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Hi all.
I want to spend some of my spare time adding residential buildings and their addresses to the OSM database. The area of interest is Plovdiv, Bulgaria. The problem is that most of the residential buildings are apartment blocks, with an address like

Block 123, entrance B, floor 2, apartment 3, Plovdiv, Bulgaria, Post Code 4023

The addresses of the blocks are completely independent of the street name or number, and they are unique inside the city limits. Also the apartment numbers in each Entrance start from 1, like a separate building.

Which tags do I use, and also do I tag the polygon or use address nodes for each entrance?
Should I use the following tags:
//for the polygon
building=apartments

//for an address node for each entrance addr:housename=Block 123
addr:entrance=B //This is needed separately and NOT part of the housename, as there are blocks such as '81' and '81A' that are completely separate buildings, with Entrances that are also independent. addr:post_code=4023
addr:city=Plovdiv

Please advice me on the best way to add the addresses, as I want to do it right, and not for someone to have to fix my mess.Thank you!

asked 01 Mar '12, 20:24

Vivo's gravatar image

Vivo
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accept rate: 0%

Just to mention, you can ask question at the bulgarian forum - http://forum.openstreetmap.org/viewforum.php?id=57 We are very few and we will be glad to see more active bulgarians :)

(06 Mar '12, 07:28) ivanatora

It seems you did your research well. ;)
Use building=apartments for the building outlines.

From what you write, floor and apartment number seem to be something for indoor mapping, not part of an address.

If a single building has more than one number, add them separately (one per entrance, as you suggest).
You can combine them with building=entrance or create them as separate nodes. I am not sure what is better. For the entrance name addr:entrance seems reasonable, it even has a few uses already. Having a complete address on each entrance is a good idea for routing and similar purposes.
At first it seemed odd that a single housename should be used multiple times (not once on the building itself), but city, street and other information is used multiple times as well...

Having said that, I have to admit, that I contradict my previous answer on similar question. You probably wont't go wrong either way (all on entrance/housename on building, entrance names on entrances).
Also consider adding generic name=* on the building if it has one.

That is all from me, if I were to think about this any longer, I would have to come up with some complicated relation based addressing scheme that would perfectly describe any address without duplicating information and that no one, me including, would understand.

permanent link

answered 01 Mar '12, 21:25

LM_1's gravatar image

LM_1
3.3k335188
accept rate: 10%

I read your previous answer to which you linked above, just before I asked my question. However I felt that there are differences in the addressing, so I asked a specialised question, describing the specific problem.
And yes, floor and apartment number are things only the postman worries about. From a geographical point of view in the context of maps, all you need is the block number and entrance letter in order to locate the address.

(02 Mar '12, 11:07) Vivo
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question asked: 01 Mar '12, 20:24

question was seen: 17,159 times

last updated: 06 Mar '12, 07:28

NOTICE: help.openstreetmap.org is no longer in use from 1st March 2024. Please use the OpenStreetMap Community Forum