Reporter: spod
[Submitted to the original trac issue database at 11.43am, Friday, 29th April 2011]

This OSM multipolygon boundary relation appears to be handled strangely in Nominatim:
http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/relation/1553735
The relation is tagged as "place=region", "name= (Fukuoka-ken)".

4 strange things:

1. Searching for "Fukuoka" in Nominatim does not return the relation. Looks as if you need to search for the full name, not just "Fukuoka".

2. The Nominatim details page:
   http://open.mapquestapi.com/nominatim/v1/details.php?place_id=2134800060
   shows an admin_level in Nominatim of "15". The OSM relation does not have any "admin_level" tag and the members of the relation have "admin_level=6" tagging. So, assuming the Nominatim "admin_level" is the same as the OSM one, surely it should be 6 (or 'undefined'), not 15?

3. The Nominatim 'address hierarchy' seems to place the relation 'inside/below' a highway (536), city (Fukuoka: http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/node/331385074) and a county (Tamana: http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/node/739281122) and another region (Kumamoto: http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/node/739281222). Because the relation is tagged as "place=region", surely it shouldn't be inside smaller things or inside an object that is also a region?

4. Nominatim appears to be classifying the Fukuoka-ken relation as "Type: boundary:administrative", but it is not tagged as such. It is tagged as "place=region". A node with a "place=region" tag seems to be classified as "Type: place:region", so is being treated differently for some reason.