaration of Covenants, Conditions, and Restrictions (CC&Rs) … the rules of your neighbourhood (as found within House Deeds)

I was paying a second visit to a service road at the bottom of Anne’s Close, Porchester Gardens. The householder from the end-of-terrace house was busy with a couple of others hauling wheelbarrows along a footpath that I’d mapped on my first visit. The state of that walk at the back of the houses had to be seen to be believed:

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Most spam gets quickly dealt with, but these three got through:
(later spam added Saturday + Sunday 8,9 Oct):

• spammy-link from Italian Wine Online (now gone)
• Inflatable bag Lamzac from “Junkstore” (Ukrainian spam; finally removed 29 Oct)
• Papier by yourfoto (now gone)

All the houses on that side of the street are even-numbers, but Number 45, Moore Road is different from the others in more than one way. The most obvious thing is that, apart from a garden shed, there arn’t any buildings on the plot at all. The space bounded by hedges is identical to all neighbouring plots (check the map). The photograph above lets you see in a glance all that was at one time available to the folks of Nottingham town:— a plot of land for them to grow stuff on.

Nottingham was a highly dangerous town on 26 March 1887 when Porchester Gardens began. The reason that the town was dangerous was because of water-born disease (dysentry, etc.). Far too many folks were crammed into far too small a space, whilst their medical men were ignorant of the basic facts of their own trade. A garden like the one above was an opportunity to grow fresh food & enjoy fresh air & water. [I published a more complete story of Porchester Gardens here in June]

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It’s a house at the Porchester Road end of Moore Road in Porchester Gardens, Nottingham. Now, I have to warn you in advance: Moore Road is a rich vein for English oddness. My last post was based on the smallest road in Porchester Gardens and, naturally enough, it is also off Moore Road (although at the other end, near Westdale Road West).

Anyway, you have your warning. I’ve just started putting Moore Road houses up on the map, and there are lots of odd things that I can choose to show. The first (strictly the second) is the very first house on the corner of Porchester Road and Moore Road. It looks fairly normal from Porchester Road, but round the corner on Moore Road it has an abutment and the abutment is castellated (for lovers of brick porn notice the Tamworth Blue Brick used both as a damp-proof course and also as decoration; very nice - the road is falling away from Porchester Road down the hill, so that damp-proof level is rather high at this point):—

(excellent!)

…is called Ward Avenue and it is now back on the map. Here is the view from Moore Road, looking up the Avenue:

Those gates on the right are for a house on Moore Road and the fence straight ahead is the end of the road, which may help to show just how short this road is (there is only one house on the road; you can just see the left-hand front of the house tucked around the end on the right). On the other side of the fence on the left is Westmoore Close, and the reason that Ward Avenue has only just been re-instated onto the map is that a couple of years ago the straight bit of Westmoore was mistakenly renamed to Ward Avenue. Whoops.

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A chap on Porchester Road has had quite some fun with his garden:—

(love the Meercats) (again!)

… See full entry

Resistance is Futile 1

More tales from the slopes of the Earl of Carnarvon’s old stomping ground, formerly known as Marshall Hill and now known as Porchester Gardens.

What we are going to see here is the tale of a householder on Ethel Avenue that wanted to demolish his old cottage, which sits on a 0.16 hectare site, and replace it with 3 new 4-bedroom houses. In pursuit of that he has uprooted almost every green thing on the site (making it a wasteland), blocked access to a green way and received written objections from (almost) every neighbour. The application has been turned down, a judge has told him to restore the Public right-of-way & in response he is throwing a major-league strop, shrouding all his boundary with black plastic. Quite a tale. But first, some brief history of the area.

Marshall Hill was part of land enclosed by the Earl of Kingston (1672), sold in entirety by Kingston’s heirs to Carnarvon (1912), and sold in lots to Nottingham citizens that wanted allotments for gardens (1887). Messrs Samuel Robinson, Charles Bennett and David Whittingham acted as guarantors for the latter action (the names of these three are known by householders throughout this 130 acre (52.6 hectares) neighbourhood). Only 2 years later roads began to be laid out & houses built on the plots; that really began to take off in the period following the Great War (1920s & 1930s).

Two things that, in my experience, feature a lot in Porchester Gardens are unadopted roads and Public rights of way; this little tale has both:

… See full entry

Mapping deep in the heart of Porchester Gardens, Mapperley (named after the 3rd Earl of Carnarvon, who sold the land) (from ‘Baron Porchester’, his 1st title), and here is a little of what some of it looks like:

Just around the corner from where I took that view is the bungalow of a chap that used to have an Ash Tree in his garden. Now I love Ash Trees, and I think that many other Englishmen think the same.They are unique for having young branches that are very straight & supple and thus are perfect for making arrows (classically a yard (900cms) long). It was English arrows married with the Longbow that saw victory for Edward III at Crécy, Poitiers & Henry V at Agincourt. However, Englishmen may love them, but French aristos & bureaucrats do not.

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Last weekend I was down in Ware again to baby-sit my grandchildren (‘babysit’? at 14 & 11? maybe not). Mum had the opportunity for a hen-night away (or was it a wedding? I forget) and as a single mum gets almost zero chances for time to herself. She had all the other days covered but needed someone for Sunday so I got the call. As a grandparent you are a whore for your grandkids (pay attention! I’m trying to pass some wisdom across here) so there was never any doubt that I’d say ‘yes’.

We had a fantastic day together. I suggested seeing a film on the evening & Mickey suggested Kubo And The Two Strings. Wow! What an inspired suggestion! Someone on twitter (kubothemovie) said:

Well, Kubo and the two strings just about blew my ruddy socks off. Thank god the kids spotted it and dragged me along.

My sentiments precisely. It is rated PG but make no mistake, this will thoroughly satisfy every human with a living heart, soul & spirit. Go watch it.

The following day was Monday, 26 Sep.. After making sure that they got away for school on time I faced a 2 hour journey back up the Great North Road to Nottingham in time to meet a British Gas salesman to examine my deceased boiler. Just enough time to map a couple more streets in Ware.

I mentioned last time that the King George Fields area where they live has homes built in the 1930s – the same period as for much of Carlton NG3 & NG4 (and for the country as a whole, as the period following WWI saw a tremendous expansion in the housing stock) (just in time for the Nazis to come along and bomb it all flat again during the second half).

… See full entry