Bench material

[MeijiRestored]

General

Affected tag(s) to be modified/added: material=* on amenity=bench
Question asked: What is the material of this bench?

Checklist

Checklist for quest suggestions (see guidelines):

• 🚧 To be added tag is established and has a useful purpose
• 🤔 Any answer the user can give must have an equivalent tagging (Quest should not reappear to other users when solved by one)
• 🐿️ Easily answerable by everyone from the outside but a survey is necessary
• 💤 Not an overwhelming percentage of quests have the same answer (No spam)
• 🕓 Applies to a reasonable number of map data (Worth the effort)

Ideas for implementation

Element selection:
Bench materials. Wood, Steel, Stone, Metal, Concrete, Brick, Iron, and others

Metadata needed:
None

Proposed UI:
Just like road/path surface, ask user what material the bench is using pictures of benches made with corresponding material.

[westnordost]

So what is the useful purpose?

[MeijiRestored]

So what is the useful purpose?

The material of benches is something that can't be mapped without surveying, it is not visible through aerial imagery or other editing sources for OSM contributors mapping @ home, similar to whether benches have a backrest. It would be quite a quick quest for the user to rapidly check the material of the bench.

[westnordost]

The fact that it may be easy to survey does not make the information itself useful.

[opk12]

• In the summer, most metal benches are unusable or PITA for most of the day, and stone and concrete make the difference.
• Wood feels easier on my back than concrete and brick; I guess medical conditions amplify the difference (chronic back pain, crutches).

[10992-osm]

So what is the useful purpose?

Wooden benches might degrade or disappear more quickly, so if nothing else, their existence could be checked more often.

Also, if it's wet, untreated wooden benches retain moisture for longer.

Looking at taginfo (global and GB), the vast majority of benches which already have a material=* tag have material=wood.

[smichel17]

their existence could be checked more often.

Currently they're checked every 6 years by default. So, if this is often enough for wood benches, we can use that value for all benches; if it's not enough, it should probably be lowered, since most are wood. :P

[westnordost]

Okay... this is all far fetched though IMO. Then, we'd also need to record if a bench is in the shadow/covered by a tree etc.

[mnalis]

Okay... this is all far fetched though IMO. Then, we'd also need to record if a bench is in the shadow/covered by a tree etc.

I guess you were joking, but now that you mention it, I do map trees near bench (and on correct sides of it) to indicate there might be shadow. I find that after I've cycled many dozens of kilometers at 30+ degrees Celsius, I do not want to sit on the bench under the full power of sun (this is multiplied on bicycle, because when I stop, the refreshing wind stops too, so I start heating up even more).

While detailed, such practice is not ideal for searching though (now, if OsmAnd offered custom Overpass queries, this would rock). But this issue let me found out about https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:shade, which I didn't know about, but will keep in mind. (although it is not as clearly defined to map as bench material).
But I digress.

So anyway this quest looks way more useful to me than for example "the material of power pole" quest (which is useful maybe only to few people repairing power poles? Who hopefully have their own database of power poles anyway and do not depend on OSM for their work), and about as useful as bench beckrest quest.

[westnordost]

No whataboutism please. I we'd always argue that there is also a more or at least as unimportant quest included, then we would slowly progress over to things like sidewalk:left:color=#656565.
As for shade, the sun obviously moves, so its really really subjective what may be considered as in the shade at what time. A really bad idea for a tag.

[matkoniecz]

So anyway this quest looks way more useful to me than for example "the material of power pole" quest (which is useful maybe only to few people repairing power poles? Who hopefully have their own database of power poles anyway and do not depend on OSM for their work), and about as useful as bench beckrest quest.

if I would do anything it would be disabling this quests by default rather than adding more similar ones

[mnalis]

No whataboutism please. I we'd always argue that there is also a more or at least as unimportant quest included, then we would slowly progress over to things like sidewalk:left:color=#656565.

Yes, I think I get your idea. I guess quests that were included in the past (when there was a lot less quests), would not be included today. (And I do apologize to the author, whoever they might be, for picking up that particular example - I didn't mean it in negative context).

I was just trying to indicate that there are uses for that (there are more than 12,000 material tags on the amenity=bench, so obviously some people care enough), and try to explain why I personally care about that and somewhat related issue; and others have given their reasons.

If the quest were written by someone and accepted, I'd surely enable it in my presets which has backrest quest. If it were not to be accepted, I'd survive - in most of my use cases where I care for benches (cycling outside of cities), benches are in most cases not mapped at all, so I have to add them (along with backrest and material, yes) from OsmAnd (or Vespucci) anyway.

As for shade, the sun obviously moves, so its really really subjective what may be considered as in the shade at what time. A really bad idea for a tag.

Well, if one looks at its wiki, it says it's for places that are shaded in most seasons and most times of day, e.g. because they are covered by vegetation, as in the photo, so not such a horrible idea as it looks at first glance when one hears it without more details. (And yes, I agree there are many more situations that are in "sometimes in shade, sometimes not" category).

But I was not actually proposing that SC asks for a shade (even if I think it is useful information) - primarily because I'm afraid many SC users wouldn't take full picture into consideration and thus answer such quest wrongly. For bench material however, I do not think there is such potential about wrong answer, so it is IMHO only a matter of "Is it useful enough?"

[mnalis]

Anyway, to put my money where my mouth is, IF such quest were determined to be useful enough to be accepted, and interested parties would help gather acceptable pictures of benches in various materials, I'd volunteer for trying to implement such quest (might be a reasonably complex quest for my first try)

(Of course, @westnordost if you're still not convinced it is useful, eg. it wouldn't be accepted, I have better things to do)

[carstenhag]

Just to chime in on the discussion, in the past I have mapped a few benches with Vespucci and added the material & backrest tags, as it was a preset. I don't think it's useful either.

[westnordost]

Alright, I go with my gut and reject this quest suggestion. If the bench material has been included in a preset, it explains the high number of it being tagged on benches.

[westnordost]

Yes I know, that is what I meant.