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Ancestry.ca uses Mapbox which uses OpenStreetMap Two cities I use all the time (Fort William & Port Arthur) amalgamated in 1970 to Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada. 48.3809, -89.2477 Mapbox in Ancestry mislocates both Fort William and Port Arthur at aprox 45.95, -81.78 How can this be rectified?

asked 26 Jan '21, 22:18

fyodor26's gravatar image

fyodor26
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The situation in OpenStreetMap looks reasonable:

https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=12/48.4064/-89.2249

I don't know the specifics, but I believe Mapbox does not limit their maps to OpenStreetMap data.

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answered 27 Jan '21, 00:19

maxerickson's gravatar image

maxerickson
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accept rate: 32%

Thanks. Yes location is correct. Mapbox directed me here. I guess I need to go back to them

(27 Jan '21, 14:39) fyodor26

Are you looking at a map, or is there some place feature built into the entries on the site? If it's the latter, I wonder if Ancestry.ca is using some other data source for the places?

(27 Jan '21, 21:20) maxerickson

When there are locations noted in an Ancestry profile and you open the Lifestory tab, small maps are displayed in the timeline. In the bottom left corner of all maps it has a mapbox logo and in the bottom right corner it says Mapbox and OpenStreetMap, both preceded by the copyright sign (c in a circle) Fort William and Port Arthur always show up in Georgian Bay about 500 miles east of their true location

(27 Jan '21, 23:16) fyodor26

There is the possibility that Ancestry.ca is looking up the location from some other source and then displaying the Mapbox map based on that result.

(and it can be using Mapbox to lookup the location and that is what is wrong)

Is there a label shown on the map? And then if so, is it similar in style to other labels?

(28 Jan '21, 02:10) maxerickson

Yes the bottom right corner of all maps on Ancestry have a Mapbox logo. A circle with a pin in it and the word mapbox in all lower case next to the circle

(28 Jan '21, 16:03) fyodor26
1

Yeah, I understand that the maps are coming from Mapbox. I'm saying that it is a possibility that the website is using additional data sources to determine what that map shows.

An example of that would be a site that had a list of place names and coordinates that looked in the list for coordinates and then showed a map based on the coordinates in the list. The map shown would be wrong if the coordinates in the list where wrong, and there would be nothing the map provider could do about it, because the coordinates are from another source.

I'm not saying that is what is happening, I don't know what Ancestry.ca has implemented, the point is that the choice of the coordinates shown may not be tied to the map provider, it may be the website.

(28 Jan '21, 17:31) maxerickson
showing 5 of 6 show 1 more comments

Like what has been answered, this week I noticed I added a few place=*s that are already found on the Mapbox outline preview at iD/RapiD's wide zoom level. You should direct you issue to them directly.

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answered 27 Jan '21, 07:11

Kovoschiz's gravatar image

Kovoschiz
2.4k31147
accept rate: 16%

edited 27 Jan '21, 07:16

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question asked: 26 Jan '21, 22:18

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last updated: 28 Jan '21, 17:31

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