Ian, I'm an OSM volunteer (http://hdyc.neis-one.org/?dandv) and I've submitted updates since 2008 based on my own observations on the ground. I fully support and understand the mission of OSM.
Imaginary boundaries, unfortunately, can by definition not be confirmed on the ground. Yet their utility is also quite clear. OSM features county lines and many other administrative boundaries that have no correspondence on the ground, and whose source is almost always external and the sole authority over the boundary. In the particular case of water boundaries, I case see several actual use cases: 1. Marine sanctuaries often don't allow personal watercraft. An OSM user could use the map to stay outside of the boundaries. 2. Zero-discharge areas don't allow activities one would ordinarily consider harmless, such as washing one's sailboat. An OpenSeaMap user could sail outside of the boundary in that case. 3. The display of the NOAA Sanctuaries boundaries on OpenSeaMap (at least, if not also on OpenStreetMaps) can help educate the public on the extent of protected ocean areas. In the particular area we're interested in, nature reserves are already marked on land - http://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=10/37.7637/-122.5903 Based on these reasons, I think it would be useful to import the NOAA Marine Sanctuaries data into OSM. On Sat, Sep 7, 2013 at 2:33 PM, Ian Dees <[email protected]> wrote: > Dan, OpenStreetMap's strength is that volunteers can verify the data by > observing it on the ground. Boundaries imported from external sources, > especially those in the water, are essentially "dead data" that cannot be > improved upon unless the external data source changes the data. That sort > of data isn't very useful to OSM and it's not my opinion that it shouldn't > be in OSM. >
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