Not available yet
06/02/2025-12/02/2025
[1] The Brandenburger Tor. © OSM go | Map data © OpenStreetMap Contributors.
Mapping
- Requests for comments have been made on this proposal:
traffic_sign:id=*to explicitly reference official traffic sign identifiers, improving data accuracy and interoperability with external databases.
- The proposal to add
golf=out_of_bounds, for mapping the area designated as being outside the boundaries of a golf hole, is open for voting until Saturday 22 February.
Mapping campaigns
- Mapbox has thrown down the gauntlet to the German mapping community, claiming that there are roads in Germany that are yet to be mapped. The contributors wish them luck and hope that Brian Sperlongano has popped enough corn for all of us.
- In response to recent disruptions in the US Federal Government disruption of foreign assistance, HOT is launching a 90 day campaign of ‘Open Maps for Humanitarian Needs’, inviting volunteers to map.
- YouthMappers at Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia is set to host
a mapping party in Bandung, aiming to document and identify local plant species.
a mapping party in Bandung, aiming to document and identify local plant species.Community
- Just van den Broecke was interviewed by OpenCage regarding the OpenStreetMap Alpumapa Workshop.
- jbcharron shared ► a series of Overpass queries aimed at improving associatedStreet, a relation used to link streets with houses for addressing purposes.
- Gregory Marler has made a video detailing his experience of mapping Perth, Scotland, using EveryDoor and KeypadMapper.
- Amanda McCann and Milvus emerged as joint winners in OpenCage’s January 2025 edition of #fridaygeotrivia. This month’s challenge asked participants to name country pairs sharing a land border of less than 50 km in total length.
►
OpenStreetMap Foundation
- The OpenStreetMap Foundation has announced that eight new entities, including ESRI, Meta, Microsoft, Niantic, and QGIS, joined its Corporate Membership Programme in 2024, contributing at various levels to support OSM’s infrastructure and community efforts.
Events
- IVIDES.org® has opened the pre-registration for the Green Open Data Day 2025 event, to be held on March 31, 2025, in Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), as part of the initiatives celebrating open data around the world. You can consult the program and register today. In-person and remote activities are planned to map trees with OpenStreetMap and to remind people of the importance of vegetation cover in the face of the current climate crisis.
- Open Knowledge Brasil is looking for proposals suggesting open data events, including those associated with OpenStreetMap, to celebrate Open Data Day 2025. Ideas are needed by Monday 17 February.
OSM research
- Héctor Ochoa-Ortiz and Barbara Re, from the Università degli Studi di Camerino (Italy), have explored why and how commercial organisations contribute to OpenStreetMap, identifying five key ways: data editing, tool development, event sponsorship, OSM-related funding, and community building. These approaches are motivated by both business needs (for example, improving data quality) and social values (fostering community engagement). The paper also addresses challenges such as governance barriers and technical limitations that have led to alternative initiatives such as Overture Maps.
- Niroshan and Carswell have published a paper with an analysis of machine learning approaches, focusing on their application to updating OpenStreetMap.
- McKeen and others have published an article about the evolution of humanitarian mapping within the OpenStreetMap community, in the Scientific Reports. The authors concentrated on the editing of buildings and roads in specific countries. The analysis of temporal patterns revealed the impact of major disaster activations for the 2013 Typhoon Haiyan, 2014 West Africa Ebola Crisis, 2015 Nepal Earthquake, and 2017 Mexico Earthquake – as well as Hurricanes Irma and Maria around the same time. Subsequent disaster activations showed less engagement from the OSM community except during the COVID-19 pandemic period. Outside of crisis times, the trend-cycle analysis revealed that humanitarian mapping experienced sustained growth regarding monthly added buildings and highways from 2012 to mid-2017. However, the trend-cycle analysis further depicted a consolidation phase since mid-2017.
Maps
- [1] -karlos- (aka DerKarlos) has revived his old 3D-rendered OpenStreetMap project ‘OSM go’ by integrating Panoramax images after Mapillary’s API shutdown, and is now exploring other improvements, including better 3D rendering techniques and possibly rewriting the project in Rust or Zig. You can view the Brandenburg Gate, one of Germany’s most famous landmarks. There is an ‘OSM go’ project page on the OSM wiki and at GitLab.
- After several months of research and server-intensive mapping, Charlie Plett has completed the British Empire’s territorial boundaries in OpenHistoricalMap.
OSM in action
- OK Klima ► has created a map that shows the current situation (mobility, energy, consumption, buildings, food system) of the municipalities in Switzerland in relation to the Paris climate agreement. OpenStreetMap data was used as the basis for calculating ► some of the indicators.
►Programming
- Sarah Hoffmann has been selected for the one-year pilot of the Sovereign Tech Fellowship programme by the Sovereign Tech Agency. The fellowship will provide support for the maintenance of Nominatim, Photon, osm2pgsql, and pyosmium throughout the next year. Congratulations Sarah!
- Matthias Schwindt, from GPS Radler, explained ► how to install and use alternative OpenStreetMap maps on the Garmin Fenix 8 watch, covering different installation methods, map activation and usability, as well as insights into Garmin’s Outdoor Maps+ subscription service.
Releases
- Nominatim 5.0.0 has been released, completing its transition to a Python package by removing the PHP front end and bundled osm2pgsql, while introducing a reworked osm2pgsql import style configuration, better integration with osm2pgsql-themepark, and new pre-processing hooks for search queries, including improved handling of Japanese addresses.
- Version 1.6.0 of the Panoramax Android app Baba has been released. This version brings GNSS support for phones without Google services, better notifications for picture uploads, and allows saving to external storage.
- GeoCompas.AI has introduced the SAMGEO-API, a service designed to streamline geospatial AI Data generation using the SAM2 module, which promises to enhance workflows for mapping projects with tools like DS-Annotate and the JOSM Magic Wand plugin. OSM contributors have talked about their user experiences on the OSM Community forum.
Did you know that …
- … the geocompx project is a community-driven effort to provide resources for learning and teaching geocomputation in multiple programming languages? Geocomputation with R and Geocomputation with Python are available as open source books, with Geocomputation with Julia in development. The making maps section of the books describe various cartographic packages. The interactive maps are based on Leaflet and OpenStreetMap.
OSM in the media
- Eleven Landesamt für Geoinformation und Landesvermessung Niedersachsen (Hannover Germany) trainees have supported ► the Missing Maps project by mapping 1387 buildings in OpenStreetMap to aid humanitarian efforts. Guided by the German Red Cross, they focused on flood-prone areas near Montréal and other global regions, gaining valuable technical and social insights.Contributors from Québec were a bit surprised to read of this emergency call on the HOT Tasking Manager. Pierre Béland tooted suggesting that next time they might concentrate on climate change in Europe.
Other “geo” things
- Eva-Maria Weiß looked ► at the 20-year history of Google Maps and highlights the convenience of navigation and travel planning, while ethical concerns have been raised ► regarding data protection, corporate influence and the decline of independent map alternatives.
- The United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction has called for nominations for the 2025 Sasakawa Award for Disaster Risk Reduction. Nominations must be submitted by Friday 28 March.
- Aurelio Morales has shown ► how to create maps in QGIS using DeepSeek, the new Chinese open-source AI.
- India’s newly launched navigation satellite has not reached its intended orbit due to an engine problem and is now in the wrong orbit, creating challenges for the country’s satellite navigation system. Currently, the Indian Space Research Organization is developing alternative mission strategies to utilise the satellite for navigation in an elliptical orbit.
- Researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Michigan have developed a new indoor navigation system for drones, utilising reflected radio waves.
- A study has analysed tuberculosis (TB) diagnostic gaps in Cameroon by integrating national TB notification data with geospatial datasets from OpenStreetMap and WorldPop. The findings reveal that 53% of TB cases and 50% of rifampicin-resistant TB cases remain undiagnosed, highlighting disparities in diagnostic tool distribution. The study underscores the need for better resource allocation and targeted interventions to improve TB detection in high-burden regions.
- The QGIS Resources Hub has a new website, which you can use to discover and explore the resources.
- Christoph Hormann has extended the coverage of his Musaicum satellite imagery to include the North Atlantic islands.
►Upcoming Events
| Where | What | Online | When | Country |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Richmond | MapRVA Meetup  | 2025-02-14 |  | |
| Pankow | 200. Berlin-Brandenburg OpenStreetMap Stammtisch | 2025-02-14 |  | |
| Moers | I Love Free Software Day Community-Hackday vom 14. — 16. Februar 2025 im JuNo, Moers Repelen | 2025-02-14 — 2025-02-16 | | |
| 東区 | State of the Map Japan 2024 | 2025-02-14 |  | |
| Karlsruhe | Karlsruhe Hack Weekend | 2025-02-15 — 2025-02-16 | | |
| Panoramax monthly international meeting | 2025-02-17 | |||
| Budapest | OSM térképest 2025-02-18 | 2025-02-18 |  | |
| Missing Maps London: (Online) Mid-Month Mapathon [eng] | 2025-02-18 | |||
| Lyon | Réunion du groupe local de Lyon | 2025-02-18 |  | |
| Arlon | Réunion Province de Luxembourg | 2025-02-18 |  | |
| San Jose | South Bay Map Night | ✓ | 2025-02-19 | |
| Bonn | 185. OSM-Stammtisch Bonn | 2025-02-18 | | |
| Lüneburg | Lüneburger Mappertreffen | ✓ | 2025-02-18 | |
| [Online] Map-py Wednesday | 2025-02-19 | |||
| Hannover | OSM-Stammtisch Hannover | 2025-02-19 | | |
| Karlsruhe | Stammtisch Karlsruhe | 2025-02-19 | | |
| Guadalajara | A Synesthete’s Atlas: Cartographic Improvisations between Eric Theise, Maria Del Carmen Camarena, Eliud Ernandes, and Gustavo Larroyo | 2025-02-20 |  | |
| OSMF Engineering Working Group meeting | 2025-02-21 | |||
| Guadalajara | A Synesthete’s Atlas: Cartographic Improvisations between Eric Theise, Zyanya Yax, and Chino Ortega | 2025-02-22 | | |
| Derby | East Midlands pub meet-up | 2025-02-25 |  | |
| Granada | Introducción a OpenStreetMap | 2025-02-25 |  | |
| Amsterdam | Maptime Amsterdam: End of Winter Mapping Party | 2025-02-26 |  | |
| Düsseldorf | Düsseldorfer OpenStreetMap-Treffen (online) | 2025-02-26 | | |
| Flensburg | 2. Open Data Day in Flensburg | 2025-03-01 | | |
| 14th OSM Delhi Mapping Party (Online) | 2025-03-02 |
Note:
If you like to see your event here, please put it into the OSM calendar. Only data which is there, will appear in weeklyOSM.
This weeklyOSM was produced by MatthiasMatthias, PierZen, Raquel Dezidério Souto, Strubbl, TheSwavu, barefootstache, derFred, jcr83, mcliquid.
We welcome link suggestions for the next issue via this form and look forward to your contributions.