Eircode - its implemetation (merged)

The boundaries of eircode prefixes will not change. There would be a lot of upheaval for very little gain. An eircode is just an identifer code for a lookup in a database. Even if you change the eircode of a single dwelling you cause confusion as databases don't update instantly.

The prefixes 087, 086 and 085 used to signify which phone provider you were with. Now they don't. But it would still be a huge upheaval to have mobile phone prefix changed.

Bray Head wrote: »

plodder wrote: »

Indeed. I am aware of all that. I don't see why that should stop its use elsewhere and a little less usefully there. Those mega areas could be split at some point in the future with little disruption also.

No they won't. The whole point of eircode is that it never changes!

Well, it would only mean that the sort code element changed. It could change say, for K05* to be split into three smaller sort codes by from say, K05 to K15, K16 and K17. K05 would remain for a period but would be phased out by placing messages on the mail with the new version Eircode on it.

*K05 is a fictional zone. If one exists, that may be so.

That is the flexibility of the Eircode structure, since the random part has been designed to be robust as well as random. Anyway, splitting a sort code poses no problems as the data integrity remains. The weakness of the Eircode structure was that it only used about 140 sort codes instead of about 1,000 to 2,000.

Bray Head wrote: »

No they won't. The whole point of eircode is that it never changes!

The whole point of Eircode was to follow An Post's crazy system. If that system changes, then either Eircode changes with it, or if it doesn't then the rationale for following the system goes up in a puff of smoke.

Carawaystick wrote: »

Bray Head wrote: »

They are useful in Dublin as they are small and relatively homogeneous.

No they aren't, A45 K45, and A42 are not homogenous, by a long stretch

I clearly meant the D postcodes but keep up the pedantry if you enjoy it.

Carawaystick

Bray Head wrote: »

They are useful in Dublin as they are small and relatively homogeneous.

No they aren't, A45 K45, and A42 are not homogenous, by a long stretch

[Deleted User]

EdgeCase wrote: »

I noticed An Post are using Eircode lookalikes now for business reply / freepost

SuperValu rewards card mail in for example is:

PO BOX 618
FREE POST FCK208
Cork

FCK seems a little odd as a letter combination...

I think that is the freepost reference number, for billing the recipient of the mail.

EdgeCase

I noticed An Post are using Eircode lookalikes now for business reply / freepost

SuperValu rewards card mail in for example is:

PO BOX 618
FREE POST FCK208
Cork

FCK seems a little odd as a letter combination...

plodder wrote: »

Indeed. I am aware of all that. I don't see why that should stop its use elsewhere and a little less usefully there. Those mega areas could be split at some point in the future with little disruption also.

No they won't. The whole point of eircode is that it never changes!

Bray Head wrote: »

Eircode handle is not a consistently useful geographical unit though.

They are useful in Dublin as they are small and relatively homogeneous.

But outside Dublin they take in huge areas which take in different social classes, urban/rural etc. Take a look at H91 which takes Galway city, the whole country west of it and much of the county east of it. Same for Limerick V94.

Indeed. I am aware of all that. I don't see why that should stop its use elsewhere and a little less usefully there. Those mega areas could be split at some point in the future with little disruption also.

Eircode handle is not a consistently useful geographical unit though.

They are useful in Dublin as they are small and relatively homogeneous.

But outside Dublin they take in huge areas which take in different social classes, urban/rural etc. Take a look at H91 which takes Galway city, the whole country west of it and much of the county east of it. Same for Limerick V94.

Bray Head wrote: »

I can think of much more useful spatial presentations of house price and completion data:
-City, large town, small town, rural
-Greater Dublin/Cork areas (the local authority boundaries are not relevant)
-NUTS 3 region

Eircodes routing keys are none of these things. They have as much informational content as using telephone prefixes or diocese boundaries.

It depends on the purpose. A common question for non statistician users might be something like "what's the average house value in the area where I live (and my eircode is K36 XXXX) ?"

The answer is very straight forward. You look up the table for K36 and there it is.

Any other presentation using NUTS codes or anything else has to be mapped from eircode to the other code and then to the table of information. Statistics aren't only used by policy wonks in the public sector. Estate agents for example would be very interested in house price info published by routing key.

Bray Head wrote: »

I can think of much more useful spatial presentations of house price and completion data:
-City, large town, small town, rural
-Greater Dublin/Cork areas (the local authority boundaries are not relevant)
-NUTS 3 region

Eircodes routing keys are none of these things. They have as much informational content as using telephone prefixes or diocese boundaries.

Actually, if they used the first four digits (after the zero) of the STD code, it would be a useful area code as they are based on population density, and are contiguous.

plodder wrote: »

Bray Head wrote: »

I agree. However Ireland's national statistical institute should know better than to promote their use in such a way.

Why though? It's useful.

I can think of much more useful spatial presentations of house price and completion data:
-City, large town, small town, rural
-Greater Dublin/Cork areas (the local authority boundaries are not relevant)
-NUTS 3 region

Eircodes routing keys are none of these things. They have as much informational content as using telephone prefixes or diocese boundaries.

Bray Head wrote: »

I agree. However Ireland's national statistical institute should know better than to promote their use in such a way.

Why though? It's useful.

plodder wrote: »

Routing keys (whether we like them or not) are public identifiers that the public and other non technical users can understand. This is not the case for NUTS codes. The other routing keys may over time become as well known as the Dublin postcodes.

I agree. However Ireland's national statistical institute should know better than to promote their use in such a way.

Bray Head wrote: »

Precisely. Eircodes were neither intended nor designed to be used for statistical presentation. They correspond to routing keys used by An Post I understand. No official map of them has been produced, and that is quite deliberate. They are simply an arbitrary code the way that 0402 denotes a landline in or around Arklow. No one ever talks about the price of houses or number of cattle in the 0402 telephone area because it is not in any way meaningful. It should be the same with eircodes.

Save for Dublin, where postcodes are contiguous and well known, the CSO should not have started to use eircode areas like this for statistical presentation as it gives them a status that they do not deserve. Instead, they should have used a simple matching algorithm to present the data for counties, NUTS3 regions or ideally groups of small areas.

It was easy to predict that they would. For any data that is already organised by eircode, then it's easy to publish aggregated statistics by routing key.

Routing keys (whether we like them or not) are public identifiers that the public and other non technical users can understand. This is not the case for NUTS codes. The other routing keys may over time become as well known as the Dublin postcodes.

EdgeCase wrote: »

It makes no logical sense as a way of dividing up the country for statistical analysis.

Precisely. Eircodes were neither intended nor designed to be used for statistical presentation. They correspond to routing keys used by An Post I understand. No official map of them has been produced, and that is quite deliberate. They are simply an arbitrary code the way that 0402 denotes a landline in or around Arklow. No one ever talks about the price of houses or number of cattle in the 0402 telephone area because it is not in any way meaningful. It should be the same with eircodes.

Save for Dublin, where postcodes are contiguous and well known, the CSO should not have started to use eircode areas like this for statistical presentation as it gives them a status that they do not deserve. Instead, they should have used a simple matching algorithm to present the data for counties, NUTS3 regions or ideally groups of small areas.

EdgeCase wrote: »

Some of the routing codes are insanely huge and others are tiny and that doesn't necessarily follow the lines of population either. I have no idea what the logic behind them was.

You get extreme granularity in Dublin due to the integration of the Dublin district numbers as a routing code and then you get reasonable granularity around Cork.

Galway and Limerick are in massive routing codes that cover vast areas.
Then little places like Ballinrobe and a few other random spots, seem to have their own routing codes for some reason.

It makes no logical sense as a way of dividing up the country for statistical analysis.

They should have used about 2,000 routing codes. It made no sense use variable sized and in some cases not even contiguous routing codes.

A poor design.

EdgeCase

Some of the routing codes are insanely huge and others are tiny and that doesn't necessarily follow the lines of population either. I have no idea what the logic behind them was.

You get extreme granularity in Dublin due to the integration of the Dublin district numbers as a routing code and then you get reasonable granularity around Cork.

Galway and Limerick are in massive routing codes that cover vast areas.
Then little places like Ballinrobe and a few other random spots, seem to have their own routing codes for some reason.

It makes no logical sense as a way of dividing up the country for statistical analysis.

The new, better stats are nothing to do with the introduction of eircode per se. That said, having a unique identifier for each dwelling will make the data manipulation much easier.

I don't really agree with the CSO using the first part of the eircode for analytical purposes though. The areas are not really meaningful - particularly outside Dublin. The CSO are giving them a significance they don't really have.

sondagefaux wrote: »

Explained above by L1011. ....

It really isn't. You'd imagine they know when a new connection is a new account or an attached to another residential one. Or numerous industrial units. That they don't is very unlikely.

We are just guessing without an explanation from whomever created the report.

EdgeCase

It'd be useful if they just knew how many houses / apartments were being built, you know, like any properly run state might be able to calculate from say planning permissions, building permits or something genuinely useful, rather than taking a wild guess based on some other data source.

I wouldn't blame Eircode for someone using the database to supplement for lack of actual data.

sondagefaux

beauf wrote: »

Doesn't seem to explain why there a discrepancy.

Explained above by L1011. A cowshed with a new electricity connection isn't a new house. Cowsheds don't get Eircodes. For the purpose of calculating the number of new build homes, Eircodes are more accurate than electricity connections.

Another positive from the introduction of Eircodes.

I think its another one of these media stories around stats that is missing the complete picture.

L1011

More accurate or more useful from a propaganda perspective?

Electricity connections was a terrible metric but I'm not sure eircodes are better - there will be cases of existing units getting eircodes allocated due to errors on day 1 for years yet. Not major but noise in statistics is always problematic

Edit: as it has reduced the figures it's definitely not more useful from a propaganda perspective...

New connections includes things like farm sheds and may even have things like supplies for Christmas lights or the like in it. Also long since built but unused housing being connected which isn't actually a new build, etc etc

Doesn't seem to explain why there a discrepancy.

sondagefaux

Looks like the CSO has found that using Eircodes to develop statistics on the numbers of new build homes is far more accurate than relying on new electrical connections.

https

/www.irishtimes.com/business/economy/number-of-new-homes-built-jumps-by-30-cso-figures-show-1.3603079

Apparently "Townland" is enough...

TheChizler

Sam Russell wrote: »

I applied to renew my EHIC card online. No Eircode requested or supplied when I gave my address.

Might be a step too far to expect the HSE to embrace something useful...