Government introduces Postcodes in Ireland..?

rlogue

I have a satnav in front of me. I am trying to use the satnav to locate my grandmother's old house in Donegal.

Now I know the address was "Three Trees", Tromaty, Quigley's Point, Co. Donegal. And you know what? I can't find it. If I had a street name and a house number that's not a problem. But I don't have a street name and a house number!!!

And without a postcode the best I can hope for with the satnav is to find the nearest village and ask directions. Now tell me we don't need postcodes! :mad:

Flukey

As has been said in this thread, our postmen, even with local knowledge can still deliver letters incorrectly. Whatever is written on the envelope, with or without a postcode it is down to the postman to put it through and a door, and he can still put it through the wrong one. It'll help in some areas, but I still maintain that the vast majority of our addresses, when written fully, are sufficient to get it to its destination, whether it is a guy who has been on the route for years, or a guy doing his first day on the job in an area he hardly knows.

The postal service has bigger issues to sort out, like why you have to post a letter nearly a month in advance to get it to arrive in time for Christmas in some parts of the world. Even allowing for increased volumes and distances, it should never take more than a week to 10 days. A person can get from just about any major town or city in the world to almost any other in less than 48 hours, so 10 days should do it for a postal item, even in December. Even in regular times of the year it is hard to believe when you order something as simple as a magazine off a company in America that they'll tell you that it will take up to 6 weeks for it to arrive!!! In this day and age that it is crazy, and postcodes are not the issue there.

rlogue

You're still missing the point - the introduction of a universal postcode allows for the rapid sorting of mail as well as a common geographical indicator of a specific house or district without the need to know the longitude and latitude of a location.

An Post already have an internal postcode system that they are not sharing with anyone, not the public or competitors.

When we finally do introduce a universal postcode we will be able to introduce open competition to postal deliveries and enable GPS systems to find specific addresses in rural districts.

What's so wrong with that?

Firetrap

Yes, it's an anti-competitive measure. That, and the Dickensian practices in An Post. If we had postcodes, it would help the likes of ambulances, the fire brigade etc. find houses more quickly in an emergency.

Ireland's also got a higher incidence of credit card fraud, partly because of the lack of postcodes. I heard this from someone who's in the know.

OTK

rlogue wrote: »

An Post already have an internal postcode system that they are not sharing with anyone, not the public or competitors.

They offer a geocoding product to anyone who wants it.
http://www.geodirectory.ie/
so I think making a postcode system based on this would be trivial. Just map a unique code to each address.

I guess this should be done by an independent body rather than An Post

seamus

An post already have their own post code system, as pointed out.

They charge other companies stupid money for access to what is a simple database and it brings in significant revenue. This coupled with the competition aspect mentioned is why they don't want to see a public post codes database.

dRNk SAnTA

There is no decent argument against postcodes, they should be brought in ASAP. With postcodes google maps becomes absolutely brilliant, for one thing.

rlogue

Eamon Ryan had better watch out as his credibility as a minister will be gone if he doesn't take action on this issue. Already he appears to be stalling on Digital TV policy and he appears to have done nothing about getting the long-promised RTE overseas satellite service up and running.

These are all issues that he had plenty to say about when he was an opposition TD - but now he's in government with the supposed ability to deliver on promises made before the election!

Sponge Bob

oscarBravo wrote: »

WGS84 or IG?

WGS84 ( IIRC ) is the standard behind the sort of M123456 T123456 refs you get on maps such as the discovery series and has been superceded by something more granular in the past 5 years .

I use simple long and lat , eg 53.222222N and 9.1111111W

( which by the way is Noel Dempseys own holiday homes co-ordinates :cool: )

Firetrap

IG is Irish National Grid. It's not used so much anymore. The Ordnance Survey has moved its digital mapping over to a co-ordinate system which is GPS compatible.

ninty9er

rlogue wrote: »

You're still missing the point - the introduction of a universal postcode allows for the rapid sorting of mail as well as a common geographical indicator of a specific house or district without the need to know the longitude and latitude of a location.

Postcodes code AREAS. Therefore if there are 23 Ryan families in the AREA, a postcode is still fu<k all good.

The system we have works. Lat and long will get an ambulance to you regardless of whether you have a psotcode or not.

I can post a letter in Limerick at 4pm tomorrow, it will be in Cork by 8 and can be on the intended recipients desk in Dublin by 12pm Tuesday: That's less than 24 hours, God forbid it should be delayed it could be Wednesday before he gets it. Whoop-dee-fu<king-do:rolleyes::rolleyes:

oscarBravo

ninty9er wrote: »

Postcodes code AREAS. Therefore if there are 23 Ryan families in the AREA, a postcode is still fu<k all good.

That depends on how the postcode is implemented. Somewhere like Denmark, a postcode pretty much identifies a post office, and not much more. In the UK, I can use a postcode to satnav to my brother's street, and recognise the front door from there. If the system is designed to solve the actual problem - which, by and large, isn't postal delivery in this country - it will work.

ninty9er wrote: »

The system we have works. Lat and long will get an ambulance to you regardless of whether you have a psotcode or not.

Which do you think it's easier to remember when calling an ambulance: "53°47.982N 9°30.162W" or "K3W 1BDY"? The latter is the same location as the former, using the GPS Ireland postcode system referenced earlier in the thread.

ninty9er wrote: »

I can post a letter in Limerick at 4pm tomorrow, it will be in Cork by 8 and can be on the intended recipients desk in Dublin by 12pm Tuesday: That's less than 24 hours, God forbid it should be delayed it could be Wednesday before he gets it. Whoop-dee-fu<king-do:rolleyes::rolleyes:

This isn't about post. (I'm pretty sure I said that already.)

Nevyn

ninty9er wrote: »

I can post a letter in Limerick at 4pm tomorrow, it will be in Cork by 8 and can be on the intended recipients desk in Dublin by 12pm Tuesday: That's less than 24 hours, God forbid it should be delayed it could be Wednesday before he gets it. Whoop-dee-fu<king-do:rolleyes::rolleyes:

Thats nice, but it depends on how big the area is and what the denisty of population is like.
My drs office which is a 15 mins walk walk posted me a letter and it took 8 days to get here, so really places like d24 and d15 do need better postcodes.

Moriarty

Gary Delaney's post has been deleted because it's pretty much commercial spam. Gary, if you want to participate here you're welcome to but please don't try to turn it into another advertising channel.

Fairlead

You referrred to GPS Ireland's Proposed Post Code System based on Irish Grid - or more correctly - the new Irish Transverse Mercator Grid. This system is now under test on a Garmin Nuvi 760 SatNav and will shortly be available in conjunction with a web map service for anyone to get their Post Code/s.

I am not permitted to explain it in full here so please follow this link to see a full explanation and details on GPS Ireland's website: http://www.gpsireland.ie/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=47&Itemid=79

or feel free to contact me on my e-mail - gary@gpsireland.ie

Pathfinder

ninty9er wrote: »

Postcodes code AREAS. Therefore if there are 23 Ryan families in the AREA, a postcode is still fu<k all good.

The system we have works. Lat and long will get an ambulance to you regardless of whether you have a psotcode or not.

I can post a letter in Limerick at 4pm tomorrow, it will be in Cork by 8 and can be on the intended recipients desk in Dublin by 12pm Tuesday: That's less than 24 hours, God forbid it should be delayed it could be Wednesday before he gets it. Whoop-dee-fu<king-do:rolleyes::rolleyes:

Post codes actually code about 8 houses with one code not an area, only the first part is the area

example


SW16 2BH

Sat navs work door to door with post codes.In rural areas its possible for each address to have a unique post code.

XJR

Frankly I don't see any great reason to do this. I mean how big is this country and how difficult is it to find your way around?

This has been on the agenda for a number of years and as far as I can see the only real reason to do this is as a precursor to opening up the postal market.

Pathfinder

XJR wrote: »

Frankly I don't see any great reason to do this. I mean how big is this country and how difficult is it to find your way around?

This has been on the agenda for a number of years and as far as I can see the only real reason to do this is as a precursor to opening up the postal market.

Very if you need to find an address in the country in the middle of nowhere you dont know.Especially at night, an individual post code means you could punch it into the sat nav and get to house you are going to no problem.

Is not rocket science.

XJR

Pathfinder wrote: »

Very if you need to find an address in the country in the middle of nowhere you dont know.

I'm not so sure how a postcode is going to help you in that instance.

I don't see that the introduction of technology for the sake of it is necessarily of any benefit, e-voting springs to mind. I wouldn't pin my hopes on this happening or working properly.

Just because the neighbours have it doesn't mean that we should. I'm quite happy without it and you know I don't get lost too often either.

Fairlead

Pathfinder you are correct! - However, what happens when a new road/street is added? - officialdom has to allocate a code and we wait whilst that happens - also even a code defining a 8 properties ( not consistent) does not necessarily get a vehicle to the right location to enter it - the entrance may be from another road with a different Post Code - I have personal experience of this only in January when I was in SW1!!! The system we propose defines the location of the Post Code as the access from the public road.

Also we need to Post Code properties in rural areas in Ireland - a much different proposition than in the UK because of the historical Parish and townland based system.

Finally Road construction site offices are put in place for up to 2 or three years - - they have a lot of things delivered by Post and Vehicle and unfortunately emergency vehicles have to find them from time to time - how to they get a Post code??? The system we propose supports this proposition....

A modern system for modern times and not necessarily related to delivering the mail - there are less Post Men trying to find addresses than there are vehicles and as always Ireland is a special case needing a special solution!!

Pathfinder

XJR wrote: »

I'm not so sure how a postcode is going to help you in that instance.

I don't see that the introduction of technology for the sake of it is necessarily of any benefit, e-voting springs to mind. I wouldn't pin my hopes on this happening or working properly.

Just because the neighbours have it doesn't mean that we should. I'm quite happy without it and you know I don't get lost too often either.

You punch in an individual post code in a rural area into a sat nav and it brings you to the door or street in an urban area with a shared post code.

It has cut UK ambulance times dramatically.


Obviously if this system works in the UK in can work i the republic, obviously the sofware is upgraded every so often like maps.

Very useful for emergency services, couriers, deliveries etc.


obviously no system is perfect, but its better then trying to find a house in the dark in the middle of nowhere with an OS map.

Fairlead

XJR if you have not operated a commercial vehicle in this country and tried to locate addresses then you should not comment on the need for a Post Code -

Anyway, lets stop calling it a Post Code because some persons are still stuck with the idea that this is all about delivering mail!!!

I call it a Location or PON (Navigation) Code.

Fairlead

Pathfinder wrote: »

You punch in an individual post code in a rural area into a sat nav and it brings you to the door or street in an urban area with a shared post code.

It has cut UK ambulance times dramatically.


Obviously if this system works in the UK in can work i the republic, obviously the sofware is upgraded every so often like maps.

Very useful for emergency services, couriers, deliveries etc.


obviously no system is perfect, but its better then trying to find a house in the dark in the middle of nowhere with an OS map.

Pathfiner - there is one major different - the uK system has evolved since the 1950'S and the Database of streets with related coordinates has grown since then. We are starting from scrath, a database of this magnitude would take a long time to develop - we need the solution now - the system I propose does not require any database and is kept up to date by the people that use it!!!

Sin e an Fear

New Zealand Post used similar arguments against a postcode system in that country, although it did have a postcode system for sorting mail in bulk, which An Post hasn't introduced in Ireland. The new system was introduced in June 2006, and becomes mandatory in July.

XJR wrote: »

Frankly I don't see any great reason to do this. I mean how big is this country?

Larger than Singapore, Andorra, Luxembourg, Swaziland, Malta, Bermuda... all of which are smaller in area, all of which have their own postcode systems. There is only one country in the world that has scrapped them completely, Namibia, after the end of South African rule. East Timor's ones fell into disuse after the Indonesians laid waste to the place, and it hasn't got round to reintroducing them. Then again, it hasn't even got round to doing a lot of more important things either.

Singapore had Dublin-style districts until 1979, when it introduced a four-digit system, which it replaced with a six-digit system (every building has a postcode) in 1995. They still use the old postal districts for property advertisements- District 9 is the most salubrious one to live in.

XJR wrote: »

Just because the neighbours have it doesn't mean that we should.

Similar arguments were put forward in South Africa against introducing television, letting cinemas open on Sundays and giving black people the vote:D

Hong Kong still doesn't have postcodes, even though it's now part of China, which does, and you'd hardly call that place a backwater.

plodder

Gary Delaney wrote: »

You referrred to GPS Ireland's Proposed Post Code System based on Irish Grid - or more correctly - the new Irish Transverse Mercator Grid. This system is now under test on a Garmin Nuvi 760 SatNav and will shortly be available in conjunction with a web map service for anyone to get their Post Code/s.

I am not permitted to explain it in full here so please follow this link to see a full explanation and details on GPS Ireland's website: http://www.gpsireland.ie/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=47&Itemid=79

or feel free to contact me on my e-mail - gary@gpsireland.ie

I think it's a good idea in principle, but the codes are too long. They are longer than the UK ones which are long themselves. I think the idea could be improved by compressing the data a bit. 5m granularity is fine for built up areas, but is too fine-grained for most of the country.

One possibility would be to identify all built-up areas and use this system only for those areas. For the rest of the country, a different coding system would be used more suited to sparsely populated areas.

Of course, this would be moot, if An Post's geodirectory could be used as the source of data for the project. Then , we could probably come up with an extremely useful system for little cost.

chipclub

XJR wrote: »

Frankly I don't see any great reason to do this. I mean how big is this country and how difficult is it to find your way around?

This has been on the agenda for a number of years and as far as I can see the only real reason to do this is as a precursor to opening up the postal market.

I am not going to state my address on this public forum but this is as good as:

Mr. Chip Club
Craptown
Navan
Co. Meath.

That's it. The local postman happens to know that Mr. Club lives in the house on the right after the big tree but nobody else has a hope of finding it. I could give the house a name but that is no good because the townland of Craptown does not appear on any map and you will not find a single road sign bearing the name. Even if there was a big ring of steel marking the boundaries of Craptown it is not a single road or street so you would have to drive the entire townland to check every house for the one with my chosen name. The only way anyone, from couriers to ambulance drivers, can find my house is to follow explicit directions. Fine when the TV licence inspector is after me but not so good when I have a heart attack.

SeanW

I know how you feel - it's the exact same story where I live, no road names, no house number etc. Trying to get a courier delivery, emergency services etc, out here is like pulling teeth. Total nightmare. Roll on the postcodes!

Firetrap

Lack of postcodes is symptomatic of the "that'll do" attitude that pervades this country. The same as our signposting is rubbish because shur everyone knows the way to Cork or whatever.

In addition to postcodes, we should have house numbers even out the country. I remember having to find a house in Northern Ireland which was out the country. Not only was the road name signposted but the house had a number as well.

It is a problem. I used to work in an office where we sent out a lot of newsletters etc. Some people had to have their addresses set up as, for example John Smith (carpenter) because they lived in the same townland as John Smith the mechanic. Also, I once had to send an urgent package to a guy who lived in the wilds of Wicklow. I used the SDS Next Day Delivery but still An Post couldn't find his place and it didn't get to him on time.

Dudess

Yeah I've seen addresses like Mr John Murphy, Name of village, Co Cork.

What a joke. People from abroad think it's so hilarious and backwards - I wouldn't blame them.

lol_leo

Funny but I have not long returned from UK where I lived last 7 years and was setting up an online account today when asked for my postcode. I done a quick google search to find it out for Meath and to my horror discovered we still dont have a postcode system!!! What on earth is going on?

I see Dempsey set up a working group (2005) which pointed out the benifits of it which other posters have pointed out also. Apart from all this with no result I would love to know how much this steering group cost the tax payers here. This is a god damn joke.

Another rant is about so called debit cards that only work in Ireland but I'll save this for another thread...

Phew...what else am I in for. No wonder we drink a lot.

PS Rinnin...I used to live on same street as you...thinkin I recognised M14 5QD, number 23 Langdale. Just swing round lampost 3 times, jump pothole, look for tree with birds nest on top and you there Irish style