OpenStreetMap completeness evaluation – March 2010

The opening of Ordnance Survey datasets at the beginning of April 2010 is bound to fundamentally change the way OpenStreetMap (OSM) information is produced in the UK. So just before this major change start to influence OpenStreetMap, it is worth evaluating what has been achieved so far without this data. It is also the time to update the completeness study, as the previous ones were conducted with data from March 2008 and March 2009.

Following the same method that was used in all the previous studies (which is described in details here), the latest version of Meridian 2 from OS OpenData was downloaded and used and compared to OSM data which was downloaded from GeoFabrik. The processing is now streamlined with MapBasic scripts, PostGIS scripts and final processing in Manifold GIS so it is possible to complete the analysis within 2 days. The colour scheme for the map is based on Cynthia Brewer and Mark Harrower‘s  ColorBrewer 2.

OSM Completeness 03/10

By the end of March 2010, OpenStreetMap coverage of England grown to 69.8% from 51.2% a year ago. When attribute information is taken into account, the coverage grown to 24.3% from 14.7% a year ago. The chart on the left shows how the coverage progressed over the past 2 years, using the 4 data points that were used for analysis – March 2008, March 2009, October 2009 and March 2010. Notice that in terms of capturing the geometry less than 5% are now significantly under mapped when compared to Meridian 2. Another interesting aspect is the decline in empty cells – that is grid cells that don’t have any feature in Meridian 2 but now have features from OSM appearing in them. So in terms of capturing road information for England, it seems like the goal of capturing the whole country with volunteer effort was within reach, even without the release of Ordnance Survey data.

On the other hand, when attributes are included in the analysis, the picture is very different.

OSM Completeness (with Attributes) 03/10

The progression of coverage is far from complete, and although the area that is empty of features that include street or road name in Meridian 2 is much larger, the progress of OSM mappers in completing the information is much slower. While the geometry coverage gone up by 18.6% over the past year, less than 10% (9.6% to be precise) were covered when attributes are taken into account. The reason for this is likely to be the need to carry a ground survey to find the street name without using other copyrighted sources.

The attribute area is the one that I would expect will show the benefits of Ordnance Survey data release to OSM mapping. Products such as StreetView and VectorMap District can be used to either copy the street name (StreetView) or write an algorithm that will copy the street name and other attributes from a vector data set – such as Meridian 2 or VectorMap District.

Of course, this is a failure of the ‘crowd’ in the sense that as this bit of information previously required an actual visit on the ground and it was a more challenging task than finding the people who are happy to volunteer their time to digitise maps.

As in the previous cases, there are local variations, and the geography of the coverage is interesting. The information includes 4 time points, so the most appropriate visualisation is one that allows for comparison and transition between maps. Below is a presentation (you can download it from SlideShare) that provides maps for the whole of England as well as 5 regional maps, roughly covering the South West, London, Birmingham and the Midlands, Manchester and Liverpool, and Newcastle upon Tyne and the North West.

If you want to create your own visualisation, of use the results of this study, you can download the results in a shapefile format from here.

For a very nice visualisation of Meridian 2 and OpenStreetMap data – see Ollie O’Brien SupraGeography blog .