The water fountains of parks
Pablocasfer-PGO
Posts: 10 ✭✭
Hello!
Lately I had a question in my mind. Fountains placed in public parks, which are not cheap, even around a thousand euros. I think they are quite important and a peculiar place within the park.
I think they should be valid as POIs, but is this so? I want to see what the community and Niantic directly think. Thank you.
PD: I posted one example. Have a good day! :)
Comments
Those look more like places to get drinking water than exquisite ornate fountains conjured by your introduction. Orate large fountains are definitely great waypoints. Unfortunately the one in the photo does not really appear to be anything of interest and should not be a waypoint. Drinking fountains are not places people hang out and do not have anything special about them. If you think that there is some way it should be a waypoint by all means satisfy my curiosity and tell me what criteria it meets.
I have never thinks of water fountains that way. It's an interesting point of view.
I think it depends on where you are. If you are located in country with regular lack of water and drought every year, they are an important place When going to explore on summer, we need to have apps like Free Taps or other to find water.
So this kind of fountains are important under the exploration criteria. And these places are used to socialize too, as they are meeting places in dry countries.
As @Pablocasfer-PGO tell us they cost euros, he probably is in Spain. In Spain, a lot of people trails and summer are really hot, with months of drought. So fountains like that are good candidate for the exploration & socialisation criteria.
I live in the Middle East where weather is very hot and dry most of the year. I do not think drinking fountains should be eligible. They're an extremely generic and extremely common piece of street furniture, akin to street lamps.
Than again, I notice that when I get reviews from Cyprus, all drinking fountains there seem to be automatically accepted.
So opinions on this probably vary from one community to another.
I lean toward saying plain drinking fountains are infrastructure - not interesting/unique enough to be a wayspot.
No. Mass produced / generic /; not interesting.
Ok, but I can't see something about "mass produced or generic" in the Niantic's criteria.
Ok, but the fountains aren't cheap, only can buy city hall...
Why then people from niantic say that this POI cannot be deleted?, this means that they are valid, it is the most recent from niantic, since since 2019 it did not say anything, this post is more recent.
Ty for the comments!
Removal criteria are different from eligibility/ineligibility criteria.
Even a garbage bin won't be removed if it doesn't meet something on the specific and limited set of removal criteria.
Understand then that it is somewhat confusing. From my point of view I think that something that cannot be eliminated should be valid, since it has passed X filters
Every element that is mass produced and also is generic due to there are catalogues that show prices and different models of water fountains are not elegible in every part of the world. Criteria says that elements that are mass produced is 1*.
It's not that straightforward.
You can try submitting that drinking fountain if you like, but it's up to you to convince your local reviewers that it really is a good candidate.
I'm personally not convinced (the same way I'm not convinced about pet waste stations...) - but then again, like I said before, there are some places in the world where drinking fountains are very common wayspots, so who knows.
Ok, please show me the criteria about mass produced, because niantic think the Water fountains are ok, but does not say anything about the mass productions of sources.
Of course, I think that in certain places one thing is valid and in another place it is not, but it depends on X situations. The best thing is that niantic gives clear indications of what to do about it, because with respect to water sources there is "a legal vacuum" of acceptance
For me the sources are POIs of great interest since as our colleague @VladDraco has said in Spain it is a hot country and there are many trails and the sources play a fundamental role for these hikers.
I review on Spain and Portugal, the most part of times this POIs were acepted. I suppose the wheather is a big factor.
If you nominate a water fountain in Spain and it is visible in Street view, it's quite easy to get it approved.
Well, the drinking fountain in the photos isn't located in a trail. It's in a park in the middle of a residential area.
Again, I really don't think it has to do with the weather at all. I think it's just one of those things that communities decide to accept regardless of Niantic's criteria, which happens pretty often. I think it's probably more common in non-English speaking communities.
The object is mass-produced, generic, or not visually unique or interesting.
That quote is under the very first section of the rejection reasons on the Criteria page.
As others have said, Niantic will not remove something if it does not fit any removal criteria, even if it should have never been approved. I personally think the removal criteria should be reworked slightly but until it is, they will continue to leave anything that doesn’t fit it in the Lightship database.
Lamp posts are also expensive. And red/yellow/green traffic lights. Mobile (cell) phone towers, power exchange substations, stop signs, sidewalks, plain green electrical boxes, waterspouts in ponds (to prevent mosquitoes).
Infrastructure is expensive - that does not make it waypoint worthy.
Thanks for your bad faith, that was refreshing.
The difference between all these infrastructure and a water fountain is your not looking for them while exploring.
That's the perfect example of an object that can be very useful for exploration in some part of the world and useless in other parts.
In UK, I've never seen any of these being submitted or accepted, which makes sense, but in dry countries they are useful points, which makes perfect sense too.
That doesn't look anything like a fountain. It is nothing more than a water spigot and would not meet any of the eligibility criteria. Water fountains are eligible because they are decorative art and would meet the criteria under exploration. But a spigot where you fill up water **** or wash something off from would not fit under the same category.
For me it really depends. When I've been on holiday I've seen some rather ornate drinking fountains/taps. I actually find it useful to know where such an ornament is, especially on a hot day. I'd be more inclined to accept such an item if it were in a public park or plaza, as in my experience these tend towards being more ornate; i.e. I'd be disinclined to accept a random roadside one.
P.S. the one @Pablocasfer-PGO showed in the photographs I'd be inclined to reject unless somebody can give me a good reason not to. It's not like some countries where the tap is only one for miles around it looks like. A well could indeed be interesting but not really some random tap.
Agreed re: wells. Recently I got to review a well in a remote village which truly seemed like a local POI with actual importance to locals. I'm inclined to review that sort of water source favorably. A generic drinking fountain in a moderately/highly populated area? Much less so.
Here you go:
Yes indeed, the town/village well can indeed be a focal point and an important gathering place. You are describing the exact sort of structure I had in mind. I could certainly see accepting that.
Okay, but I don't see a fountain of this type there ... being an important place within parks and hiking routes due to the heat in Spain, for example.
I think Niantic should explain more about the "mass produced" criteria because the only thing it produces is conflicts between accepting or rejecting, leaving it up to each person to interpret.
Ok, I also don't see picnic tables, BBQ grills, benches, lamp posts, waste bins, no parking signs, electrical outlets, toilets, no smoking signs, backflow prevention devices, storm drains, parking meters, etc. In most cases, these things should be treated as "mass-produced, generic or not visually unique or interesting" unless the item in question actually is visually unique or interesting.
You can submit a water spigot and explain the local significance about why it is important, interesting or visually unique, but the reviewers also have to believe that the location is important or the nomination will not be accepted. Niantic has prepared a system meant for reviewers to use their best judgement rather than a binary yes/no on whether or not the thing should be a wayspot. These judgments are intended to be influenced by local knowledge and perceptions. In my community, the examples you shared would be dismissed as irrelevant street furniture, but it could be different in your community. Other comments have pointed out that a water well or pump might not only be eligible but also acceptable based on being the only source of clean water and a natural gathering spot for their community.
If you're nominating in Spain, don't care about what they tell you here.
Look at the existing wayspots and nominations that you have to review, you'll find that water fountains are in the approval list for Spain and you can go ahead. You might find sometimes some reviewers that don't agree and try to reject them, but in the end it will pass as long as you do your homework and everything else about the nomination is OK (visible in streetview or with a 360 photo, use the proper location, put proper title and description,...)
Refuting the supporting argument - “not cheap, even around a thousand euros,” the first supporting statement in the OP which you yourself echoed in your first post - is not bad faith. Actually, moving the goalposts from ‘these are expensive’ to ‘these are things to look for when out walking’ is bad faith.
I would never vote to approve this; it’s clearly mass produced and utterly non-unique. But apparently other countries rubber-stamp these things like Michael Bay does his pyrotechnics budget, so… whatever.
I see that you feel annoyed in your words. I just want to comment on this topic, which I think is interesting.
I just want to say and express, that I think Niantic should be clearer with this kind of thing.
I think that in places where the volume of POIs is not very large, they could be a good option, for example in towns. In which everything is very close together and by cells we cannot enjoy all the POIs.
plain drinking fountains is a good wayspot?
Nice joke!
Here in reject criteria is the first thing that says, "The object has been produced in mass, generic or is not visually unic or does not have any interest. And for me a fountain of water that has been produced in mass is 1* for this criteria. Also 90% of public water fountain in Spain are produced in mass and you can find on internet catalogues where appear a lot of models of fountains.