Talk:Tag:amenity=loading dock

Amenity vs entrance?

It's odd that this type of entrance is under the amenity key instead of entrance=*. Is there a reason to do this instead of using entrance=loading_dock? It seems most of the uses of this tag were added recently in the USA, while entrance=service is much more common in general: https://taginfo.openstreetmap.org/tags/amenity=loading_dock#map vs https://taginfo.openstreetmap.org/tags/entrance=service#map --Jeisenbe (talk) 02:43, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Originally the tag was intended to be used "at the location of the loading dock." Which doesn't assume to only be the entrance (door) to the building. The part about it being tagged on the buildings way wasn't added to the article until after a preset was added for it in iD Editor at the suggestion of quincylvania. Personally, I was (and still am) against such language because to me a loading dock is an area where loading and unloading takes place. Similar to a slipway which isn't tagged on way of the water body. So, I tag loading docks at the end of the driveway. Which terminates in the middle of the loading or unloading area. If you want to look at like a slipway and as something useful for HGV routing (as I do) I think that's the "proper" way to map them. Otherwise, I don't see the point. Know one is using loading docks as a traditional place to go into a building and you wouldn't want your vehicles routed into the side of them anyway in most cases. Although, that's not possible if they aren't tagged on the driveway anyway. That said, I think also tagging the location of the actual door with something like entrance=service or entrance=delivery is perfectly fine. Since I don't think they are mutually exclusive. One describes an area as a feature of a roadway or whatever (a loading dock, again like slipways), while the other describes a feature of a building or enclosed area (the door or entrance), and I don't see anything conflicting about that. Again though, a loading dock isn't "a point where you can go into a building or enclosed area." You can even have loading docks inside buildings depending. So, IMO the language should changed back to what it was originally instead of being exclusive to the building way. As it's just wrong and not how the tag was intended to be used. --Adamant1 (talk) 07:36, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for the feedback, Jeisenbe and Adamant1! The page was quite terse and I tried to expand it based on my understanding and what makes sense to me and the logistics service I'm developing. To me, the loading dock is a hole in the wall (plus a door) for accessing a building, not unlike an entrance but a bit above the ground level. This is also what the photo shows on the page. Also, the page says that it should be mapped as a node which doesn't make sense as a restriction if it's supposed to represent an area. We can also link to Loading dock in Wikipedia for more photos and description. (The Wikipedia page also talks about "loading zones" which are areas.)

I don't want to map using entrance=service since it's not primarily for people, but entrance=loading_dock would make perfect sense to me. Meanwhile, an amenity would be something that I could search in a city, whereas here I know that I should deliver to a specific building and I'm looking for the most convenient way to get the goods inside.

One more option is door=loadingdock but it hasn't seen much use and I would like to use door=* to describe the kind of door the loading dock has instead.

Adamant1, could it work to tag the loading dock on the building outline and draw the driveway all the way to that point? This is normal for footways and doors, and it lets you calculate a route from your current position along the street network all the way to the building you need to deliver to. As for loading docks inside a building, I see two options: consider the driveway inside the building to be a tunnel and not really inside the building, and then it's a normal entrance (to the building:part=*), *or* use an indoor tagging scheme - is there one for parking halls, garages etc.?

--TuukkaH (talk) 19:33, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

I agree with Tuukka. entrance=loading_dock would be more descriptive than amenity=loading_dock. -- T99 (talk) 09:53, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

A lot of the time loading docks aren't really entrances. At least not in any way that matters. But this has been approved in the meantime so it's kind of a moot point either way. --Adamant1 (talk) 10:07, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

Capacity

I added capacity=* to the main page. This is a trivial addition and I hope nobody minds. --T99 (talk) 09:56, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

Well done!

I've already indicated it in the voting of the original proposal: this is one of the best wiki pages I've ever come across. Its content is well thought-through; the definitions are complete and unambiguous; the explanations are clear and concise; the pictures are suitable, adequately edited, nice to look at, sorted from simple to complex and aligned with the content of the page. The links are useful. No typos, flawless grammar, comprehensive language, no unnecessary tech-talk. This page sets a great example for other pages in the wiki. Really well done Kylenz and all other contributors. --Martianfreeloader (talk) 11:31, 4 December 2023 (UTC)