What is "places_type" for the API call for `/places/nearby`?

General
1

Hi,

The /places/nearby/ call returns a collection of places near a latitude & longitude input.

One of the properties is ‘places_type’. Does anyone know what this means?

Here are some examples of returned values for this property:

place_type = 1000
Ensenada, MX, Bahamas

place_type = 103
Mpumalanga, South Africa
Western Cape, South Africa

place_type = 100
Sabi Sands Game Reserve, South Africa

place_type = 29
South America
Africa

place_type = 21
Logone Oriental, Chad
Southern Africa

place_type = 12
Niger
Chad
Brazil
South Africa

place_type = 9
Nya Pendé, LR, Chad
Mirriah, ZI, Niger
Maraã, AM, Brazil
Ehlanzeni, MP, South Africa
Witrivier, MP, South Africa
Central Karoo, WC, South Africa

place_type = 8
Amazonas, Brazil
Zinder, Niger

Some, such as 29 and 12 are obvious, but the others are not particularly clear, especially those over 100.

What are all the possible values for this property and what do they mean?

Thanks,

Ryan

2

Here’s the list of possible options for ‘Place type’ extracted from the ‘Create New Place’ form

Code Name Code Name
0 Undefined 100 Open Space
2 Street Segment 101 Territory
5 Intersection 102 District
6 Street 103 Province
7 Town 1000 Municipality
8 State 1001 Parish
9 County 1002 Department Segment
10 Local Administrative Area 1003 City Building
12 Country 1004 Commune
13 Island 1005 Governorate
14 Airport 1006 Prefecture
15 Drainage 1007 Canton
16 Land Feature 1008 Republic
17 Miscellaneous 1009 Division
18 Nationality 1010 Subdivision
19 Supername 1011 Village block
20 Point of Interest 1012 Sum
21 Region 1013 Unknown
24 Colloquial 1014 Shire
25 Zone 1015 Prefecture City
26 Historical State 1016 Regency
27 Historical County 1017 Constituency
29 Continent 1018 Local Authority
33 Estate 1019 Poblacion
35 Historical Town 1020 Delegation
36 Aggregate

[EDIT Removed duplicates and sorted]

2 Likes
3

Oh great!! Thanks :)

BTW how do I access this form? I would also like to clarify the ‘admin level’ property.

5

On a page for any iNat place (eg Hong Kong) on the left side near the very bottom there should be a ‘Add a New Place’ link.

admin_level cannot be set on the form, it is only used for “standard places” in iNaturalist (as opposed to “community curated places”) it indicates the hierarchy of the place eg:

Place type # type name admin lvl
Africa 29 Continent -10
Southern Africa 21 Region -5
South Africa 12 Country 0
Mpumalanga 103 Province 10
1 Like
6

Oh I see. I need 50 verifiable observations to do that. No wonder I couldn’t find it.

Only 16 more observations to go. :)