Proposal talk:Airspace

Source

This proposal is based on an idea from the german namespace DE:Luftraum and I modified it to start the discussion on a more international basis as aviation can never be locally. It might be neccessary to add some things to its definition, to make it more comfortable for other countries. TobiBS 10:13, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Temporary Airspaces

Some Airspaces do not have the same definition 24/7. It might therefore be interesting to define its time of activity, but I couldn't figure out an easy concept for this, feel free to develop one and propose it. TobiBS 10:13, 29 May 2009 (UTC).

Temporary information needs to be checked by the pilot during pre flight planning. This can be found in AIP's, NOTAMS and AIC's. Permanent airspace conditions should be refreshed in this map (if possible by copyright laws).—Preceding unsigned comment added by Quintsegers (talk • contribs) 10:20, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

I did not mean temporary airspaces as for airshows or similar, what I meant where airspaces that are there all the time but are not active all the time (HX). I do not see any copyright concerns, as the data is published by the state, it is only neccessary to take the base data, not any reassambled data from Jeppesen or other data providers. TobiBS 11:01, 11 February 2010 (UTC

An even more striking example is the CTR of Liège EBLG, which is class D when controlled by the military (more or less business hours) and class C at the other times, when civilian Belgocontrol takes over. For the rest I fully agree with TobiBS that these data are, by nature and by law, public - even if some national authorities limit access to them. Jan olieslagers 10:58, 21 September 2010 (BST)

Unmappable and unusable

Airspace cannot be mapped traditionally (i.e. by using yuor GPS and looking at signs). The only way to map it is to import it from posibly copyrighted sources (explain where you want to extract airspace info from if not copyrighted maps?). Also, there is no way to verify whether it is still correct or outdated. Airspace in OSM would be dangerous and possibly even illegal to use for aviation purposes. I really can't see the reason behind it. If you need to have it, put it in a separate database. Airspace is generally not realted to any features on the ground anyway, so it will be completely disconnected from the rest of our data. --Frederik Ramm 06:46, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

A lot of things that can not be mapped with a GPS are already in the database, or does your GPS display the inhabitants of a city? What about state borders, they are sometimes only defined by law and not by traditional landmarks. At latest if it comes to reporting points which would be the next proposal after this one, they are always defined by popular landmarks, like street crossings, towers, etc.

Regarding the sources for airspaces, they are defined in the AIP, not only on the maps, but also in textual description. I think you can't claim a copyright for coordinates that define a rectangle or something like that if they are in textual form. I don't think it is possibly illegal, but it is illegal to use other maps than official ones for real aviation, but there is still a wide use for OSM aviation maps, because if you want to show your route to friends or if you are doing flight planning for simulated aviation or similar, you have to draw the maps on your own, or you have to use non free maps, therefore there is use for it and it is clear and obvious that no one should use these maps for the purpose of flight planning or actual flying, look at fl95.de for example, there is not only a map, but a complete flight planner and they are also stating that it is not legal to use the site as a basic flight planning.

As I understand, there is a consens of leaving the data in one database, the reason is simple, if the copyright of any database changes you are maybe unable to combine the data on one day, if the data is in the same database it will always be easier to keep track of it.

Closing I would like to remind that it is not forbidden to tag thins that are not Map Features and as people will create and tag it, I would like to recoomend to argue about the how, not the if. These data hurts nobody and can also be interesting for none aviation related persons who would like to know if there house of interest is located in a military low flying area or similar. TobiBS 09:23, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

Comment withdrawn. Wolfbert 05:12, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Changed class=* to airspace=*

I read that class=* is an obsolete parameter and that the concept follows another standard, therefore I changed it to airspace=*

Good idea

I am currently building an aircraft and am a current airline pilot with over 30 years experience. One issue we have in the United Kingdom is infringement of controlled airspace by aircraft not equipped with either transponders or GPS, who rely on traditional map reading skills. These infringements cause massive problems for ATC controllers. What I would propose is having the airspace available on a standard Garmin car GPS so that users would be warned of approaching controlled airspace cheaply. This is something that OSM would be ideal for.

I was looking for some kind of airspace data in the past. So I totally agree with the owner and especially with the guy from GB. But I am missing a tag which stores the frequency you have to call to receive permission to cross an airspace.

Airspace data can be downloaded for free in the openair format. I have to check the license but I guess, you can use it for free. In order to convert the data I have written a small engine to convert it. Kaymen 18:31, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

I would propose some more attribute like controlzone = (yes|no) and temporary = (yes|no). The last one is for airspaces, which are not active H24 (HX). Frequency would be another nice attribute.

I finished writing the converter and will upload all airspaces in the north of germany in the next weeks. This morning I received the answer from the DAEC, which makes the german airspaces available for the public (openair format).

Die Segelflugkommission des Deutschen Aero Club stellt die Daten, die sie käuflich von der DFS erwirbt, den Luftsportlern zur Verfügung. Einerseits sind sie die Grundlage für die Wettkampfgebiete der Segelflugmeisterschaften aber auch ein hervorragendes Tool sich ständig mit den aktuellen Luftraumdaten der Bundesrepublik Deutschland auf allen möglichen Plattformen zu versorgen. Ein Copyright wird mit Absicht nicht eingetragen, da die möglichst weite Verteilung eines der Ziele ist. (Günter Betram from DAEC).

Kaymen 11:48, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Great to see that others like the idea, too. Regarding the ideas of controlzone and temporary: I intended to do this type of classification in the type=* field, but as it was only a proposal, we have to find the best solution. Regarding the frequency their is a problem, because it is not always the same and can be also dependent from time.

If you have done the conversion and added the data, please inform me, so that I can render a bigger part of northern Germany for the OpenAviation Map. TobiBS 16:06, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Why camelCase?

Why are the lowerLimit, lowerLimitType, upperLimit and upperLimitType written as camelcase and not in the more widely used form with underscores and colon, eg. lower_limit, lower_limit:type, upper_limit, upper_limit:type? Daeron 09:59, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

You are right, there is no need for the camelCase. TobiBS 19:45, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

Unit of measurement is needed on height limits

I propose two more attributes:

• upper_unit=ft/m/fl/etc..
• lower_unit=ft/m/fl/etc..

This property does not make sense when we're talking about flight levels (or maybe it then would be fl?). I'm not proposing this because i know of any airspace that's defined in meters, it's more about being compitable with the eventual future or other systems. Lysgaard 10:17, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

• Another way to do it would be to have the unit as a suffix in the lower_limit and upper_limit tags. would then be like lower_limit=4000ft.

Conversion of OpenAir files

Today some airspace information are provided on some web sites (http://www.winpilot.com/openair/index.asp) using the OpenAir format ... A good idea would be to try to map (and to develop an automatic tool) to convert OpenAir into direct OSM XML data....

OSM database or separate database

Just a word so that everyone is aware of what has been told elswhere : Airspaces shall not be mapped in OSM main database.

cf. Aviation.

(Message above is not my opinion, just factual information) -- Djam 18:41, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Civilian / Military airspaces

Is A/B/C/D/E/F/G/restricted/prohibited/dangerous classification sufficient to cover military zones ? -- Djam 18:46, 31 October 2011 (UTC)