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Distinct from public post offices, these shops are private businesses that ship parcels. Many shops offer other services -- the rental of mailbox addresses to receive and hold mail, and office services similar to shop=copyshop. It seems like the most common tagging in use is simply amenity=post_office but I feel it would be preferable to distinguish public postal services from these private shops. Maybe add post_office:type=private or post_office:type=shipping_centre? Or is there some value of the shop key that would be better? shop=shipping? In the USA there are chains of shops branded and operated by a particular shipping company (eg The UPS Store) but there are thousands of independent shops that will offer customers various shipping choices such as FedEx, UPS, DHL, standard US Mail, and sometimes local couriers. Is there a way to tag which shipping services a shop offers? |
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After some pondering and querying, I've come to the conclusion that it's better not to use amenity=post_offce for these shipping stores. One clear reason for me is that the tagging on post offices is so inconsistent that there would be no reliable way to distinguish USPS post offices from shipping stores tagged with amenity=post_office. I've gone with shop=shipping, which isn't on the wiki but seems to have a lot of use already. Here's how I plan to tag a USP Store: And an independent shipping shop: I'll try to get around to writing a proper proposal when I get a chance... You ask a good question about how to tag the different postal/shipping services places offer, but using shop=shipping doesn't resolve that and (as you say) contradicts the wiki and current practice. 70 uses of shop=shipping is not very large, and even some of those seem to be companies shipping freight, not individual parcels
(11 May '18, 14:52)
neuhausr
I agree with much of the logic, degrading the meaning of post office would be detrimental for many uses of OSM. Thinking about the same issue, I would probably have chosen amenity=shipping_office or amenity=parcel_office (an old phrase now) to keep the relationship with post offices clearer.
(12 May '18, 14:13)
SK53 ♦
As far as I can tell, shop=shipping does not contradict the wiki. Neither the post_office page nor the shop page addresses the issue at all. I found shop=shipping discussed on the talk page of the shop tag. It's not widely used, but it seems to be the best fit of what is in use. The wiki's definition of shop is "A place selling retail products or services" and I feel these qualify. Certainly they feel like shops to me. Amenity would be fine too, but I feel that shop=shipping is succinct and clearer in meaning. (A commercial freight shipping company should not be tagged shop=*, as it's not a retail service. Maybe office=shipping or industrial=shipping would be appropriate.)
(07 Jun '18, 00:25)
jmapb
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