GeoNames Forum

I've come across geonames.org by way of geotagging my photos (I'm using GeoSetter). One thing that I'm finding rather strange is the sublocation assigned to my photos.

A picture taken in Disneyland (Anaheim, California) is labeled as being in 'Micaflores, Anaheim, California, United States'. One taken in the adjacent California Adventure park is labeled as 'Neff, Anaheim, California, United States'.

Should these adventure parks be given their own 'sublocation'? how about Disneyworld in Florida? the various Six Flags parks across the United States?

Paul

Hi Paul

I think you are right. Amusement Parks are quite important as Point of Interest and worthwhile to add to the GeoNames database.

Would you volunteer to enter a couple of them if I add a new feature code :
http://forum.geonames.org/gforum/posts/list/130.page

Cheers

Marc

Yes, I'll gladly contribute a few. The least I can do in return for the benefit I'm getting from geonames.

'Amusement Park' is a better term - they're not all themed, by any means.

Can I also request a 'Amusement Park Ride' feature code, or is that getting too granular? I've added a handful already, for Disneyland and California Adventure, where I've been often enough to be able to pick them out from satellite images

-- Paul

Hi Paul

I think a feature code for 'Amusement Park' makes sense. With the rides I am not so sure, though I don't have kids and know hardly anything about amusement parks.
Do you think it would be sufficient to give them a kind of generic point-of-interest code and use the GeoNames tagging system to further specify what kind of point of interest it is?

Cheers

Marc

Which generic POI code did you have in mind? I'd like to put it in the same class as L.AMUS, for obvious reasons, and have been using 'Locality' (seemed to be the most appropriate from http://download.geonames.org/export/dump/featureCodes.txt.

I like tags as an approach in general, but here I'm concerned that the 'free format' of tags means consistency goes out of the window. Any two people from the same culture won't tag in the same way consistently, throw in cultural/language differences and there's no hope. That's where the rigid taxonomy really brings benefits - in sharing the information, and building on it. Which reminds me - are tags public or private to me? they're not mentioned at all in the online manual.

By the way, looking at the maps for a couple of amusement parks, it seems 'attraction' is the preferred term, rather than 'ride'. Makes sense, not all attractions are rides.

Amusement parks can be huge - take a look at the grand daddy of them all - Disneyworld in Orlando, Florida. 44 square miles... approximately the size of San Francisco. Big enough that I think it's useful to be able to add more points-of-interest within that area.

Paul

p.s. You don't need to have kids to enjoy a good amusement park

Hi Paul

I didn't have a specific generic code in mind. I was just thinking loud. The tagging system is not yet very sophisticated and kind of mixture between private and public. Taggs are searchable but only ones own tags are displayed in the info window.

Marc

The more I think about it, the more it seems like an 'attraction' featurecode makes sense.

Besides amusement parks, 'roadside attractions' are a part of the culture here in the United States. Usually something claiming to be 'the world's largest', or some collossal piece of art/sculpture. I'm English, so Amercian culture will always seem a little bizarre to me at times

A couple of the many web sites devoted to them:

http://www.roadsideamerica.com/

http://www.wlra.us/

You may not agree it's worthwhile, and I'd respect that if so. But I know I'd put it to good use

Paul