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Names of English counties  XML
Forum Index -> Administrative Divisions
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speaklanguages



Joined: 11/08/2010 01:04:22
Messages: 11
Location: Estonia
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It appears that the majority of English counties are currently stored in the database with names in the format "County of Hampshire", "County of Surrey", etc.

I would like to propose that these are renamed to their shorter names "Hampshire", "Surrey", as this shorter form is what people actually use when talking about these counties.

If including the county name when addressing a letter, one would also always use the shorter form. If you ask someone where they are from, they will simply say "Hampshire" or such.

Even in official correspondence from the county council, I can't recall ever coming across a county being referred to as "County of ___".

Note that this change would bring the English counties into line with US States, which are simply listed in the format "Texas", with "State of Texas" being given as an alternate name.

Chris
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marc



Joined: 08/12/2005 07:39:47
Messages: 4412
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Hi Chris

It certainly makes sense. Do you want to start with this task?

Best Regards

Marc

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speaklanguages



Joined: 11/08/2010 01:04:22
Messages: 11
Location: Estonia
Offline

Yes, I'd be happy to take care of this. I should be able to do it sometime this week.

Kind regards,
Chris
[WWW]
speaklanguages



Joined: 11/08/2010 01:04:22
Messages: 11
Location: Estonia
Offline

Sorry, it took me a while to take care of this, but I've now managed to rename the English counties as discussed.

The only one I wasn't able to edit is as follows:

County of Bedfordshire

For consistency with the others, this needs to be renamed to just "Bedfordshire", with "County of Bedfordshire" being added as an alternate name.

Chris
[WWW]
marc



Joined: 08/12/2005 07:39:47
Messages: 4412
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Thanks Chris. I have updated Bedfordshire.

Best Regards

Marc

[WWW]
rfay



Joined: 14/10/2007 01:00:50
Messages: 8
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Hmm - there are still 78 admin2 entries under GB with names like "County of", "City of", "Borough of".

I'll be happy to update them if I have a higher priv level (username rfay, need userlevel 2 I guess).
rfay



Joined: 14/10/2007 01:00:50
Messages: 8
Offline

I did the English Admin2 entries that I had permissions for, which was most of them (http://geotree.geonames.org/6269131/)

There are still two "City and Borough of" and one "City of" and seven "Borough of" which are locked to me with userlevel 1.

I have to admit that my Warmshowers.org users in England remain quite resistant to this list. They want the counties they use on postal addresses, which must be the Ceremonial County or something. For example, Newcastle upon Tyne (wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newcastle_upon_Tyne, geonames: http://www.geonames.org/3333174/newcastle-upon-tyne.html) would actually be in "Tyne and Wear", which is listed in Geonames only as an ADM1H (id 2635274)
 
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