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The Postcode Finder is a tool developed to encourage the addition of UK address data and postcodes into the OSM database. By providing a useful search and navigation facility, address data is usable by the consumer. The talk will focus on details of the data processing needed to put things into a useful format as well as challenges faced when presenting the information in a useful way. How to use the tool itself will also be covered as well as thoughts on future direction with adding new features to complement the existing tools. http://milliams.dev.openstreetmap.org/postcodefinder/ This is my talk from State of the Map 2013 on Friday the 6th of September at 16:50.
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The Open Postcode Finder
Matt WilliamsMilliams
● Aiming to be a sort of 'replacement' of the Royal Mail
Postcode Finder using only open data.● Allows search by postcode or address.● By default only searches OpenStreetMap data.● Will search OS Code-Point® Open if no match is found in
OSM.
Searching
● If you search for a valid postcode you receive a list of all houses with the postcode as well as an inset map showing the area
● If there's no matching OSM houses, you'll just get the map (from OS Code-Point Open)
● Searching by addressworks similarly
● All houses in results list are hyperlinks to an address page
Address Page
● There is an address page for each extracted address from the OSM database showing the address map and postal address
● The street name is a link to all houses on that street
● The postcode is a link to all houses with that postcode
● You can also get a direct link to the relevant object in the OSM database
Technical
● Offline C++ processing tool
– Uses the fantastic Osmium
– Builds up logical street from the disparate nodes, ways and relations
– Also tracks errors.
● A web application for the user interface
– http://milliams.dev.openstreetmap.org/postcodefinder/
– Uses Django, GeoDjango, PostgreSQL and PostGIS
Uses
● Aims to (one day) be a usable product for postcode searches
– Very reliant on OSM data
● Provides a view into the OSM data which is normally hidden
– This encourages people to add postcodes and addresses to OSM
● Has proved handy for merging in external data sources...
Land Registry House Price Data
● The Land Registry are publishing their 'price paid' data sets under the Open Government License
● This includes the price paid for a house (obviously) as well as a full address and postcode
● Using the postcode finder, we match up the entries into:
– Address match, wrong postcode
– Address match, no postcode
– No match
– Perfect match
● Then add the postcodes to the database manually
Progress in OSM UK
c.f. 29 million in PAF; we're now at ~1.1%
2011-03-24 2011-06-24 2011-09-24 2011-12-24 2012-03-24 2012-06-24 2012-09-24 2012-12-24 2013-03-24 2013-06-240
50,000
100,000
150,000
200,000
250,000
300,000
350,000
Houses with post codes
Progress in OSM UK
● But two years ago we were at 0.25% - we've quadrupled
● There's been no real coordinated effort in OSM to add postcodes and addresses to OSM
– There's been a lack of usable data sources
● With the Land Registry data and perhaps soon the Companies House data we can provide mappers with the information they need
● With the right tools and input data, we could increase coverage much more quickly
Thank you
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