[Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
> The consensus of those who replied seem to be to exclude these privately held lands from the National Forest boundaries. It isn't just privately held lands. U.S. DoD has numerous inholdings ( DOD owns 11.4 million acres in the United States, with individual parcel ownership ranging from 0 acres owned to 2.3 million acres ), FAA for nav aids, I believe there are also instances of tribal lands ( Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), the U.S. holds approximately 56.2 million acres in trust for various Indian tribes and individuals. ). For instance, the Department of Energy ( 'Better Bombs for a Better Way of Life' ) ... " DOE is the fourth largest federal land manager, conducting its mission at 50 major sites on 2.4 million acres across the country." And size is no determination of importance, because the 'rules' are dramatically different for different agencies and departments. Some of these provide access, The Magruder Corridor easement is basically the width of the track, between two wilderness areas, similarly various boat landing on lakes etc. Other very small areas, which have VERY nice gravel roads leading to them, will result in an armed response. "There have been 12 Minuteman missile sites constructed on the ( Pawnee, Forest Service ) ) grassland. These fenced areas (approximately two acres each) are US Air Force and public access is not permitted." Michael Patrick Data Ferret ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
On Tue, Oct 15, 2019, 16:39 Mike Thompson wrote: > On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 2:28 PM Bradley White > wrote: > >> Yes I understand that, that is what the landuse tag is for. Private >> land should tagged as private. Public land should be tagged as public. >> The 'access' tag is probably preferable for this, and it's what I use. >> My point is that none of this involves the NF boundary, and to please >> leave it alone because it's a pain to fix problems with it. >> > I understand and generally agree. One point is that the NFS may have made > arrangements with the landowner such that some access by the public is > permitted. I say this because an official USFS trail (Crosier Mountain > Trail)[1] crosses private land and there are no signs saying "No > Trespassing" > Once again, I deal with what I think is an exact parallel in New York. If there's a public-access easement on private land, I outline the easement or map the trail and put the appropriate access constraints (and boundary=protected_area+protect_class, if appropriate) on it. I haven't done very many of these for want of reliable data. One set that I have done is that there are a good many public-access lands in the Catskill Mountains for which New York City's Bureau of Water Supply is the 'private' landowner. These are mapped (within the boundary=national_park of the Catskill Park) as things like leisure=nature_reserve boundary=protected_area protect_class=12 protection_object=water access=private foot=yes. (There are other tag combinations, once again, because there are regulations pertaining to specific parcels). Sample situations: Administrative border of the Catskill Park: https://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/6265477 New York City public-access inholding within the Catskill Park: https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/424227080 Note that the highway right-of-way is a state-owned inholding within that. (The road is private once you cross onto New York City lands and the gate is ordinarily locked to prohibit motor vehicle traffic. They unlock it in the winter to allow snowmobiles through) One parcel of public-access land that the state owns in allodium (being sovereign, the state does not hold in fee), within the park. Note exclaves of this holding, plus private inholdings mapped by exclusion: https://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/6367009 A single-purpose recreation area (again, state-owned, although privately operated) within the Park, again with private inholdings: https://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/6373343 A private inholding (untagged) within a Wild Forest area (one tier below Wilderness), within the Catskill Park: https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/428667447 within https://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/6375713 within https://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/6265477 A public footway mostly on public land, but with portions that cross private inholdings: https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/286143201 What sort of thing am I failing to model here? ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
Once again, I think that New York state lands offer a parallel. The administrative borders of the Adirondack and Catskill parks are mapped (boundary=national_park protect_class=2). This has been discussed elsewhere; for these two specific regions, national_park appears to be a better fit than a mere protected_area. The state-owned and -managed land within the regions is mapped as well. boundary=protected_area protect_class=1b leisure=nature_reserve foot=yes is one combination, but there is a whole zoo of land classifications with different land use and access constraints. The private inholdings are mapped only by exclusion. On Tue, Oct 15, 2019, 15:30 Mike Thompson wrote: > > > On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 1:12 PM Bradley White > wrote: > >> No, this is incorrect. USFS administrative boundaries and USFS managed >> land are not the same thing, though the latter is always inside the >> former. The boundaries currently in OSM are administrative boundaries, >> and are tagged correctly as such. It is perfectly fine to have private >> land within a USFS administrative boundary, in the same way it would >> be okay to have private land within any other government-defined >> jurisdictional boundary. >> > Ok, so how to tag the parts that are within the administrative boundaries > but which are not owned by the US Government? Or, how to tag the parts that > are both within the boundary and owned by the US Government? > > This is important information to prevent trespassing. > ___ > Talk-us mailing list > Talk-us@openstreetmap.org > https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us > ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
> I downloaded a quad (geotiff) for part of the area in question and pulled it > into QGIS. It generally agrees with the county land ownership information, > with the exception that some state lands are shown on the quad as owned by > the Federal Government. Perhaps this is an error in one of the datasets. As far as I understand (and tag), the owned lands should be tagged as landuse (generally, landuse=forest, access=yes, operator=xxx National Forest), but the administrative boundary is something different from that. From what I see in parts of the SE (looking specifically at Chattahoochee-Oconee, Nantahala, etc area), the administrative boundary multipolygon is around *only* USFS owned lands. I would consider this tagging style incorrect, and largely the exception relative to the rest of the US. >The Fee Owned is a a subset of the Congressionally Mandated boundaries as >someone else explained. My unofficial suggestion is if you want to model >recreation, it would be better to show the Fee Owned boundaries so people >don't end up on private lands. The US Topo uses proclaimed at this time. Proclaimed boundaries are the administrative boundaries, and should be tagged with "boundary" tags as they are in most of the US. Actual owned land (fee owned) is a matter of landuse and should be tagged using landuse tags. Unfortunately, this doesn't necessarily show distinctly on the main OSM slippy map. However, this is a generic map that is not *necessarily* designed to be useful for any one specific thing, and trying to show different ownership of land can get messy very fast. The data in the OSM database should reflect the distinction between designated administrative boundaries and actual managed forest land, regardless of whether this shows nicely on the slippy map. If the goal is to see clearly what land is actually owned by the USFS, then it is likely better to either use the USFS topo maps, or develop your own map style that shows the difference! ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
> One point is that the NFS may have made arrangements with the landowner such > that some access by the public is permitted. I say this because an official > USFS trail (Crosier Mountain Trail)[1] crosses private land and there are no > signs saying "No Trespassing" The way may be, but usually the land itself is not. The land is still tagged access=private, and the trail is tagged either access=yes if it is a legal public easement over private land, or access=permissive if there is an agreement with the landowner to allow public to access the trail as long as they stay on trail (but there is no legal right of way otherwise) ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
All, I got this message off list from Greg Mathews who works for the USGS, for some reason he was unable to post himself (something wrong with his subscription perhaps): BEGIN Hi folks, This is a dataset I'm somewhat familiar with. Likely the best available data for land management agency boundaries is from PAD-US here: https://www.sciencebase.gov/catalog/item/5b030c7ae4b0da30c1c1d6de Federal land management agency boundaries generally come in two types: 1. Proclaimed boundaries - these are Congressionally mandated boundaries, and 2. Fee Owned - these are boundaries actually owned by the agencies and show in-holdings, slightly different boundaries, etc. The Fee Owned is a a subset of the Congressionally Mandated boundaries as someone else explained. My unofficial suggestion is if you want to model recreation, it would be better to show the Fee Owned boundaries so people don't end up on private lands. The US Topo uses proclaimed at this time. - Greg Matthews Published Maps Products and Services Focus Area Lead Office of User Engagement US Geological Survey END On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 2:41 PM Mike Thompson wrote: > > > > This key works for anywhere on this >> (https://data.fs.usda.gov/geodata/rastergateway/states-regions/states.php >> ) >> slippy map - take a look at the national forests near you and you will >> find plenty of private land that is still within the NF boundary. >> > I downloaded a quad (geotiff) for part of the area in question and pulled > it into QGIS. It generally agrees with the county land ownership > information, with the exception that some state lands are shown on the quad > as owned by the Federal Government. Perhaps this is an error in one of the > datasets. > ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
This key works for anywhere on this > (https://data.fs.usda.gov/geodata/rastergateway/states-regions/states.php) > slippy map - take a look at the national forests near you and you will > find plenty of private land that is still within the NF boundary. > I downloaded a quad (geotiff) for part of the area in question and pulled it into QGIS. It generally agrees with the county land ownership information, with the exception that some state lands are shown on the quad as owned by the Federal Government. Perhaps this is an error in one of the datasets. ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 2:30 PM Bradley White wrote: > Sorry - not too familiar with imgur! Does this work? > https://i.imgur.com/4OC23x3.png Yes, that worked! > > ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 2:28 PM Bradley White wrote: > Yes I understand that, that is what the landuse tag is for. Private > land should tagged as private. Public land should be tagged as public. > The 'access' tag is probably preferable for this, and it's what I use. > My point is that none of this involves the NF boundary, and to please > leave it alone because it's a pain to fix problems with it. > I understand and generally agree. One point is that the NFS may have made arrangements with the landowner such that some access by the public is permitted. I say this because an official USFS trail (Crosier Mountain Trail)[1] crosses private land and there are no signs saying "No Trespassing" [1] https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/49458204 ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
Another place to discuss this might be https://wiki.osm.org/wiki/Talk:United_States/Public_lands , an emerging place to try to unravel the highly complex multi-jurisdictional, part human-recreation (part not), "public lands" in the USA. This wiki originally started from a multi-volunteer effort to try to better express semantics regarding "parks" — especially "state parks" and "county parks," somewhat nightmare-ish in OSM, but with greater understanding and many voices, perhaps many years from now, I believe these issues can be solved, if not better expressed than they are today. The issues discussed, like inholdings, wilderness-OVER-forest (rather than subsets of) are what I and others here have mightily struggled with for over a decade, especially as good data (like USFS shapefiles and CPAD) have emerged and are available to us, AND update over time! The topics (and concomitant tagging) are complex and not easy for OSM's tradition of wide consensus to agree upon. Nonetheless, we should continue to strive to do our best. I am heartened to see good discussion like this here. Please know that when you ask such questions, and others (well-intentioned, intelligent, familiar with the topics and difficulties involved...) chime in, you walk into a very large space with seriously complex semantics. OSM can (and will, I believe) better untangle these issues, but we must give ourselves the time and polite space for the many voices, points of view and deep knowledge we have to synthesize into how we best do this. A good starting point is "this is difficult, there are widely differing points of view, there's a lot of history in OSM and new schemes have emerged while older data remain in the map." See, that right there is a lot to chew on! There are likely multiple ways forward, really. SteveA California ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
Sorry - not too familiar with imgur! Does this work? https://i.imgur.com/4OC23x3.png On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 1:24 PM Mike Thompson wrote: > > > > On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 2:21 PM Bradley White > wrote: >> >> A visual example since I don't feel like what I'm saying is being >> understood: https://imgur.com/a/0ELKyxH > > The link takes me to a page that is asking me to sign in. >> >> ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
Yes I understand that, that is what the landuse tag is for. Private land should tagged as private. Public land should be tagged as public. The 'access' tag is probably preferable for this, and it's what I use. My point is that none of this involves the NF boundary, and to please leave it alone because it's a pain to fix problems with it. On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 1:22 PM Mike Thompson wrote: > > > >> >> Please do not add holes in the boundary unless they are officially >> designated! Otherwise there is no point to keeping these >> administrative boundaries in OSM. > > Ok, but we still need to know where those private inholdings are, because > Forest regulations will not apply. For example, unless posted otherwise, I > can go anywhere on National Forest government owned lands, and I can camp > anywhere as long as I am not within a certain distance of a road or stream. > I can't do those things on private land. So access=private, ownership=private? > ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 2:21 PM Bradley White wrote: > A visual example since I don't feel like what I'm saying is being > understood: https://imgur.com/a/0ELKyxH The link takes me to a page that is asking me to sign in. > > ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
> Please do not add holes in the boundary unless they are officially > designated! Otherwise there is no point to keeping these > administrative boundaries in OSM. > Ok, but we still need to know where those private inholdings are, because Forest regulations will not apply. For example, unless posted otherwise, I can go anywhere on National Forest government owned lands, and I can camp anywhere as long as I am not within a certain distance of a road or stream. I can't do those things on private land. So access=private, ownership=private? ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
A visual example since I don't feel like what I'm saying is being understood: https://imgur.com/a/0ELKyxH This key works for anywhere on this (https://data.fs.usda.gov/geodata/rastergateway/states-regions/states.php) slippy map - take a look at the national forests near you and you will find plenty of private land that is still within the NF boundary. ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
Every National Forest has an administrative boundary - they can be downloaded here: https://data.fs.usda.gov/geodata/webapps/EDW_DataExtract/. Accept the disclaimer, click the button with the scissors in the top left corner, choose the national forest you want, select 'Administrative Forest Boundaries' (preselected), choose your file format, and open in your favorite GIS program. This boundary is what is in OSM, or at least what should be. These boundaries can also be viewed using USFS Topo maps (https://data.fs.usda.gov/geodata/rastergateway/states-regions/states.php) You will see that sometimes private land punches a hole in these boundaries, and if so it should be in OSM as such. But you will also see that sometimes (often times in the west coast), private land *doesn't* punch a hole in the boundary, and thus there *shouldn't* be a hole in the boundary in OSM despite being a private in-holding. This is what I mean by these conflating landuse and jurisdiction. Private land inside NF boundaries does not automatically mean there's a hole in NF boundary. Please do not add holes in the boundary unless they are officially designated! Otherwise there is no point to keeping these administrative boundaries in OSM. On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 12:45 PM Kevin wrote: > > Bradley, > I'm not sure that this is typically how federal lands are conceptualized, at > least on the east coast. It is usually as Mike suggests a 1:1 correspondence > with the actual Fee Simple boundary and federal management. A lot of times > when maps are drawn or gis data is developed scale is a consideration and > just conveying where a National Forest is is more important than showing a > patchwork of in-holdings (which by the way are constantly changing with land > swaps and selling or buying parcels). This may be where the idea of an > administrative boundary or area comes from? In any case a really excellent > source for all protected lands is the USGS PAD-US dataset. > https://www.usgs.gov/core-science-systems/science-analytics-and-synthesis/gap/science/protected-areas > Disclaimer: I am the Georgia data steward. > > So Mike, > I would say if you have the information and data that there's a private > in-holding, I would exclude it from the National Forest (or whatever) polygon > and maybe map the landcover (forest, etc) if you are so inclined. > > Kevin > > On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 3:12 PM Bradley White > wrote: >> >> No, this is incorrect. USFS administrative boundaries and USFS managed >> land are not the same thing, though the latter is always inside the >> former. The boundaries currently in OSM are administrative boundaries, >> and are tagged correctly as such. It is perfectly fine to have private >> land within a USFS administrative boundary, in the same way it would >> be okay to have private land within any other government-defined >> jurisdictional boundary. >> >> > The consensus of those who replied seem to be to exclude these privately >> > held lands from the National Forest boundaries. Is that correct? Does >> > anyone object to that approach? If not, I will proceed in that manner as >> > well. >> > >> > Mike >> > >> >> ___ >> Talk-us mailing list >> Talk-us@openstreetmap.org >> https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
> Ok, so how to tag the parts that are within the administrative boundaries but > which are not owned by the US Government? Or, how to tag the parts that are > both within the boundary and owned by the US Government? It depends on what is actually on the ground. It appears you and others are conflating jurisdictional boundaries with landuse/ownership. While NF-owned land must be within a NF boundary, that is the end of any relationship between NF boundaries and on-the-ground landuse. The "National Forest property behind this sign" demarcates landuse, not jurisdiction. For example, in theory, there could exist a single parcel of private property, that is also partially within a designated wilderness, that also spans across two different national forest boundaries. There's no casual relationship between these concepts, in the sense that "this land is private, therefore it is a 'hole' in the NF boundary". What is actually on the ground should be tagged using landuse. Private forest cabin within NF? landuse=residential, access=private. Tree-covered land owned by USFS? landuse=forest, access=yes, operator=Tahoe National Forest. Private timber harvesting land? landuse=forest, access=private/permissive, operator=whoever. Notice that none of these involve changes to anything 'boundary', because they're distinct and (mostly) orthogonal concepts. The NF boundaries, for the most part, are correct in OSM as they are and should not be touched unless incorrect per USFS GIS data which is the reference for them. It's difficult to notice when they've been incorrectly changed, and it's even more difficult to fix them once they have been messed up. Someone has made up a lot of work in California a few years ago by making wilderness boundaries share ways with NF boundaries (mutually excluding NF jurisdiction from wilderness area), when in fact wilderness areas *overlap* NF jurisdictional boundaries and do _not_ exclude them (ie, wilderness areas are often managed by multiple National Forests, and are not their own separately-managed entity). I have fixed a couple near Lake Tahoe, but it is enormously time consuming work that requires some experience with GIS tools as well as JOSM, which is very frustrating considering they were correct in the first place. ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
Bradley, I'm not sure that this is typically how federal lands are conceptualized, at least on the east coast. It is usually as Mike suggests a 1:1 correspondence with the actual Fee Simple boundary and federal management. A lot of times when maps are drawn or gis data is developed scale is a consideration and just conveying where a National Forest is is more important than showing a patchwork of in-holdings (which by the way are constantly changing with land swaps and selling or buying parcels). This may be where the idea of an administrative boundary or area comes from? In any case a really excellent source for all protected lands is the USGS PAD-US dataset. https://www.usgs.gov/core-science-systems/science-analytics-and-synthesis/gap/science/protected-areas Disclaimer: I am the Georgia data steward. So Mike, I would say if you have the information and data that there's a private in-holding, I would exclude it from the National Forest (or whatever) polygon and maybe map the landcover (forest, etc) if you are so inclined. Kevin On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 3:12 PM Bradley White wrote: > No, this is incorrect. USFS administrative boundaries and USFS managed > land are not the same thing, though the latter is always inside the > former. The boundaries currently in OSM are administrative boundaries, > and are tagged correctly as such. It is perfectly fine to have private > land within a USFS administrative boundary, in the same way it would > be okay to have private land within any other government-defined > jurisdictional boundary. > > > The consensus of those who replied seem to be to exclude these privately > held lands from the National Forest boundaries. Is that correct? Does > anyone object to that approach? If not, I will proceed in that manner as > well. > > > > Mike > > > > ___ > Talk-us mailing list > Talk-us@openstreetmap.org > https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us > ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 1:12 PM Bradley White wrote: > No, this is incorrect. USFS administrative boundaries and USFS managed > land are not the same thing, though the latter is always inside the > former. The boundaries currently in OSM are administrative boundaries, > and are tagged correctly as such. It is perfectly fine to have private > land within a USFS administrative boundary, in the same way it would > be okay to have private land within any other government-defined > jurisdictional boundary. > Ok, so how to tag the parts that are within the administrative boundaries but which are not owned by the US Government? Or, how to tag the parts that are both within the boundary and owned by the US Government? This is important information to prevent trespassing. ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
No, this is incorrect. USFS administrative boundaries and USFS managed land are not the same thing, though the latter is always inside the former. The boundaries currently in OSM are administrative boundaries, and are tagged correctly as such. It is perfectly fine to have private land within a USFS administrative boundary, in the same way it would be okay to have private land within any other government-defined jurisdictional boundary. > The consensus of those who replied seem to be to exclude these privately held > lands from the National Forest boundaries. Is that correct? Does anyone > object to that approach? If not, I will proceed in that manner as well. > > Mike > ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
The consensus of those who replied seem to be to exclude these privately held lands from the National Forest boundaries. Is that correct? Does anyone object to that approach? If not, I will proceed in that manner as well. Mike ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
Re: [Talk-us] National Forests and Private Ownership
> Not all of the land within US National Forests is owned by the US > Government, there are private "inholdings" [1]. > > The boundaries between government land and private land are often marked by > signs, e.g.[2] The above photo is geotagged, and if you drag it into JOSM > you can see that it is quite far from the overall National Forest boundary > as currently depicted in OSM[3]. Land actually owned and operated by the USFS is always a subset of the jurisdictional boundary of a given NF. Near where I live, half of the entire city of Reno is within the Humboldt-Toiyabe boundary, the entire city of South Lake Tahoe within LTBMU, town of Truckee entirely within Tahoe NF, etc. The jurisdictional boundaries are more or less unhelpful in determining whether land is managed by the USFS or not. I'm assuming this must not be the case in other parts of the country, where the vast majority of the land within a boundary can assumed to be owned by the USFS? Aside from surveying boundary markers (which are inconsistently placed and would be a logistically impossible task), the only other ways to know what land is actually owned by the USFS is to check county parcel data, or use the 'Surface Ownership' gdb/shp available using the USFS Data Extract tool. In CA, we are very lucky to have the CPAD database, which compiles the majority of public/semi-public lands into one database, updated yearly, and free to use (see Contributors page in OSM wiki). Where these lands also have tree cover, I tag them 'landuse=forest' and 'access=yes'. Any private "inholding" gets tagged for what it is. ___ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
