National Postcodes to be introduced

shewasdiesel

Been waiting for these postcodes for a long time. Surely the winning connected snout in the tough has been picked ?

Impetus

Deleted User wrote: »

It will be used, if the civil service are instructed to only deal with correspondence that has the postcode added to the address of the "customer", e.g. no postcode, no benefit payments!

While that might be imposed on benefit seekers, those seeking to impose this bureaucratic arrogance on the public in general might want to consider their position. This is rapidly becoming the most hated postcode on the planet.

Impetus

SpaceTime wrote: »

In the Southwest they're as vague as Family Name + Nearest Village + Post Code (which is just repeating the nearest village name in code).

It's only a problem for actual rural farm houses though. Ireland would have a much higher percentage of those relative to villages.

Which is why Ireland needs townland names to be re-defined as roads, using the townland name as the base and adding a building number. Anyway if France tried to impose an eircode-style random 4 characters after the 5 digit code postale, would it make it any easier to find the farm house?

Impetus

F1ngers wrote: »

An alpha-numeric code would extend it.
By how much, I don't know.

If you followed this line of argument you would be back to the stupid Eircode.

shewasdiesel

Impetus wrote: »

While that might be imposed on benefit seekers, those seeking to impose this bureaucratic arrogance on the public in general might want to consider their position. This is rapidly becoming the most hated postcode on the planet.

Didn't stop or change anything else they've done. The public have been quite happy to roll over on everything else, they'll roll over on this as well. Ireland is incapable of getting any postcode system correct or non corrupt. P-Pars, e-voting, pulse and long list of other fiasco's will testify to that.

Impetus

shewasdiesel wrote: »

Didn't stop or change anything else they've done. The public have been quite happy to roll over on everything else, they'll roll over on this as well. Ireland is incapable of getting any postcode system correct or non corrupt. P-Pars, e-voting, pulse and long list of other fiasco's will testify to that.

Well the country has the option to carry on as before. Make the same mess of postcodes as the Central Bank & Co (and their ECB associates) did with the management of bank lending, as well as the other issues you mention.

Or the powers that be can surprise the public by applying a refreshing level of intelligence to updating the addressing "system" - which dates back to Norman times. Back in the day, before the Normans came, the country was probably the highest quality book publisher on the planet - Book of Kells etc etc.

Is it not time to end this gradual fall downhill, which probably started about 1,000 years ago? Countries like Switzerland, Singapore and Monaco discovered this decades ago and focused everything on quality. All three countries have zero unemployment in real terms, and a high standard of living for all. At a global level, smart money follows / rewards intelligently run countries. A country with third world postal addresses can't call itself intelligently managed.

SpaceTime

The problem is that An Post and the city/county councils let addressing go completely unmanaged for nearly a century.

You basically just made up your address and it was used by convention and you've insane situations like house names in use in cities and suburban areas instead of numbers.

An Post's even delivering letters to house names in places that have house numbering. That kind of thing is just nuts.

shewasdiesel

A post code is just a form of grid reference, it's not rocket science, except to the Irish it seems, who can't agree yet on which connected cronie company to make rich with the post code contract and how.

Impetus

shewasdiesel wrote: »

A post code is just a form of grid reference, it's not rocket science, except to the Irish it seems, who can't agree yet on which connected cronie company to make rich with the post code contract and how.

The difference between a normal postcode and a grid reference :

1) A postcode does not refer to a square box. It takes into account the shape of towns and the out of town areas served by the town. ie mountains, valleys, railways, roads, motorways all have a part in shaping the growth of urbanisations - ie where people live and work.

2) A postcode is far more user-friendly is 4002 or 59233 rather than a lat long ref of 53.896527, -9.145020 or something similar in terms of a national grid reference.

3) A short postcode combined with the name of a road and the number of an address on that road in a particular town is both user-friendly and machine friendly. Which must be the objective.

shewasdiesel

Impetus wrote: »

The difference between a normal postcode and a grid reference :

1) A postcode does not refer to a square box. It takes into account the shape of towns and the out of town areas served by the town. ie mountains, valleys, railways, roads, motorways all have a part in shaping the growth of urbanisations - ie where people live and work.

2) A postcode is far more user-friendly is 4002 or 59233 rather than a lat long ref of 53.896527, -9.145020 or something similar in terms of a national grid reference.

3) A short postcode combined with the name of a road and the number of an address on that road in a particular town is both user-friendly and machine friendly. Which must be the objective.

You entirely missed the 'form of' bit. The point is a postcode is not rocket science, except to the Irish it seems, who can't agree yet on which connected cronie company to make rich with the post code contract and how. Most other modern societies have had them for 50+ years.

Impetus

SpaceTime wrote: »

The problem is that An Post and the city/county councils let addressing go completely unmanaged for nearly a century.

You basically just made up your address and it was used by convention and you've insane situations like house names in use in cities and suburban areas instead of numbers.

An Post's even delivering letters to house names in places that have house numbering. That kind of thing is just nuts.

That is the history. We now have an opportunity to fix this mess. Using a user-friendly, machine-friendly, logistics-friendly gov-friendly, solution. There is no point throwing z million Euros in the trash can exacerbating the problem with random coded junk that few people will use because it is meaningless to them.

shewasdiesel

Impetus wrote: »

That is the history. We now have an opportunity to fix this mess. Using a user-friendly, machine-friendly, logistics-friendly gov-friendly, solution. There is no point throwing z million Euros in the trash can exacerbating the problem with random coded junk that few people will use because it is meaningless to them.

And give up the long Irish tradition of trying to reinvent the wheel and making a complete and utter corrupt balls of it ? It'll be another P-Pars, evoting, PULSE fiasco before our fine Politicians, Civil Service, and Private Sector are finished with it.

Impetus

shewasdiesel wrote: »

You entirely missed the 'form of' bit. The point is a postcode is not rocket science, except to the Irish it seems, who can't agree yet on which connected cronie company to make rich with the post code contract and how. Most other modern societies have had them for 50+ years.

Mea culpa. Perhaps it is because I have no financial interest in the issue. But I do agree something that should be a nationwide extension of the Dublin postal district number (with an additional code for po boxes and large postal users) is not rocket science. I will refrain from calling it a dysfunctional racket, because some of the participants had a limited involvement in its "design".

SpaceTime

Just to give you an idea of how long this fiasco is rolling on:

First post : 20-09-2009, 22:22

So, that's :

4 years, 10 months, 13 days

or

1777 days, 20 hours, 14 minutes and 27 seconds
The duration is 1777 days, 20 hours, 14 minutes and 27 seconds

shewasdiesel

We'll be getting them as soon as Irish water and the winning tender demand them . . . .

SpaceTime

SpaceTime wrote: »

Just to give you an idea of how long this fiasco is rolling on:

First post : 20-09-2009, 22:22

So, that's :

4 years, 10 months, 13 days

or

1777 days, 20 hours, 14 minutes and 27 seconds
The duration is 1777 days, 20 hours, 14 minutes and 27 seconds

And that's only this thread on boards, just how many years ago was the idea first mooted?

Carawaystick

Impetus wrote: »

Rural road names need to be rationalized (devised from townland names).

What do you do where several roads traverse a townland?
What do you do where a road has an existing name?

Sam Russell

Carawaystick wrote: »

What do you do where several roads traverse a townland?
What do you do where a road has an existing name?

If it has an existing name, you use it. If there are more roads than one, you give them names like Morebeg North, Morebeg South, Morebeg Ave, Morebeg Road. Just look at any estate built by the greedy developers and see the type of names they invented. Try Morebeg Garth for example, or even Ard Morebeg.

Any name will do, just make sure it is unique in the general run of things. And number in a way that is also sensible. In the long run, it just does not matter as long as it is undestandable and not a source of confusion.

SpaceTime

I find it mind boggling that here in Cork City there are several roads with the same name!

What kind of ridiculous local authority would have allowed that?

Impetus

Carawaystick wrote: »

What do you do where several roads traverse a townland?
What do you do where a road has an existing name?

You put a qualifier on the name.

eg Townland = Ballymore

You could have Ballymore West Road, Ballymore East Road etc
Ballymore Mountain View road etc etc

If a road has an existing name as a road, and it is not duplicated within the postal district you keep it and just number the buildings on it. If there is more than one existing road name that are identical, put a qualifier on them (eg East, etc).

It is not rocket science. It is far more understandable than house number 1 on the road being *** R8GW and house number 2 next door being *** G2UQ, etc.

In any event unless the road has a name and each building has a number on display, how is one to know that one has arrived at the address in question? Eircodes do not provide a solution to this either.

Impetus

SpaceTime wrote: »

I find it mind boggling that here in Cork City there are several roads with the same name!

What kind of ridiculous local authority would have allowed that?

Dublin and any big city has the same issue. If you look at a street directory of any city, in alphabetical order you will notice name duplication across the city. But so long as the road name is not duplicated within a postal district it doesn't matter much.

It is no more of an issue than there being an O'Connell St in Dublin city and one in Limerick city.

SPDUB

SpaceTime wrote: »

An Post's even delivering letters to house names in places that have house numbering. That kind of thing is just nuts.

Because if they can find it by it's house name then they are obliged by law to deliver post to that address

Impetus

SPDUB wrote: »

Because if they can find it by it's house name then they are obliged by law to deliver post to that address

House names are in the An Post sorting system Geodirectory. House numbers are obviously far preferable, in terms of finding a place. Metric numbers are even better - 200 is 100 metres from 300, and if a house is built in between 200 and 300, it will probably be number 250 (depending on its position). Which is better than 22A etc. Google maps also has many house names - just put in a house name you know and the road and it will probably have it on the map.

Most countries require a house number by law - you can put a name as well - but this is "decorative" in terms of the addressing structure. French law requires the house number to be displayed in white lettering on a blue background, and that has been required since the Napoleonic era.

SpaceTime

You'd be running a serious risk of postal efficiency if you did that!

Impetus

SpaceTime wrote: »

You'd be running a serious risk of postal efficiency if you did that!

Agreed. But it is not just postal efficiency. It is making things efficient for visitors, online shopping deliveries, ambulances and other emergency services, etc.

The emergency services issue of not having street names and building numbers has massive implications in terms of medical survivability, and not wasting ambulance time/resources. Ditto for houses on fire. The list is potentially infinite.

SpaceTime

I can see this postcode being totally unused tbh.

If its useless nobody's going to be asking for it for deliveries.

Impetus

SpaceTime wrote: »

I can see this postcode being totally unused tbh.

If its useless nobody's going to be asking for it for deliveries.

Yes. And could you imagine your average pensioner, on the phone to 112 calling an ambulance for a heart attack or whatever. What's your Eircode (it is not a postocde - it is a BPPSN). I am sorry I can't send an ambulance to you until I have your Eircode. If you can't remember your Eircode you stupid 75 year old man/woman, tough. Let you die of a heart attack, let your house burn down or we can't send a Garda car to your home etc.

The same pensioner or whatever would have no problem remembering the name of the road they lived on and the number of the house. And s/he would know the name of the town. Which is all that should be needed.

And fine, many people might be thinking of a pensioner in abstract terms. But what if it was your father or mother trying to get help as quickly as possible?

Like Ireland, Malta's postcode system in a re-invent the wheel job, with a slight copycat of the British postcode. Not a million miles away from the stupid Eircode. The first three characters is an abbreviation for the town name. eg STJ = St Julian's. This is just codified repetition of the town name. Waste of space. This is followed by a four digit number (or sometimes 2 digits). eg STJ 8999. And the four digits are random - 2345 could be next to 7000. ie there is no geospatial relationship in the numbering. As a result nobody uses it, especially not the government. Unlike the Eircode it is not building specific. You could have 10 apartment buildings of 20 stories each with 1000 households sharing the same postcode.

I came across this Dutch postcode site recently. A Dutch postcode complies with the European norm - ie 4 digits before a town name - but has a space followed by two alpha characters.

eg 1011 AB AMSTERDAM

If the OCR recognition system can't read the two alpha characters, it has a high probability of reading the four digits. The first three digits is the postal district number (eg Dublin 22 would be 1220 AA to 1229 ZZ.) That is not to say that a Dutch postcode is house specific. It covers about 20 houses typically.

http://www.zoekplaats.nl

Enter a town name in NL in the search box and drill down. Or enter an NL postcode and find out the streets it covers. etc

a65b2cd

Impetus wrote: »

And could you imagine your average pensioner, on the phone to 112 calling an ambulance for a heart attack or whatever.

Can you tell us more about this average pensioner Impetus - you don't seem to have much regard for them judging by your ageist remarks ...

SpaceTime

The issue will be if they don't get buy in from logistics companies, Garmin,Tomtom, Google Maps and Apple they might as well forget it.

Tow

SpaceTime wrote: »

The issue will be if they don't get buy in from logistics companies, Garmin,Tomtom, Google Maps and Apple they might as well forget it.

Look at it this way, how much will extra is Joe Public or Joe Bloggs Ltd willing to pay for their Eircode enabled GPS/App? Answer: Zero

GeoDirectory is priced by Annual Subscription plus 'Data Fees' and is not cheap, €125+22 appears to be the starting rate (not taking into account the 'free' address check on An Posts site) with a €50K a year cap on the Data Fees. The estimated Eircode cost for a haulier is €5K per year. Not clear how it was calculated, maybe a one user account back at head office.

People are expecting a system where they can key a postcode into a standard GPS/App!

As things currently stand, I can safely say that thanks to Pat Rabbitte and public sector incompetence the system will not be an success.