Talk:Tag:leisure=park

Park type

park:type=* should be added to the schema. Values are:
park:type=regional_park
park:type=community_park
park:type=neighborhood_park, etc. (see Taginfo for current uses)

parktype=* and park_type=* are also used, but most values entered are not "real" park types, unlike the values for park:type=* above--Ponzu 07:31, 12 April 2011 (BST)

The word "type" is to be avoided in a tagging schemes. Anything can have a type, and "type" can refer to any kind of attribute. It's too tempting a word to go for, and too ambiguous.

Also we have a convention of "tag chaining" which would seem to be more appropriate for this kind of categorisation. So something like: "leisure=park" + "park=regional" I suggest would fit better with the way tags have always been designed in the past. Notice how this also avoids any colon or underscore characters.

-- Harry Wood 16:38, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Any chance of this getting revived and used somehow? I think park=regional etc sounds good and it would help define park types better. Which is badly needed. Adamant1 (talk) 16:02, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

Slim chance. People don't read documentation and the voting process doesn't work. Just use the tag. T99 (talk) 17:06, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

Please see this section below, which suggests beginning to merge park:type and operator/owner tags. Stevea (talk) 20:35, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

Both SteveA and I have edited a park:type page to expand further expand on the tagging scheme and to better explain its depreciation in light of better tagging options. It would be good if further discussion goes happens on it's talk page. --Adamant1 (talk) 03:41, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

That talk page's active proposal is now v2. v1 can be ignored except for the introductory paragraph for reference at how we fit together the pieces of "low hanging fruit 1 & 2" identified there. The first one, city_park, seems maybe "one afternoon worth of work" (at least for California) though there may be some ticklish categorization questions (one likely replacement being ownership=municipal). Again, this is if you're wanting to help the specific task of cleaning up (to deprecation) the park:type tag, now at around 1500 instances. The idea is to clean up tagging "up" on the way "out" of the tag (deprecating it while moderinzing tagging). Stevea (talk) 01:48, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

ownership=* captures part of this semantic, this conflates with the park_level talking point. Using that tag with frequent values of state and national seems easy to cede; shedding that meaning from the park tag helps. Stevea (talk) 22:33, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

Why only relations?

Why is this tag marked as only usable with relations? I've always used it in lines (areas, actually) with no problems, either on Potlatch or iD and they render correctly on Mapnik. --Nighto (talk) 21:33, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

I think you've misunderstood the icons, the third on is for usable on areas (mouse over it to see) not relations SK53 (talk) 22:01, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

Oops! You're absolutely right. Thanks! =) --Nighto (talk) 22:27, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

Is it supposed to be used on nodes?

The icons on the right say it shouldn't be used on nodes (and apparently that's how JOSM sees it, too) whereas the "How to map" section says "set a node _or_ draw and area". This should be made consistent. Meanwhile I'll just set it on a node that I found mapped with only tourism=attraction named "Nam Dong Park", but it's not obvious from aerial images what area is actually covered by that park. Mbethke (talk) 05:50, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Should be resolved now. Areas are preferable, but nodes can be used as a last resort Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 09:32, 27 April 2019 (UTC)

Street landscaping?

Is this the correct tag to use for areas around highways, streets and trails landscaped with planted grass, bark, shrubs and small trees? The setting is usually very similar to proper parks and the areas are maintained by the Parks&Rec department but you are generally not supposed to enter these areas for leisure. --T99 (talk) 08:51, 3 November 2015 (UTC)

No, planting trees/flowers between carriageways of a major road is not making this area a park Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 09:27, 27 April 2019 (UTC)

Parks which are not municipal. Example?

Currently the page says "Parks are often but not always municipal." What's a good example of a correctly mapped leisure=park which is not municipal?

How about this private park managed by a homeowners' association (not by a city or a county). --T99 (talk) 19:28, 8 September 2016 (UTC)

In the data I can see plenty of examples of (what I'd consider to be) incorrect use of the leisure=park covering big rural areas, so it would be good to get clarity on that, and give an example on the page.

-- Harry Wood (talk) 14:26, 12 July 2016 (UTC)

Morden Hall Park in London belongs to the National Trust.--Andrew (talk) 17:58, 12 July 2016 (UTC)

Ah OK "municipal" as in belonging to the government. That's another dimension on the meaning of that sentence. I was thinking of municipal as in "in a town/city". Maybe the sentence could be clarified "Parks are often but not always municipal (government owned)"

What I'm actually trying to work out is whether it's legit to have the leisure=park tag on a big area in a rural location outside of any town or city, as in "national park" big wide rural space.

It is being used as such, and it means this tag gets used on two different types of thing with very different character. I did write this section on the page to try to avoid this Tag:leisure=park#National Parks but some people are confused by that, because the rural area is not necessarily designated as a "national park" (and so it feels wrong to tag it as such)

-- Harry Wood (talk) 12:50, 8 September 2016 (UTC)

Parks which consist mostly of natural ecosystems (as opposed to man-made landscapes) should probably be tagged as leisure=nature_reserve. Example: Traylor Ranch Nature Reserve --T99 (talk) 19:28, 8 September 2016 (UTC)

I'm continuing from below, "Definition of parks." This is USA-centric but might work in other places: let's assume that boundary=national_park is a correct tag for "National Parks" (and "State Parks"), but we shouldn't tag that/those leisure=park — pretty easy to assume, yes? That still leave wide open whether county parks, especially as they may be quite large rural (not urban) areas (e.g. Joseph D Grant County Park — and it's likely there are even larger ones) should get the tag leisure=park. I'm genuinely asking, as it's quite confusing: people have been tagging such "parks" (even large ones) with leisure=park for many years. Are we saying that is incorrect and it is desirable for OSM to restrict this tag to "urban" parks only? We would need to sharpen up our definition (maybe use the word "urban" if that's what we mean, instead of "municipal" which is a wonky precision definition that limits to a city or town). Maybe it's time to explicitly say on the Page that national parks (and state parks?) don't deserve this tag, but are better tagged with boundary=national_park. It seems that would go a long way to both more clearly stating what OSM means to do with this tag as well as better avoid future confusion, because it is used on "larger, non-urban" parks. As it stands now, such large parks (even national parks) really do meet the definition as we state it today. Stevea (talk) 19:19, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

Definition of parks

What constitutes a park needs to clarified better. At this point the definition is to wide. Which has led to a lot of miss tagging and bickering over what can be tagged as a park or not. If nothing else, something like "A park is an area of natural, semi-natural or planted space set aside for human enjoyment and recreation or for the protection of wildlife or natural habitats" which is from Wikipedia should be added so things like food courts in shopping centers, grassy areas outside of corporate offices don't get tagged as parks. Either way though, it should be clear what exactly a park is so its not just "an open space where people are." It should also be clear how a park is different from meadow, grassland, or a lone trail. If a park requires trees/grass, the wiki should explicitly say so. It should also be clear what alternatives there are, like place=square and when the appropriate time to use the alternatives are. Some places public places like zoos, fairgrounds, and amphitheaters are tagged as park because of the ambiguity, which they obviously aren't, and it could be as much due to them not being listed as alternatives then anything else. Having a clearer definition of a park would probably help.

Also what constitutes a municipal vs private park should better defined. Currently there are a bunch grassy areas outside apartment complexes, commercial areas, and front yard lawns getting tagged as parks. Its hard to dispute that they shouldn't be tagged that way when the wiki definition is not clear on it. Saying "A park is an area of open space provided for recreational use" isn't enough and it should be stated that to qualify for a park the area has to be usable by the general public and created for that purpose. In my opinion if the general public can't use the spot as a leisure area, it shouldn't be tagged as park. If people have to pay for access to the area or its main use is retail, it shouldn't qualify. It should be clear how parks are different from parklets or other similar temporary "open urban spaces" also. --Adamant1 (talk) 17:37, 17 July 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia does not define the meaning of tags in OSM. You are welcome to improve the documentation of this tag (and it could really use improvement) but this needs to aim at documenting what leisure=park means in OSM and not what it should mean according to some subjective opinion.

The main problem with leisure=park is that many mappers view this based on some culture specific understanding of what a park is which does not necessarily have much to do with what leisure=park is primarily used for. See also Talk:Tag:landuse=recreation ground.

--Imagico (talk) 18:14, 17 July 2018 (UTC)

I'm aware of that. That's why I said "something like." I don't want the definition to be subjective either, that's why I brought this up in the first place. There still needs to be a better starting point to get to the definition then currently exists though. Hence the Wikipedia reference. Especially since as you say there is the cultural use of the tagging going on, which is hard to get around. It seems like other tags aren't beholden to that though and in most of conflicts I have had over the use of the tag it seems more like an issue of not being properly defined more then anything. I read the debate going on in landuse=recreation_ground. Its very similar, but I feel like "park" is a little less vague of a term and maybe a discussion about it wont get stalled out like it did there. If only a few of my complaints get resolved and only a few people give input on it that would at least be some progress. I'm really not sure how to improve the documentation myself at this point anyway. So id at least like some feedback and clarity before I do. --Adamant1 (talk) 19:10, 17 July 2018 (UTC)

IMHO, a private park is a park just as much as a public park is a park, like a private road is a road just as much as a public road is a road. Additional tags such as operator=* or access=* can be used to indicate other details, and the map renderer can use those tags to decide how to render the park. T99 (talk) 19:43, 17 July 2018 (UTC)

T99, I guess. For me private versus is more about ownership then usage. For instance, you can have a privately owned park that is still open to the public. So access tags wouldn't really be appropriate. Where as if its a privately owned "park" but also has private access, then its just something like a playground or grassy area in front of an apartment complex that only the residents can use and shouldn't be classified as a park. They same goes for "common" areas at universities in my opinion. There's also public places like universities that have private courtyards or common grassy leisure areas that are sometimes tagged as parks but I don't think they should count because they are open to the public. So I think the classification for private versus public as it relates to parks should account for both access and ownership. Otherwise, I might as well let the Pokemon Go mappers in my area have at it and turn all their front lawns into parks because them and their friends hangout there. The same could go for all the protected areas mapped as parks that shouldn't be because technically they are private access despite being publicly owned. The general public can't lounge around in the them or it would destroy the wildlife. Not to mention a lot of them are swamps. But yet they are still tagged as parks just due to being publicly owned land. At least I assume that's why. --Adamant1 (talk) 07:42, 21 July 2018 (UTC)

"Where as if its a privately owned "park" but also has private access, then its just something like a playground or grassy area in front of an apartment complex that only the residents can use and shouldn't be classified as a park" - not always. For example my city has a park that is clearly a park, but as access by a general public is blocked by its current owners Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 13:24, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

Mateusz Konieczny, thanks for the example. I guess there is an exception to every rule. In this case it sounds like since the park was originally meant for public use and is now closed, it should be considered abandoned instead of just private. So I don't it really qualifies for what I was saying, since know one uses it anymore. Although I get your general point. I still think a more clear definition of access, ownership, and what should or shouldn't be included as a park would be really helpful. The line on what to include should be drawn somewhere. Maybe ultimately the definition needs to partly be country based like road classifications partly are. Although I do think there are some universals. Id be interested to know what other thoughts, if any, you have on the subjects. --Adamant1 (talk) 03:14, 23 July 2018 (UTC)

There's a private park I've mapped https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/616232802 ; The land is privately owned by an oil & gas company, it was part of a power generation plant. When they tore down the plant there were ground & water contamination issues. The land was used for two parks: part of it to be used by the city for a public monuments park, (information plaques, static displays of bouy's propellers, cannons. and the other part (the conservancy) is private access to dues members from the surrounding homeowners. The city owns none of it, but both sides are clearly "park" to the average person's eyes. --DoctorSpeck (talk) 20:57, 27 April 2019 (UTC)

In my opinion (shared by most I have discussed it with over the last decade, all of them in the USA), if a public recreational area has the word "park" in its name, tagging it leisure=park is correct. (There are exceptions, these often present themselves as unanimously obvious). This includes county parks, state parks and national parks, even as this might seem to (but doesn't) violate the "Sentence #1 definition" on the Page: "A park is an area of open space provided for recreational use, usually designed and in semi-natural state with grassy areas, trees and bushes." Why doesn't it violate this? Because of Sentence #2: "Parks are often but not always municipal." (Municipal implies, but isn't always, something like city-level, or "about if not exactly admin_level=8"). Yes, it is also true (in the USA) that state parks and national parks (perhaps also, perhaps only) are tagged boundary=national_park, as this does render in Carto with a pretty green edge — people like to see their tags render (but it's OK if sometimes they don't). However, as we do not have boundary=state_park, boundary=county_park, boundary=city_park, boundary=private_park rendering, as the only one which does in this scheme is "national" (admin_level=2), people get stuck here. (Do remember, OSM consists of data, not rendering). In 2009, I began to develop a proposal to do this, perhaps merging somehow the concept of admin_level=*, but I scrapped it for precisely why admin_level=* exists: there is too much variation (in name) in the "levels" at which parks exist. "National (park), state, county, city/municipal, private..." differ all over the world and the tagging would become a cacophony. (Is it possible to better blend "park" with the 1 through 10 "levels" we use with admin_level=*, beyond the only equivalence we now have: boundary=national_park, admin_level=2 — which isn't explicitly tagged, as it is implicit in "national" — and "rendered in Carto with pretty green boundary?" I still imagine it is possible: state parks/4 render with a blue boundary, county parks/6 with orange-yellow, city parks/8 with red-pink...I welcome suggestions. I believe I was on the right track considering a new park_level=* tag, with values identical to those of admin_level=* in that jurisdiction). Yes, we also have leisure=nature_reserve and boundary=protected_area, complicating "simply park" into "IS it a park, or is it something else?" These are better tags to use on open space reserves, "conservation areas," et cetera. This is exceedingly complex all across the world, yet we do evolve our tagging strategies: look at boundary=protected_area and especially park:type potentially better evolving into operator/owner tagging, as that really is at least an important part of the semantic we wish to convey. However, sometimes park:type has very specific values that are partially not related to their (political) "level." For example, park_type=county_beach: is this a leisure=park or is this a natural=beach? Well, "sort of both," perhaps we agree to tag the former to enclose legal boundaries and the latter to capture the truly natural area (at least partly the landuse vs. landcover debate). Or how about park_type=city_monument, the entire property of which the city considers a "park" yet also calls a monument, and there is a statue in the middle? We have established methods to tag these, we must be careful to not only use these more-precise strategies (some wiki-documented, some not and are simply a convention), but also to do our best to come to better agreement about what "correct" tagging is. (And document it). This can and does vary around the world, and it is likely correct that local/regional conventions will prevail in one area while others will in other areas. Yes, parks and their semantics are messy. Keep up the discussion, please. It may feel never-ending, but I feel things (slowly) get better. Stevea (talk) 21:26, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

"If a public recreational area has the word "park" in its name, tagging it leisure=park is correct. (There are exceptions, these often present themselves as unanimously obvious). This includes county parks, state parks and national parks" - Yellowstone National Park certainly is not a leisure=park. In fact nearly no national parks or landscape parks should be tagged leisure=park Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 10:11, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

Mateusz, I may have misspoken (mis-typed) when I said national parks are included in leisure=park, as I recognize we have tag boundary=national_park, widely used on exactly those entities and elastic enough to encompass state parks in the USA (and in fact IS tagged on state parks). However, the main reason I say this is by observing most national parks are not tagged with leisure=park. But, this begs the question: why is this? What is it in the definition of leisure=park that has caused us as OSM data editors to do this? Why do you say "certainly?" (It actually doesn't contradict the listed definition, and while I'm sorry for the double-negative, that means that Yellowstone does meet the definition, even if it and other national parks aren't tagged that way). Is is that we don't like seeing a light-green rendering in mapnik/Carto on such a large area? Is it that there is a picture of Central Park in New York City and "somehow" Yellowstone and other national parks don't intersect well in our minds that the two are the same thing ("an area of open space provided for recreational use...")? While I could be persuaded either way, I still don't know: WHY isn't Yellowstone a "park?" (Or "shouldn't be tagged that way"?) And why did you include the word "nearly" in your qualification? What makes those exceptions? I'm not being pedantic, I honestly want to know how these exceptions are formulated in people's minds when the definition says what the definition says. Stevea (talk) 15:05, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

leisure=park is intended (and used) for areas for recreation in cities with managed vegetation (things like Central Park as pictured on https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/File:3015-Central_Park-Sheep_Meadow.JPG ). Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 18:32, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

"doesn't contradict the listed definition" this is a problem and should be fixed. I attempted to improve a bit - what you think about my changes Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 18:32, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

"Is is that we don't like seeing a light-green rendering in mapnik/Carto on such a large area?" - no, it is not caused by tagging for renderer.

"And why did you include the word "nearly" in your qualification?" - because there may be some exception somewhere - for example some country may have extremely small national park protecting specific urban park Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 18:32, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

"don't intersect well in our minds that the two are the same thing" - yes. leisure=park AFAIK was always intended for urban parks, not national parks. Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 18:32, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

Mateusz, thank you much for your answers, especially your explanation of "nearly" (a very small urban national park is a quintessential and excellent example). Your answers are helpful (to me, I hope also to the wider dialog of others who read here), yet they also lean in the direction of "assumptions are made, yet 'how this happened' isn't well explained." This is what I wish to unravel: why it is you (and others) think "was always intended for urban parks, not national parks"? Is it because OSM has the tag boundary=national_park and "this" is something different? Is it because of your "AFAIK"? (That seems like an assumption, I'm not judging you for having one, I'm asking you where you get this). Is it because Central Park's Sheep Meadow is pictured and we should somehow think "urban park only"? (even though the definition says "parks are often, but not always municipal"). https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/User:Imagico says above OSM should not have definitions driven by what Wikipedia says. So, even though you quote Wikipedia's "urban park" definition, I'm not sure OSM should do that. Rather, I think it would be better to stress a more-clear definition here, in OSM's definition of leisure=park. How about this? (not carved in stone, rather an attempt to get closer to what we mean): we could better define what we mean by "municipal." (Strictly, that means "relating to a city or town"). "Municipal" doesn't intersect perfectly with "urban," yet people keep using the word "urban" with leisure=park, so maybe we can be more precise. Is "urban" a better word to put into our definition? I think so, let's call that a modest proposal we might consider, as it could make things more clear. Stevea (talk) 19:05, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

'Is it because of your "AFAIK"' - I am basing this on remembered discussions about how this tag should be used. I may be mistaken, and it may be worth checking on tagging mailing list whatever what I added to page is representing consensus of mappers. Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 21:29, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

'OSM should not have definitions driven by what Wikipedia says' - I agree, though in this case OSM concept and Wikipedia page seems to be matching at this moment (what is quite rare and may change once Wikipedia article is deleted, merged or edited), so I used synonym list from Wikipedia Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 21:29, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

I made some quite minor changes to the Page, essentially substituting "urban" for municipal where it added clarity to do so. I also explicitly said that we should instead use the boundary=national_park tag on those entities where it is appropriate, pointing to Mateusz' new section (and thanking him for it!). Stevea (talk) 19:46, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

OK, we've nested seven levels deep here as well as made some excellent edits to the page between us recently. While further posting to the tagging list is welcome, I think our conversations and edits here relatively well "self-document" what we have done. Further, these seem to do a very good job channeling the sentiments of what has been said (typed) here as well as your memory of wider consensus. Let's let it mellow for a while and the relatively minor changes we have made can (will?) further clarify, yet if anybody has something to say about them, they can say them here. Again, you are welcome to post to tagging list if you think it's a good idea. Thank you for fine collaboration and good work between us and others recently here. Stevea (talk) 21:45, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

Using the word "urban" rather than municipality seems to not be an accurate word for what you're going for. I can think of several parks within 25 miles of me that are surrounded by corn fields, but they have picnic shelters, sports fields, dog parks, open grassy play areas, playgrounds. These would by no means be considered "urban." But to define them as something other than parks seems quite wrong. --DoctorSpeck (talk) 20:40, 27 April 2019 (UTC)

It's to bad that whole discussion and the changes to the article happened within a day and people like me didn't have time to contribute anything to it before the changes were made. Oh well. Maybe it would be a good idea to decide on a change, then wait a week or whatever amount of time before implementing it in the article to see if anyone wants to add to it or critique something about it. As far as this discussion goes, for me the main reason I don't think national parks, or even state parks, qualify as parks is because of the "managed greenery" clause. For me, parks kind of a "you'll know it when you see/step in it" kind of thing. With national and state parks, there's no real way to tell when you are in one or not, because there's nothing "managed" about them. I could wonder into a national park or state park randomly and wouldn't even know it. That won't happen with a local park. 99% of the time, you'll always know when you enter a local park because it has grass, managed greenery, path's, etc etc. There's kind of a presumption of those things in a park. The singular reason someone goes to a local park is for recreation also. In state parks, there's lots of none recreational things that happen or at least things that are recerationally debatable in my mind.

For instance people go to them to hunt and fish for food. Which might be recreational in some sense, but in the same way a gym or a local shooting range is. Which don't get tagged as parks. There's also an implied question of leisure to what the tag is added to. Which they don't qualify under in my mind. There's nothing leisurely about hiking Yosemite or climbing El Capitan. They are hard things to do. People die doing them. Nobody dies in a local park unless it's a freak accident or crime. Also, major roads go through national and state parks . A lot of times people drive through them without getting out of the car to "recreate." Whereas, it's extremely rare a local park has a major freeway through it or that people just go through one without stopping.

To me, a park is sort of the middle ground between a public garden and like a state park. It's less managed and less leisurely then a public garden, but not as wild or rugged as a state/national park. You lay around in a local park without packing bug spray. You push your toddler in their cart through the place on a Sunday afternoon if you want. There's almost zero prep to it and you don't need to take anything. Whereas, in state/national parks, you have to do a lot of pre-planning, make reservations, pack a lot of gear, set things up when you get there, use a tiny little stove that's a hassle to set up for making meals or worry about finding fire wood. You have to manage things, like how much gas for the stove and water you used or how many hours of battery life your GPS unit has left. You could easily get lost on a path and fall into a ravine, be mulled by a bear, or just have a horrible time because you didn't test your tent out ahead of time and it wasn't rain proof. So you slept all night in a puddle of freezing cold water (it's happened to me a few times). Or maybe you go down a random path and stumble on a bunch of cultists in white hoods doing a seance, who want to sacrifice you to their goat god and you have to run for your life through poison ivy, but it's better then dying at the hands of a goat god. Even though your allergic to it and thought for a moment that maybe facing the goat god would be better then itching horribly for the rest of trip.

Anyway, A lot of that isn't leisurely or even really recreational. So, I don't think national/state parks should qualify as parks. Maybe some people leisurely enjoy them or do recreational things in them, but it's not their main purpose, nor is most of the things people do in them either of those things, or if they are like with hunting it's subjective. Whereas, with local (regional, urban, whatever you want to call them) parks it's the complete opposite. You only go to them do leisurely, recreational things. It's their main and only purpose. You won't get sacrificed to a goat god in one either, hopefully. --Adamant1 (talk) 08:30, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

Adding the operator=* and/or owner=* tag

I use to be really into the idea of tagging parks with a park:type tag to designate what type of park they are. After some time passed, I'm not as solid on the idea. It seems like in a lot cases park:type is used as a sub optimal way of showing ownership. It seems pretty superficial to tag that a park is a "neighborhood park." I think the more important thing in that case is that the park is municipally owned. The same goes other types of parks. So would there be any objections to adding a reference to the "ownership" tag to the article and the Useful combinations section? It would also help separate who the operator of the park is (sometimes private companies or different government departments) versus who the actual owner is. (Above post unsigned by Adamant1, 02:26, 27 January 2019)

I also use to be really into this idea, and have been right up until recently. However, as I've been tagging with park:type for nearly a decade (after user:Apo42 did so during a 2009 state park import — we didn't have Import Guidelines back then), I have come to use owner=* and especially operator=* tags more frequently. (I do a lot of railway=rail tagging, where because of what are known as "trackage rights," these two tags frequently interact in complex ways, often resulting in confusion if both are not entered correctly when required). While OSM will likely be "stuck with" a great many park:type=* tags well into the future (OSM started with and still has plastic/flexible/free-form tagging), I support moving toward operator=* and owner=* tags on leisure=parks going forward. I have already done so on some parks I have entered or edited. Of course, this will take time. I don't believe a wholesale bot-edit of existing park:type tags is correct right now. So, let's listen to feedback (here, on the tagging list...), see if there is more consensus that can be built (it is, after all, simply being more consistent with existing tagging, which seems easy to support) and go from there. I'll also link the first section of this Discussion (on park:type) to this section. For example, we might agree that California State Parks now in OSM tagged park:type=state_park might have that tag simply replaced by operator=California Department of Parks and Recreation. (Without getting overly political, the owner=* tag might properly be set to owner=the People of the state of California, or, we might consider that "optional by implication." And as a USA-specific aside because I am on the topic, it is well-established convention in OSM that state parks are correctly tagged with boundary=national_park, as the fifty states in the USA are sovereign). I do want to stress I believe the correct tag if/as we do this is operator=* as in the example above: the owner=* really is "the People," at least in the USA. (In other countries, this may be different). Let's let "the crowd" first better establish and perhaps reach consensus on these tags, then (slowly) the tagging will improve to what we agree as our tagging evolves and improves. Stevea (talk) 20:34, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

I mostly agree with what you have said. Except with the caveat that having a park:type tag would allow for a universal way to render different parks type differently. Which was why I thought it was a good idea. You can't do that with an owner or operator tag. A national park is vastly different then a community park in form, function, and purpose also. There is no reason they shouldn't be represented differently in OSM tagging, other things similar to them are. So, I think there's still a case for something like park:type, but owner and operator are also good. Its not like things can't be tagged as both park:type=* and also owner/operator. There's also the issue of who the owner is when it comes to national parks, which you bring up. I don't think "the people" really fits the desired usage of the tag. --Adamant1 (talk) 22:48, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

I like park:type as well, except I also hear that others find it fuzzy/ambiguous and perhaps poorly named. There are MANY values that can fit here (and we DO have plastic tagging), that many wouldn't think to use, but which do (at least begin to) capture the "flavor of park semantic," like city_beach, county_park and state_historic_monument. Those are nice and specific, fit into the free-form text of a tag (so, can in a local language), yet park:type hasn't any examples for a new (better, and without "type") key, let alone advocates to use it more often. I, too, in 2009-2010 sought a better (universal? hm...) method to render different parks differently. (The closest I got was fiddling around designing a maybe-proposal or usage of a park_level key with values 1-10 to show level like admin_level does, with values equal to those in the host jurisdictions). I don't think that park:type would allow for usefulness there, as the universe of possible values wouldn't be something simple for a renderer (like 1-10 are for dashed lines of admin_level) rather it would be enormous, with all the possible text values in many languages. (And why, I believe, admin_level=* was coined). Let's continue watching what people think of park:type and this discussion, it is good to "take the temperature" of this discussion again. Yeah, "the People" might be something specific to the USA (I'm not sure) and doesn't seem like it needs to be added to an owner=* tag, I was mentioning it for a kind of "completeness' sake." Stevea (talk) 23:14, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

Btw, I wouldn't include beaches in that. Even if your 100% convinced "your" beaches Santa Cruz are parks, which I don't think they are as you already know (especially since the city of Santa Cruz doesn't even classify them that way as you have claimed), 99% of the beaches in world are just beaches (including lots in Santa Cruz. By their own definition). So there shouldn't be a special "city_beach" tag for them. While we are on the subject though, does anyone else here think beaches should be tagged as parks or qualify as them? And if so, in what specific situations? (btw, I think its clear from the section above already, "Definition of parks," that beaches don't qualify).

P.S. I added a topic about parks and beaches below. It would be cool if people comment on it there. --Adamant1 (talk) 08:36, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

--This discussion concerns me because it seems that much of what gets decided is based on who talks the loudest or is the most verbose. 1) I don't think it's generally accepted that US state parks should be tagged as national parks. The states are not sovereign. 2) It isn't clear to me whether the recent edits to the wiki are clarifying the park tag, or revising it. The general usage in the US is to call a park a park, including large county or state parks. The oxford dictionary says "A large public garden or area of land used for recreation.", no mention of managed greenery or urban, I believe that is British English correct? By restricting the tag to "(usually urban) parks with managed greenery" that goes against common tagging practice and common English. Bradrh

It concerns me also for the same reasons. We should be taking a scientific, fact and evidence based approach to this. Instead of one where whoever can write the longest and most paragraph's get's their way. Hopefully that's how it will be going forward. Also a wiki page shouldn't be edited mid discussion to fit a certain narrative, by only one side of the conversation, like it was. Otherwise, it makes these discussions and the wiki essentially useless. It's just not a good faith, consensus built, way to do things either. Hopefully that won't happen again.

I agree with your first point. States are only sovereign symbolically. As they share power 50/50 with the federal government. Which can over rule them sometimes, even when it comes to things having to do with public lands. No normal mapper will get the distinction anyway. I think we are doing things wrong if someone has to read through a government document, like the constitution, to understand why we tag things a certain way. There was a recent discussion on the USA mailing list about this and the general agreement there was that state parks shouldn't be tagged as national parks and that the national park tag should probably be phased out. There was one exception in New York, but that was a unique case and the person who did it said the tagging scheme shouldn't be broadly applied. So it seems to be the consensus that state parks shouldn't be tagged that way. Instead, they should be tagged as boundary=protected_area, with a class=5 (or similar class) tag. As suggested on the mailing list. --Adamant1 (talk) 08:49, 16 May 2019 (UTC)

I addressed Bradrh in this thread and largely repeat here what I said there. The fifty states are sovereign. Period, full stop. This is not "symbolic" or "50/50." The US Constitution, in a few pages, spells out the "limited powers" (doctrine) that the federal government has, and as the Xth Amendment says: the rest is left up to the (sovereign) states. I have no idea what is meant by a "normal mapper" and might even assert that such an animal does not exist (nor is there anything known as "common English," Brad, there are easily dozens of dialects of English, from Scotland to Singapore). However, there are intelligent US mappers (home of American English) who understand our national constitutional framework, agreeing with the Xth Amendment, the US Supreme Court, citizens and jurists over centuries about states being sovereign: click the Wikipedia link in the thread to see. The example in that thread of Oregon tagging many, many "parks" as national_park, when only one (Crater Lake) meets a strict definition, shows that there are dozens, likely hundreds of OSM contributors who tag clearly, unambiguously STATE parks (and monuments, historic sites, beaches, recreation areas, scenic viewpoints...) in the USA with the boundary=national_park tag: go ahead, click the link, try the Overpass Turbo query and see for yourself. I myself didn't edit a single one of these, OTHER contributors to OSM did so. Hence, please do not assert that there is "general agreement" that state parks shouldn't be tagged as national parks: it is a simple truth that people do so and anybody can prove it to themselves right now by clicking the link to the OT query, it takes about 20 seconds. There is little to no consensus about this in the USA, there is only how we tag. It is, politely speaking, a confused mess, and I aim for light, not heat. (I'm simply being truthful and descriptive here, I am not saying how we SHOULD tag). Absolutely nothing was said about "the national park tag should probably be phased out" and if it was, we'll need a cite here to assert that. Otherwise, that appears to be a wishful assertion, as no such "general agreement" exists (here). While I don't wish to start or participate in an argument, because of the false assertions/misunderstandings here, I thought it prudent to set the facts straight. Stevea (talk) 02:48, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

A few general comments, not aimed at anyone in particular. First, the definition of sovereign is having "supreme power or authority." In no way does that apply to states, governmental or otherwise. Second, what the X amdendment actually says outside of the cherry picked part above is "Each state retains its sovereignty, which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled." In other words, states have sovereignty only on matters that aren't delegated to congress (I.E. the federal government). That's it. That's why America is a federalist system in the first place. If states were sovereign and had supreme power it would be a confederate system of government, not a federalist one. To summaries a couple of constitutional law professors and peer reviewed journals "Federalism differs from confederalism, in which the general level of government is subordinate to the regional level. Confederalism is a system of organisation in which there is a union of states with each member state retaining some independent control over both internal and external affairs. Federalism though be defined as a form of government in which there is a division of powers between two levels of government of equal status. Each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a defined geographic territory, and shares its sovereignty with the United States federal government. States, however, are not sovereign in the Westphalian sense in international law which says that each State has sovereignty over its territory and domestic affairs, to the exclusion of all external powers."

So, like I said its 50/50 and the term "sovereign" is superficial because states don't have supreme power. Only powers granted to them by the congress. Ultimately, Its a shared system where neither side has supreme rule. Constitutional law professors, peer reviewed law journals, the constitution itself, and indeed the actual form of government we have in America, a federalist system of government, agree. "full stop."

More importantly though is the question of whether it is useful to tag state parks as national ones in OpenStreetMap and if it fits the tags definition or not. It clearly isn't and it clearly doesn't. It's inherent in the name "national park" that the tag applies to "nationally" ran and states are not nations. One, because of the explanation of why they are not sovereign above and two because that's why they are called states. Which is where "regular mappers," who don't call states "nations" comes in. Tagging state parks as national parks makes it seem as if they are the same thing when they aren't. There are clear differences between the two in how they are managed and by who, the size, and in other ways. Tagging should reflect that. Because mappers have wrong blurred the lines between them in the past through miss-tagging has nothing to do with if state parks should continue to be tagged as national parks going forward and it's clear they shouldn't be. There is zero upside and a lot of downside. Plus, there is census to not tag them that way, despite what certain users say. As is proven by conversations both here, on the mailing list, in the definition of the tags, and how our own government actually classifies them. Again, "full stop." The instances of miss-tagging have zero to do with it. I'm not even sure why there is continued discussion about it. Especially from users who don't want to argue about things and value consensus. As its clearly a case of miss-tagging. Most of the time when it comes to clear miss-tagging it's just dealt with and there isn't the long, drawn out discussion about it. That's clearly how things should be handled in this case. --Adamant1 (talk) 21:19, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

I think any further discussion as to what can or can't be tagged as a national park should go on the specific talk page for the tag. As it's generally off topic here and doesn't really have an effect on whether or not parks can be/should be tagged with owner/operator tags or not. --Adamant1 (talk) 03:44, 17 June 2019 (UTC) strong consensus

Btw, another discussion where tagging state parks as national parks can be found here. Where it didn't have "strong consensus" as it's speculated by some to have. Due to the idea being widely rejected by everyone involved in favor of boundary=protected_area instead. Which has been resoundingly echoed by almost everyone in every conversation about it. --Adamant1 (talk) 07:00, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

I found it difficult to follow all of the sentence fragments in previous entries, though I did offer my best effort at understanding them. The facts are (the data in OSM are) that state parks ARE tagged with boundary=national_park. By the dozens, even hundreds. Many have tagged and do tag like this, as we understand that sovereignty applies to states when it comes to determining when a park is a park. This is not a declaration "I am right," simply that dozens of mappers in the USA tag like this. And OSM is in the midst about what we're doing about it. The repeated use of "clearly" (and "clearly" and "clearly") does not make things more clear. The linked discussions and diary entries show how much tagging actually varies, by many people in the US and how they tag. There is no clear standard, simply many ways to tag. Numerous efforts are underway; see our park:type=* wiki and WikiProject_United_States_Public_Lands. Stevea (talk) 23:22, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Know is debating that some state parks are tagged as national parks. The ratio of ones that are versus aren't versus how many state parks actually exist is pretty low though. Like less then 10% overall. I could go through the actual tagging and real world state park numbers to back it up, but I don't want it to be "hard to follow." The important thing is that it's not a widely done practice by any means like you claim. "hundreds" of parks tagged that way might seem like a lot, but it's not when there are over 10,000 state parks in America. I have zero with you saying "some" parks are tagged that way. As its a fact that some are.

My issue is with you saying there's "strong" consensus on it and that it's due to state sovereignty because "we understand that sovereignty applies to states." When know one in any discussion anywhere except you has stated that as the reason and most people who have given their reasons for doing it are clear that it's about the ambiguity in the national park tag. As yourself in your own message "tagging actually varies, by many people in the US and how they tag. There is no clear standard, simply many ways to tag." But yet your still perfectly fine asserting what "we" as a community do and why we do it, as if there's a "strong consensus" and we are a homogeneous group that agrees on this or that people tag state parks as national parks just because aren't part of the "community" and their reasons for doing so shouldn't factor into this. Your the one that says its a sensitive subject. So treat it that way by leaving out the speculation or at least be clear that's what it is. I'm not sure what's so complicated about that.

It would be fine to say "there's speculation that it's due to state sovereignty" while also adding that it could just as well be due to the ambiguity of the national park tag (which is exactly why people have said they tag them that way). Saying otherwise like it's fact is just misleading though and risks newbies miss-tagging things because they think "we" agree on something you yourself say "we" don't. I know because I've already had a few conversations with people who did exactly that based on the way you worded things. Just be neutral about it and state facts. That's it. P.S. while I agree there is various tagging practices of state parks based off that blog discussion, it's still clear from that the mailing list discussion that boundary=protected_area is a better alternative if it was a choice between the two. Which it is because you can't double tag boundaries. So write or wrong about "state sovereignty" your still possibly compromising on more descriptive tags by doing it that way. Whatever constitutional law says or not. --Adamant1 (talk) 01:03, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

"less then 10% overall." Please cite (your sources, or show something using taginfo or maybe offer a well-constructed OT query). I don't know what you mean by "blog discussion," if you mean "talk-us thread" then please specify it as I strive to specify links, too. Embedding links and offering proof to your numbers or what you say or that you propose to post to a national talk-list that "how about we end all national_park tagging on state parks, everybody, huh?" then I'm listening. But you don't. I don't know if this is something you and I continue to find "missing" in communication between us, or if you are simply unwilling or unable to gain consensus through established channels. It does feel kind of lonely here, like simply you and I talking to each other. I find that concerning, like "we need to go wider." Let's let others have a chance to say something here. Stevea (talk) 01:13, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

There's an OverPassTurbo query for finding the count of tags. It's something like [out:csv(::count)][timeout:250]; nwr["name"="Kathmandu"]["shop"="outdoor"]; out count; where name and shop are replaced with the relevant tags. Although I'm not sure if that work will on it's own like that, I'm can message it to you if needed. The numbers seem to break down to real world there's 300 state parks in California and 10,234 overall nation wide. Out of that the tagging numbers are boundary=national_park + park:type=state_park is 146 uses world wide, with leisure=park instead of park:type having uses world wide 560. If we assume that's all mainly for America/California and that park:type=state_park is mainly confined to California, it means that a little less than half of the state parks in California are tagged as national parks. That's hardly a clear consensus or anything. Especially since there's no way to know what the motivations of the taggers were or how many come from imports. Nation wide though your only looking at 5.4% for just parks tagged as leisure=park and boundary=national_park. Who knows how many of those are state parks or what though. There's really no way to tell since we haven't been using ownership tags on them or how of those national parks are in other countries. I don't know how to query a specific area unfortunately. The more precise numbers are with Park:type added and there's probably a more precise way to do it but I still think its fairly accurate. I'm perfectly to go with more accurate numbers even if they disagree with my opinion though if there is a way to come up with them.

I don't need to say on a mailing list that we remove all national park tagging on state parks any more then you need to do the same about if you should tag children's surf areas as playgrounds or not before you do it or any other thing. Especially since unlike the playground thing, the census where it has been discussed has agreed with it. I'm not advocating for the removal of all national park tagging from state parks anyway and know where have I said I am. What I said is that you should be more even in how write about the topic in articles and not make clearly untrue statements about it. That's it. I'm perfectly fine with it being the procedure in edge cases where it makes sense like in New York. I'm against it being used as a catch all for every state park in every situation though. I especially have a problem with it being presented That way in articles. That's it. Personally, I think we should slowly move away from it in favor of operator/owner and protected boundary tags since it makes more sense and that's what other people have suggested. I see know good not to either. That's not to say I disagree that we need to go wider for the discussion, except that doesn't preclude taking a balanced stance on it that presents the facts in the mean time or slowly moving away from it where appropriate. I'm not going to keep going wider and wider on it until someone agrees with you then stop there in spite of the opposition either. For me it's a "currently 4 people say its this way, 5 people say it's that way" thing. That doesn't mean there can't be more discussion that will be integrated into the numbers, but I'm not going to take a stance and act like it's a done deal where the community has already decided in articles in the mean time like you are. --Adamant1 (talk) 02:52, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

In the meantime, provide a source where anyone, let alone the vast majority, said they tag state parks as national parks because of state sovereignty? Outside of you and the New York edge case. Btw, it's worth mentioning that your the one who said in the first place that you didn't think these discussions should go to mailing list and that Slack ins't a good option. So I'm wondering where you expect this wider discussion you want to have to occur. Also, if to consensus isn't reached on these talk pages, the mailing list, Slack, or blog post discussions, where exactly is it reached then? I have a feeling you would have been fine with any one of the mediums being "consensus" if they agreed with you. I'm sure we can at least both agree that consensus isn't solely determined through raw tagging numbers right? Where's the consensus on it that your claiming already exists exactly? --Adamant1 (talk) 02:52, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Adam, I don't wish to ridicule you, but if you can't effectively construct and link to an Overpass Turbo query here, please simply go home and cease your insistence that you have a point or case to make here. Please don't say "there is one" (a query,), rather LINK TO IT, please. To not do so when challenged is a failure to bolster your assertions, anybody would agree. I have no idea what to make of your "Kathmandu" blather above, it is nonsensical. Don't "message it" to me, simply embed the link to the query as I have done so in this wiki Talk page: I have, so, you can, too. I didn't ask for "boundary=national_park + park:type=state_park" as that isn't relevant here. Even if I accept sloppy numbers that "a little less than half of the state parks in California are tagged as national parks," that is still a significant number of parks so tagged which cannot be ignored away. You might say "that's hardly a clear consensus" but it doesn't matter what the motivations of the contributors is/was: the numbers of parks so tagged is significant, not a single person tagging because of a peculiarity or two, but a widespread and diverse number of people who so tag. I can't help but conclude you simply wish to argue for argument's sake, something I do not wish to engage in, as it is non-productive. And what are you talking about is "5.4%?" I have no idea, your writing is so scattered I can't make sense of it. ("Perfectly to go" and "the census where it has been discussed" and "know where" and "you should be more even in how write about the topic" — huh?!) I am as frustrated as if I were reading the writings of a student in grammar school who needs to take an English class on how to write a paragraph. Really, I try not to insult you, but I am simply unable to understand your nonsensical sentences. It doesn't matter about state sovereignty being "a" or "the" motivating factor behind why people tag the way they do (same with whether "park" in the dialect of American English is why or why not there is or is not so much semantic smearing of "park" in USA park tagging). What actually matters is that "how we have tagged and do tag" is confusing to many, and what we attempt to do here is the hard work of teasing apart (or trying to do so) how to BETTER tag. I fail to see or understand anything about a "done deal" like you have, I'm trying to have a discussion about this. Whereas you muddy the water with confusing numbers, ill-conceived and no-link references and "4 people say this and 5 people say that" quotes without saying "which 4?" or "which 5?" I am MORE DEEPLY confused with each and every new post of yours. Every single new post of yours MORE confuses me than it does clarify. I'm sorry, but your poor communication skills do not foster the good will nor constructive dialog needed for me (and I suspect others) to move forward here. Stevea (talk) 08:27, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Steve. I tried to copy a link from OverPassTurbo here, but it didn't work for some reason. So I decided just to copy the code. It happens sometimes. Software isn't perfect. If you can't figure out how to paste three lines of code into the OverPassTurbo window and make it work, that's on you. I know I can. You've repeatedly ignored any counter evidence anyway. So there's really no point in providing a link even if I was able to get it to work. The important thing is that I gave the numbers. Know where did I say that I think half the state parks in California that are tagged as national parks should be "ignored away." What I said is that half the parks is not a strong consensus that things should be tagged that way. As you continue to assert it is and that you continuing to do so is misleading and is causing miss-tagging. That's it. All I'm saying is, half the parks are tagged as national parks. I haven't took a stance one or another as to its meaning or anything else. Aside from saying that tagging them that way comes at the expense of tagging them with "better" tags. Mainly boundary=protected_area and the owner/operator tags. Which is what this about. Nothing about that is "ignoring them away." Nor have I made any assertions about it being anymore then my opinion or have I even stated that it should be how things are tagged. My opinions on it and edits related the subject are as valid as yours are. Your the one everywhere saying how people should be tagging things based on your opinion. Not me. I'm not sure why you keep getting so distressed and worked up just from me stating what my opinions on the subject are or asking questions about it. Also, as I said above a few times, I'm fine with state parks being tagged as national parks in the few edge cases where it's appropriate to do so. Like the example in New York. My problem is with your assertion here and elsewhere that it is appropriate to do in every situation because there's strong consensus on it. When it isn't and there isn't.

Ultimately, your the one attempting to judge it as one way or another. Your the one editing wiki pages toward a certain slant etc. Not me. I've said repeatedly, simply state what the numbers are and leave it at that. Don't add your interpretation to it. I don't really care about people's motivations or why they do things. Your the one that keeps talking about those things. All I care about is stating what the facts are, being clear about them in the articles so there isn't problems, choosing better tagging, and getting on with improving things. That's it. Anything else you want to claim I've said or done is simply false.

You keep muddying the waters by asserting things about this that aren't backed up by any evidence. Then expecting other people to show evidence why your wrong. That's not the way it works. If your going to assert something, it's on you to provide the supporting evidence for it. It's not on other people disprove what your saying. So like I asked above, if none of the discussion that's already happened in multiple places on this isn't consensus what is? Where exactly is the "strong consensus" that state parks should be tagged as national parks that you have repeatedly stated exists here and other places? Where has a single mapper, or more importantly a majority of mappers, said that state sovereignty is why they tag state parks as national parks as you claim? It shouldn't be that hard to show sources for any of that. Especially if those things are true like you keep claiming they are and writing about in articles. --Adamant1 (talk) 13:04, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for what appears to be better clarity in your recent post. The OT code you copied (a notoriously imperfect process across the web, which is why OT makes it easy to create a link to a snippet of its Query Language) had to do with outdoor shops in Kathmandu and you saying "replace with the relevant tags." That's deeply unhelpful on at least TWO levels: please use the correct tags with QL (else I don't know your domain, I don't know your tags), then please create the link. Otherwise, we're wasting each other's time about asserting "certain data are in OSM" by not properly citing evidence. You could use the Oregon link as a template (it contains a "geocode:area" directive to restrict it to Oregon, sub in what you like here — states work, counties work if they are not ambiguous across states), modify it to suit your purpose and then create a link. That's done all the time and is relatively straightforward and easy. AGAIN, let's assume roughly half of (all parks? state parks? your domain makes a difference) of what is already tagged in California has a semantic smear we disagree about, or wish to further discuss. AGAIN, I am NOT saying this tagging is right or wrong, I am NOT saying how things SHOULD be tagged, I AM saying that because many (dozens, maybe hundreds) of other OSM contributors "tag like that" (the data are actually IN THE MAP), that creates a de facto consensus about "a" method to tag something. ("Half" seems "strong" [enough] to me to use the word "strong," as when "half" of a community does something, it must mean that "the other half" is doing something different, whether "all other half" or further fragmented into smaller solution subsets. That absolutely needs attention and to be addressed, whether you agree that "strong" is the right word or not). And please don't get hung up on sovereignty being THE reason or that the American English dialect's definition of park is absolutely THE reason: I have suggested these as likely reasons behind these tagging inclininations, not the absolute why or how (American English DOES have a wide and elastic definition of "park" and the USA DOES have state sovereignty that is a likely reason people say "hm, state park? ok, tag with national_park" — and yeah, sure, I could be wrong as to those reasonings, but I feel certain in at least some cases that these are the roots of why certain tagging happens). Ultimately, a reason why isn't important (it is offered "by way of explanation" of a likely, easy-to-understand reason for why these tagging inclinations took place). Ultimately, what IS important is that "people have tagged and do tag like this," so, what might we do about it? One or two people being autocratic (I don't believe I am, and I believe you may be confused about my motivation or methods) or tussling over "the" right answer in a Talk page isn't going to satisfactorily answer it (to me, anyway, and I suspect to the larger OSM community, too). That is why it is likely helpful to have this discussion in such an open manner, so others can better understand the conundrums of it and express THEIR opinions (which can be or maybe aren't helpful) or even better: suggestions of what to do to remedy things — such as slowly populating a table with "old, disagreeable tagging" and "proposed, new, better tagging" as I have begun to do on the park:type page. Which by the way, park:type is only one aspect of this difficult, historical, vexing "problem" (I'd prefer to call it an opportunity to solve something longer-term in OSM, though that seems a very tall order). When you say "the discussion that has happened in other places," I'm sorry, but I don't know what, when and where you mean. I acknowledge that there has been a great deal of such discussion (and concomitant confusion and disagreement) and that to insist that you document it all would be exhaustive, but that IS a problem of trying to cause consensus to "accrete" as it often does. I wish I had a sense of where such consensus was going, but I don't. I do believe that if we chip away at things as we are in park:type's table, we might make some slow progress, and I'll take that (for now). But I would like to limit what appears to be an argumentative tone between us as I observe that we likely more agree with each other than disagree: we agree that there are widely (even wildly) different tagging methods on parks, some of this VERY likely stems from linguistic and political differences and/or misunderstandings between OSM contributors around the world, AND that there is a difficult road ahead to sort it all out and gain some altitude of clarity. I'm doing my best to start from a judgment-free, descriptive rather than prescriptive position as I do so. Please, let's work towards that, rather than against each other, which I'm certain the larger community finds quite tiring. Stevea (talk) 18:50, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

I humbly suggest that this and similar conversations be taken to Talk:Key:park:type although there is also a conversation at WikiProject_United_States_Public_Lands. This is a wide and diverse topic on many different wavelengths simultaneously. Stevea (talk) 20:22, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

That's fine for the owner/operator conversation as it relates to park:type tagging. I think the wider discussion about tagging state parks as national parks should take place on the boundary=national_park page. Since to me it's more to do with that and I don't feel that it has to be worked out now or in order for us to at least make progress on the park:type tagging. Although I'm sure there is some overlap there, my opinion is that owner/operator tagging can be implemented while we put national park tagging on the back burner. Then after owner/operator is more widely used, at least in California, it will help us to get a better handle on what state parks are actually tagged as national parks etc. As I agree with your statement above that it largely depends on what terms your using etc and that we are at a dead end with it at this point. I don't want it stall other progress out though.

I do have a few questions about your statements above though. One you said "I have suggested these as likely reasons behind these tagging inclinations." Yet on the park:type article you wrote "There is strong consensus that state parks in all fifty US states (states being sovereign)." That doesn't sound a suggestion me. Otherwise, it would be something like "there is speculation that it is due to states being sovereign. It could just be (add whatever reasons also) though." Two, why even bring consensus into it in the first place at this point? Why not just say something like "half the state parks in California are tagged as national parks"? That's much clearer and less prone to misinterpretation. Most people assume that a strong consensus means there's a general agreement about it by the community. There isn't. Tagging isn't "the community." It's merely one aspect. So the more concise we can be the better in my opinion and we should use raw numbers when we can to do that. You could also be fair in wording by citing the opinions that it's not a good thing to do and also linking to the discussions. Three, why is the national park thing even in the park:type article in the first place and how does it relate to it exactly? Because it's not really clear (you can answer on that articles talk page).

Finally, I think some of this comes down to a disagreement about the threshold where becomes "strong consensus" or "De Facto." To me it has to be over 50%, if not more like 75%, agreement. For instance, a de facto ruler is someone who has the overwhelming majority behind them, not half the population. Or to put it another way, if you have two people in a room, where each persons opinion is 50% of the opinions, and they disagree on something that's consensus and there isn't De Facto support of the idea. Neither would it be if it was 5 people out of 10 etc. Maybe there's a different meaning to those terms in OSM. I don't know, but that's how I see it. It should be over like 75%. I think voting on proposals is like a 70% threshold or something to pass. That 50% is just on tagging numbers alone anyway. The opinions put forward in discussions also factor in and balance it more in the other direction. Know where in OSM does it say anywhere "supported" tagging is only determined by tagging numbers. There's a lot of tags out there with large usage numbers that are complete trash. A lot of them aren't accepted, encouraged, discussed, or even mentioned in articles and I think that's a good thing in a lot of cases. Simply by talking about these things and writing articles on them is us effecting their usage, for good or bad. I'm not sure why you spend so much time trying to act like it's not that way.

Oh yeah, one more thing. How many state parks have you tagged as boundary=national_park? From a quick look I can see you've edited a lot of state parks. Although, I don't know many you've added the national park tag to, you can hardly claim complete impartiality while editing a large number of the things being discussed. There's zero wrong with impartiality and we all have things we'd like to see done. So, it's not an issue per say. Just something I wonder why you keep trying to side step your own rule in.

Btw, I would separate arguing from rigorous debate. While I don't support arguing, I don't see anything wrong with having a rigorous debate on subjects. Sometimes it's hard not to. As these things are complicated. Although, I know the line between the two is hard to tell sometimes and things can get heated. If the wider community has an issue with us discussing these things in more then two paragraph messages or they see that as arguing, that's on them. I think we are being civil in this case and figuring things out that need to be figured out. Although I do think we need to bring it back around at some point to a few actionable things we can do to move things forward and also do a better job at sticking to talking points that are relevant to the specific article/topic we are writing messages on, but just long messages isn't arguing. Although I plan to cut mine down now that we have worked out the main points. It would be good if you split your messages up into sections if there are going to be long. It's easier to read that way. Anyway, feel free to answer the questions about national parks in its article and park:type comments there, or however you feel like doing it. --Adamant1 (talk) 01:42, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

"Mapping history in the USA"

There is a long paragraph on this page about the history of the use of leisure=park in the USA. As an American, I understand that most Americans think our concerns are important enough to be mentioned in this prominent way, but I'm also aware that most OSM users are not from North America, and that this page is meant to provide a global, international view. I suggest deleting the section. --Jeisenbe (talk) 07:45, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

As its author, I don't think five succinct sentences constitute a "long paragraph," though that may be quibbling on my part. This paragraph means to both clarify and assuage the very difficult semantic tangling that caused great misunderstanding and consternation here, resulting in two of its participants (myself and Adamant1) to be blocked from wiki contributions for a short time. (Our first and only such block for each of us). As I believe that these considerations are and continue to be important for mappers in USA/North America (because of 15 years of tagging with leisure=park on a wide variety of areas which are known in our dialect of English as "park" — a reasonable thing many USA mappers did) to better understand their historical context, I believe the paragraph should remain. I have no problem with it being moved to a "further down" location in the page, as I agree with Jeisenbe that it "only" adddresses contributors in North America (true, not global, but still, a significant portion of OSM contributors). Or, we might "further down" a link to this paragraph and place it into another suitable location (the Talk/Discussion page?), with a brief blurb of "For some historical context of 'park' for North American mappers, see here" (and link). However, the difficulties of how leisure=park is strictly defined here, the 15 years of historical tagging (many say incorrectly) still extant with this tag in the USA on what many agree are not really what OSM calls "park," (but USA mappers do) and how this best resolves itself in the present and future, all remain as open, largely unresolved issues. (Though, efforts to better the situation continue). For these reasons, I believe the text should remain, in some form. Stevea (talk) 22:04, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

I mostly agree with both people. Although, I lean more toward Stevea's suggestion of moving the section down some instead of doing the other options. Originally I had wanted it to have it's own article, but I don't think there's enough variation in tagging to warrant one. Plus, I think a unique article might lead to more entrenchment of certain opinions about it then there is now (whatever those opinions are) and article ownership (by whomever) that can't exist with the main one. I don't think putting it on the talk page is good either, because then it would seem more like an ongoing discussion then a semi-standard as it does now. Really, it should be both, but if the discussion stalls for a while (as it has) at least there's the semi-standard to sustain things until it comes back. It wouldn't work if it was just discussion though IMO. Mainly, I don't think this is just a United States "problem." I read somewhere that people in the Middle East tag parks differently also (lots of desert and all that) and I'm sure there are other places that do to. So, it would probably be best if there was something like a "None European park tagging conventions" section, that would include other countries besides America where parks are currently tagged differently. It might help people in those countries not run into the problems we have in America, but also serve as a collection bin for how parks can be (are) tagged globally if something like a world wide standard ever is suggested or implemented. --Adamant1 (talk) 04:04, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

I have been mapping various parks, nature reserves, management areas, etc. in RI and I've pretty much been guessing at the tagging as the protected area and leisure tagging pages are not straightforward to apply. At one point I stumbled upon a page that described for a few states how to tag various types of areas specific to that state. I can't find it for the life of me. I think it would be incredibly useful to have a centralized location with guidelines on green space tagging by state, and I would be happy to contribute RI information ZeLonewolf (talk) 03:27, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

There's https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/United_States/Public_lands and I'm sure there are others. The problem with any of those types of articles is that they have mainly or exclusively been edited by a single user and rarely (if ever) with any kind of broader consensus involved in it. So, I'd take anything said in the articles with a grain of salt. The Wiki is suppose to be descriptive, not prescriptive anyway. Which at least is what I'm told. So, really, nothing should be taken as "this is how you should do it." Often times if you do what the wiki recommends you will be verbally beaten into the ground for it by certain users anyway. While others will go off about how you should do what it says. At least's been my experience. So, maybe it's for the better that it's only descriptive. Anyway, my advice is to map how you want to map things and ignore fringe ideas of how to map things by people who claim they are authorities. Ultimately, it doesn't really matter. Since there's no consensus on this and probably never will be because people involved in it rather beat their chests and talk in circulars. Just don't map for the rendering and you'll mostly be fine. --Adamant1 (talk) 03:41, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

Please take Adamant's comments as the disingenuous unsuccessful jab that they are. The article may have been primarily edited by a few authors, but is not the exclusive "original research" that he claims it to be. Rather, it is the channeling of a great deal of consensus and very carefully states where it is prescriptive and descriptive, precisely because it was created by numerous authors. For example, there are at least three different state entries in the state tables entered there, all by different authors in their respective states. ZeLonewolf, if you wish to do so for Rhode Island, I would encourage you to do so following the guidelines and other states as good (or improving) examples and continue to build on the efforts. I wouldn't listen to Adamant1 when what he usually does is tear apart the fabric of our good data entry (both map and wiki) with his unsound advice, words of friction, ill will, being disingenuous and truly ugly nastiness and even foul-mouth potty talk. (See the Archives to this page if you don't believe me; judge for yourself his atrocious behavior). I don't like saying these things, but when terrible behavior by a single, identifiable, less-than-1% of my experience of the good people in OSM (he is ONE TERRIBLE bad apple out of HUNDREDS of GOOD and positive relationships I have enjoyed and do enjoy in OSM) continues, it must be called out. Adamant1, cease your feud(s). BUILD this map, rather than tearing it down by throwing rocks at the good work of many others. Rising up like a troll does not make you a better mapper nor OSM a better place. ZeLonewolf, I am sad that you (and others) experience Adamant1's antics, yet again on this Talk page. Sigh. Stevea (talk) 05:19, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

SteveA, how many times in the many conversations that we have had did you tell me that you are simply describing things and not making recommendations? If that is the case, and your the one that has said repeatedly that it is, then there you don't need consensus to describe things. Otherwise, if you are making recommendations, while saying repeatedly that you aren't, it seems as though your the one being disingenuous here. I'm simply describing a fact. You've mainly edited the park articles, you've said over and over that your only describing things, etc etc. It's not an "antic" to say so. Your the one being nasty and causing friction by claiming otherwise and making this personal by attacking me when there's zero reason to. As far as your pontificating about how I should "build the map", last time I checked I have 3000 more edits then you and none of them were imports. Whereas, most of yours are. So, who's really been building the map here? The one with less edits that piggy backs off the hard work of others (then acts like your gods gift to OSM because you can push an import button in JOSM) or the one with more edits that doesn't? Anyway, go be a condescending blowhard to someone else. It's completely uncalled for, doesn't add anything, and I have better things to do then deal with it. Go map some backyard bee hives as farmland or something. Supposedly I'm the one feuding by just repeating exactly what you've told me. Yet your the one attacking me for no reason. What the hell ever. BTW, your also the one that constantly drones about the supremacy of local mappers. So, me telling ZeLonewolf to map how they want in their local area is 100% exactly in line with your own way of doing things. So don't attack me for recommending exactly what you say you prefer. It's always projection and endless hypocrisy with you. Your not even consistent with your own freaken standards. --Adamant1 (talk) 05:41, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

I do not rise to your foolish, repeated baiting. ZeLonewolf decided to make contributions to the page you suggested. Good night! Stevea (talk) 07:08, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

Nothing new there. You always dodge out like your the civil one in the room when it becomes clear your completely full of crap and were the one who originally instigated things with your hypocritical, condescending bad attitude. You already rose to the foolishness by commenting and attacking me in the first place. There was zero reason you needed to involve yourself in the discussion. Since it had nothing to do with you and ZeLonewolf would have contributed to the article anyway without your worthless, judgmental screed. Hopefully you've learned your lesson and will just piss off the next time you feel like attacking me. --Adamant1 (talk) 07:25, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

I genuinely appreciate the "mostly" harmony. I am comfortable "moving down" the section (let's say, from its present postion to after National Parks) and let's take a "go slow" approach starting with that. If Middle East or other parts of the world want to add updates to that, it might morph into a "non-European" section, though I think it's safe to say "let's go there if we need to." To be clear, rather than point fingers or fault, citing the history of what happens, perhaps noting it is likely to do with "language overlaps" (semantic blurring, really) with tagging that it is understandable, but that there is a longer-term improvement underway is a good/better/best way forward. Stevea (talk) 04:11, 25 January 2020 (UTC)