What has changed that permits duplicate names?

Don't you still get the "too far apart" error when trying to save?

orbitc wrote:

jondrush wrote:Don't you still get the "too far apart" error when trying to save?

No we don't.

So how do they prevent smudges when they do this?

Moved from another thread:

PhantomSoul wrote:Frankly, it's plain and simple. They guidelines very specifically say do not use unincorporated names in the Primary City field. Whether unincorporated towns/neighborhoods or other names in the Alternate City fields display on the map or search results is not in our control as map editors.

As far as I know, nobody in any state is supposed to be entering CDPs in Primary City fields (unless of course something has changed and I missed it - in that case, I need to see a reference to a wiki article describing that). The only exception I can think of is maybe in states that have vast rural areas completely unincorporated, you may have to enter an unincorporated village's name into the Primary City field in order to prevent errors, since you cannot have No City for a Primary City with an Alternate City. However, this does not apply to any state that is comprehensively divided into townships, like every state in the Northeast, among others.

Many unincorporated (or in some cases just plain incorrect) names exist currently on the map en masse because that was the data originally imported from the basemap. These names, as per the guidelines developed since, are technically wrong, and should be considered as smudges. We just haven't been so quick to fix them because it doesn't have as much of an impact on navigation as other things and there have been much bigger fish to fry so far.

Thank you for the explanation. I am aware that this is an age-old discussion and we both agree this isnt causing routing issues and therefore I dont want to press the issue.

My main points here are:

• A-

  Kobes1878 wrote:We are a community first app, regarding naming Streets as defined by locals, so that should IMHO carry over to city naming.

• B-

  Additionally, I am trying to understand why NJ is (seemingly) the only state in Waze that officially DOES NOT include these places as primary st names - PA, MD, MI, NE, CA all use CDPs as far as Ive seen on the map and per their respective state forums/wikis.

Here are the wikis/forums I was referring to: PA , MD , MI , NE - Mass (of the 351 cities/towns , approx 150 are CDP's). I cant seem to pull the forum I found earlier regarding CA, but I think these should be sufficient.

All of these States' guidelines point to the exact opposite of what the NJ wiki clearly states, as you've said. I wonder if it is an older wiki page that may require examination, or -without trying to be redundant- is there a reason why NJ is (seemingly) the only state with these guidelines (I have not searched all 50 states, just the ones I know to be plentiful of CDP's). Many states vary on many a topic, so it is entirely plausible that this is an exclusion that is state-specific.

Once again, this is not a pressing issue as we do not have routing issues, which I don't believe to be the case. The one UR I came across stated simply "Bayville not Berkeley" and was just a "city name on map" concern, which is an entirely different topic.

Regardless, the wiki is to be followed in its entirety and I have been compiling a list to submit to an RC or Champ. It hit me when the list started to grow abnormally long. Hence the request for clarification.

I am on board completely with what everyone is saying here and I appreciate the feedback.
qwaletee - your concerns regarding "well meaning editors" however is precisely the issue. How many "major cities" are there that an editor who READ the wiki will look at and say OK im not supposed to use CDP's right? He will promptly go and change Woodbridge (CDP) to Woodbridge Twp, Old Bridge (CDP) to Old Bridge Twp, Barnegat>Barneget Twp, Lacey>Lacey Twp, Toms River>Toms River Twp, Lakewood>Lakewood Twp. Thats not even touching upon the smaller communities like Dover Beaches, Leisure Village, Cedar Glen Lakes. Per the wiki guidance every NJ editor SHOULD/MUST go ahead and change all of these to XXX Twp. Which we all agree is wrong as/when there is no conflict. This addresses Jons extremely important point that certain unincorporated place names are better known than the actual name. Every place mentioned above is almost unequivocally known simply as Toms River, Old Bridge, Woodbridge. All CDP's. In fact, in the case of Old Bridge we have moved to change all Old Bridge Twp to simply Old Bridge. That is extremely conflicting and confusing to editors that DO their research.

Hence, my proposal is simply to change the wiki guidance to include CDPs (except when they conflict) but exclude other unincorporated places. At least this would be accurate and I am not understanding the resistance towards it.

Sidepoint: There is one more thought here, although I have yet to test it. A lot of house numbers from the original base map import we all know are incorrect. I wonder what would happen in a scenario where Waze's address has been manually fixed in WME but not in GMM. A search will give you the correct address in Waze, but with a seemingly incorrect "town name". For someone unfamiliar with the lay of the land they will immediately opt for the second result (Googles) since it has the town name they were searching for in the first place. But this address turns out to be a few miles away... Speculation and food for thought.

Great discussion all! Even though it seems we may have been a little late to the party.
It seems this topic is particularly complicated in NJ as it factually has the most conflicting names of any other state (Surprise!). Until we have a good solution in place as Orbit mentioned, it does seem like we all agree that a change to the wiki is in order.
Present text:

Cities and Towns

There are 565 municipalities in the New Jersey 250 Boroughs, 52 Cities, 15 Towns, 245 Townships and 3 Villages. Every segment of every road should have a city name filled in; there are no completely unincorporated areas in New Jersey. Cities, Boroughs, Towns, and Villages should all have their name in the primary city name field without the words City, Borough, Town, or Village after the name, unless of course that word is part of its name (e.g., Jersey City).
Townships should also try to use just the name of the township in the primary city field. However, since many township names in the state coincide with borough names that may be located across the state, a Twp suffix may be added only to such townships to avoid conflicts. Further, some township names coincide with the names of other townships in other counties (e.g. Franklin Twp, Springfield Twp, etc.). In such cases, county names may have to be added as a suffix in parenthesis to avoid conflicts (e.g. Franklin Twp, Hunterdon vs Franklin Twp, Somerset).
Some roads straddle the border between two municipalities, where addresses on one side of the road are in one municipality while addresses on the other side of the road are in the other municipality. In this case, pick one and put it in the primary city field and put the other in an alternate name row along with the road name. It doesn't matter which municipality goes where, but be consistent along the road for that entire border.
Unincorporated census designated places (CDPs) should never be added to the primary city field. Instead, they can be added, along with the road name, to an alternate name row so that addresses using the CDP name can be found.
Segments in some townships whose names coincide with the name of some other municipality in the state were left out from the base map to avoid conflicts. The local township names for these segments need to be added as described above.
Any segment showing a city of "Greater XX Area" needs to be updated to reflect the correct local municipality as described above.
See the forum topic New Jersey Cities and Towns for more information.

The sentence saying never to use CDP's is erroneous and the entire section seems especially long.
Proposed Change:

[Cities and Towns
In Waze Map Editor, every segment of every road type should have a City Name in the Primary Field. (NOTE: The city naming of freeways is presently in discussion.) In NJ there are 565 municipalities, 250 Boroughs, 52 Cities, 15 Towns, 245 Townships and 3 Villages. There are no unincorporated places in NJ. When naming a segment use the incorporated name or the CDP (Census Designated Place) name when the place is locally known and/or more commonly recognized by that name. In the event of duplicate city names, consider adding "Twp" if applicable to one of those places. For additional guidance and in the event of more than one conflicting name please refer to the wiki Duplicate Cities . Note that the current map shows CDP names from the 2000 Census, please refer to this 2010 census List to determine which unincorporated places are CDP's and which are not.
Any segment with the name "Greater XX Area" is a mistake and needs to be updated to reflect the accurate place name.
Please refer to the forum New Jersey Cities and Towns for more information.

Thoughts please?

MinionsWeb wrote:

Kobes1878 wrote:There are no unincorporated places in NJ

I just presented 4 examples, isn't this an error?

MinionsWeb wrote:More for the fire.
Sorry for the fuel.

Ive been gone for a minute, now im back.

Nope, not an error.
I believe qwaletee addressed the main points already, so here's for the sake of clarification. The word "place" can be broad, so for simplicity lets define "place" simply as "land" in this post. The US Census Bureau defines an Incorporated Place as "A type of governmental unit incorporated under state law". The various types of government units that apply here, vary state by state in countless ways. (Thus making it impossible to set specific guidelines nationwide. Sorry PS and PDF.). NJ uses Counties and municipalities to define government units. The neighborhoods you mentioned are not considered unincorporated places, as the LAND falls under a municipality.
Qoute:
"Local government in New Jersey is composed of counties and municipalities. Local jurisdictions are simplier in New Jersey than in other states because, all of New Jersey is included in one of the state's 21 counties and part of the state's 565 municipalities. That means there are no independent cities or consolidated city-counties in New Jersey. There is no unincorporated territory. Every municipality is in exactly one county and every county has more than one municipality."

Um, what fire?

As of 2010 (possibly 2000), CDP's are statistically equivalent to incorporated places, with the exceptions of not having hard borders and its own local government. (Although some states/countries will have both.) Also, in a recent Federal registrar (interesting read) I found:

" The CDP name should be one that is recognized and used in daily communication by the residents of the community. Because unincorporated communities generally lack legally defined boundaries, a commonly used community name and the geographic extent of its use by local residents is often the best identifier of the extent of a place, the assumption being that if residents associate with a particular name and use it to identify the place in which they live, then the CDP's boundaries can be mapped based on the use of the name. There should be features in the landscape that use the name, such that a non-resident would have a general sense of the location or extent of the community; for example, signs indicating when one is entering the community; highway exit signs that use the name; or businesses, schools, or other buildings that make use of the name. It should not be a name developed solely for planning
or other purposes (including simply to obtain data from the Census Bureau) that is not in regular daily use by the local residents and business establishments."

Sounds awfully familiar to our mission

qwaletee wrote:Note that some cities-within-cities are actually incorporated. For example, Metuchen is similar to Short Hills in that it is a smallish community within a larger city (Edison), but it is different form Short Hills in that it is separately incorporated, with its own elected government.

Isn't Metuchen an incorporated borough surrounded by Edison Twp? The rule is, you cannot have a CDP in an officially incorporated city/place. Although this does not and cannot apply to the townships in NJ, because Townships = CDPs here.This issue was acknowledged by the Census Bureau 'sfar as I know.

orbitc wrote:I'm following this topic very closely. I'm trying to find a better answer to give you. Currently, I have few questions of my own to sort it out first. Routing and search are on top of my concerns to naming townships. Based on my discussion with few people, we may need "sub city level"
I'll keep you posted.

Orbit, the Census Bureau addressed this topic giving every place its own unique code with added code for county-subdivisions (CDP,MCD,CCD).. Being that we already have segment IDs which hold magnitudes of data, wouldn't it be possible to include the name of the CDP+County to each segment in that neighborhood? We can define the borders if they change (once every ten years?!) and everything can be handled in the back-end so as not to have conflicting data. Rules for city naming will also be clear-cut this way - either the county or local name.

qwaletee wrote:I dont think i understand your point of adding CDP+County. Could you explain the goal?

qwaletee wrote:I don't think any of this will be happening. If Waze had better search and didn't use Google, it might be worth the effort, but as it stands, what are we hoping to gain?

The goal would be as minionsweb and pleasedrivefast said to resolve the duplicate place names. I actually felt this may be simpler than adding an entire new level for sub-cities. The more computer savvy among us may have better insight on this. Also, When you try to add a city name that is X distance away from a city with the same name, you get an error. Meaning the city names are already in the database somewhere not allowing duplicates. Adding a layer within the city name will accomplish the same thing as the addition to the segment ID. I completely agree that this conversation, while fun, gains absolutely nothing until the Waze navigation page is displayed first on the client.

PleaseDriveFast wrote:I think this would be the cleanest way to store the data, creating a new database row to store the CDP/County/whatever segment. As Kobe noted, this should be relatively static until the next census, but do know this would require a the servers to be updated which will obviously take some time.

Longer than creating a Sub city layer?

MinionsWeb wrote:On another note, using primary/secondary naming conventions is fine for streets but is not available to places (points/areas) or PLRs, so granular searches will yield inherent error due to lack of available data, yes?

For PLRs you do have the alt field. For Places, good question. Being that these are POIs, using the local name would be right thing to do.

PhantomSoul wrote:Anyway, the point is that a sub-city field may or may not be a solution to this problem. It may be the case that simply using CDP names as primary cities and entering municipal names (and postal names, if divergent) as alternate names turns out to be plenty sufficient. It's just not clear at the moment, and the one thing I certainly want to avoid is setting a guideline now, causing a rush on mass city name changing, only to possibly have to do it again in the near future.

In the meantime, let's worry about city names only on the immediate segments that need fixing to solve URs, and let's stick to the current city-naming guidelines to resolve that - incorporated name in the primary name, and add any other names like CDP or postal cities, if different, to the alternate names so they get matched in searches. It's not perfect, but it should be enough to solve URs while we get a more permanent solution figured out.

Phantom! Nice to see you come around! Having you playing devils advocate was no fun. Now that we are all (more or less) on the page, I just want to point out the original suggestion that we change the guidance to include CDPs.
I understand the concern of changing guidance only to be changed back later. My suggestion was not for editors to go on a mass editing spree and start including every CDP they find. in fact if there are no URs there should be no reason to change anything, as you stated. My concern here was the opposite extreme, of having CDP names from the base import DELETED or moved to he alt field en masse, again when there are no UR's.
>The wiki FOR NOW can say simply "Incorporated places and CDP's are used in the Primary Field. No changes should be made to existing CDP names unless they are blank or there are routing issues (ie. URs) involved. In either of those cases contact the SM for guidance."

PhantomSoul wrote:Do you have a link to the PA standard?

Here you go. Duplicate Cities.

voludu2 wrote:I think that is the only way the current cities model can actually be used.

Waze will have to change this in the future, but the future is not now.
Putting useful place names on the map, by whatever contorted means, is the best use we can make of the current cities layer.

I'm not sure I understand what you are proposing or the need for a change. The current model of using 1. The incorporated place name, 2. The Census designated place name, 3. The township name - in that order - seems to be working fine. Adding postal names to the map requires creating hundreds of additional city names and IMO clutters the map unnecessarily. Additionally, those names will undoubtedly begin to migrate beyond their borders extremely quick; we have enough problems containing city name boundaries as it is.

As far as routing is concerned, Jon addressed that earlier.

jondrush wrote:Like I said earlier in this thread, don't worry about postal searches, you will never stay ahead of them. Let Google worry about postal searches.