Topic: Can i edit Location settings in weather underground

[fiestaman]

Hi is it possible to edit my City and State in weather underground. My station was offline for the past while and i now have it up and running again, but since i was off somebody set up a new station about 10miles away and put the name of my station down as they're city so now when i type in my location it keeps defaulting to they're station. Ive sent an email to WU but have not got a reply. Clould i delete my account and setup a new station id, maybe this would be best?

My station is

Weather Station ID: IKILKENN5
Station Name: Castlecomer

Latitude / Longitude: N 52 ° 48 ' 58 '', W 7 ° 8 ' 25 ''
Elevation: 827

City: Kilkenny
State: KILKENNY

Hardware: Davis Vantage Pro2 (Wireless)

Software: Cumulus v1.9.4

Theyre station is

Weather Station ID: ICASTLEC5
Station Name: Tinnalinton, Ballyragget

Latitude / Longitude: N 52 ° 48 ' 30 '', W 7 ° 19 ' 53 ''
Elevation: 269

City: Castlecomer
State:

Hardware: other

Software: Weather logger V2.2.

[galfert]

I think you should not do anything until you fix your temperature sensor. WU may be blocking you from search results for bad data.

It isn't clear what you mean by, "type in my location." Are you entering in Kilkenny or Castlecomer for your location search?

If I enter in location Kilkenny, Ireland into the search I get station IKILKENN2 which is not yours and not the other one you mentioned. And IKILKENN2 is more central to Kilkenny than you. And there are others that are also more central to Kilkenny.

If I enter in Castlecomer as the location I do get ICASTLEC5 as I would expect to get as that station really is at that location and they have good data. I would be upset if I performed that search and somehow ended up with your station as your station has bad data at the moment, not to mention that you also are not claiming to be in Castlecomer.

But even if you had good data I think if I searched for Kilkenny I would still think those more central should be the one to end up as the result. And If you had good data and I searched for Castlecomer well it might be a toss up between you and ICASTLEC5 except for the fact that you don't claim to be in Castlecomer but they do. So again I would expect to end up with ICASTLEC5 as the result. Although you do seem to be a bit closer to the center of Castlecomer which is why I say it is a toss up and we'll see when you have good data what happens.

I think besides you first fixing your temperature sensor you also need to then reconsider your location to be Castlecomer. But you can't edit your city name. You'll have to create a new station ID and location. You'll lose all history.

After setting up the new station ID with location Castlecomer and fixing your temperature it will still be a toss up if the search results end up with your station or that other person's ICASTLEC5. I see that ICASTLEC5 has done nothing wrong. As Castlecomer is the closest city to them.

Also you don't delete your account. You just set up a new station ID under the same account. You can have multiple stations. So you don't even need to delete the old station ID if you want to keep that historical data.

[Mtnviper]

It's always freezing in Kilkenny.

[wunderground-PWS]

You are almost certainly failing QC which would keep your station off the site.  As others have said, you will be back in service once you fix your temp sensor

[BeaverMeadow]

You are almost certainly failing QC which would keep your station off the site.  As others have said, you will be back in service once you fix your temp sensor

Temperature sensor bad data may flag WU QC but humidity sensor bad data is happily accepted, displayed, and given a gold star.

[fiestaman]

Thanks for your reply, I found out later that if the data was not correct from the station in relation to others near by that it would not show on the map. Im awaiting delivery for a new sensor. Basically Castlecomer is a Townland and not a city. Kilkenny is the nearest City to either station. When i set up my station  it asked for City and State which i put Kilkenny and Kilkenny. ICASTLEC5 is twice the distance from castlecomer as i am and theyre nearest Townland is Ballyragget not Castlecomer. And ref to been upset if you searched my station and seen bad data from my station,ICASTLEC5 seems to have an issue with wind speed....no issues with that?
I dont think the other station has done anything wrong, il just have to setup a new station id and put in false city as castlecomer

[fiestaman]

It's always freezing in Kilkenny.

it sure is everyday...

[galfert]

Well in the US we don't have townlands (at least I've never heard of it). But we have towns, townships, and villages and probably some others. But people think of any one of these nomenclatures as a city. Everything is a city no matter how big or small nor what they really classify themselves as. When you fill out any form it asks, Name, Street Address, City, State, Zip Code. So everything is a city regardless.

So for you when asked for city I would enter in Castlecomer and I would not call that a false city. I understand you have separate distinctions in your country but you have to look at it from the perspective of the software and how it was written. Castlecomer is over 10.5 miles from Kilkenny. From a software perspective that is only asking you for city it doesn't make any sense for you think you are in Kilkenny.

Think of it this way. If someone wanted to now the weather at your location, would they be thinking of the city of Kilkenny or would they think of the townland of Castlecomer? I think they would probably think of the townland of Castlecomer. So use that for your city as there is no place for a separate townland in WU. And isn't that (Castlecomer) what you were using as a search anyway? So that settles that.

I'm in a similar situation. I live 12 miles from Orlando, FL (as the bird flies). If I meet someone that doesn't intimately know central Florida and they ask me where I'm from I tell them I'm from Orlando. But if I know I'm talking to a local person I tell them I'm from Winter Springs, FL.

As for wind data quality, yes you are correct. Seems WU doesn't judge wind as rigorously as temperature. They also don't mind humidity errors either.

[fiestaman]

thank you

[havtrail]

Well in the US we don't have townlands (at least I've never heard of it). But we have towns, townships, and villages and probably some others. But people think of any one of these nomenclatures as a city. Everything is a city no matter how big or small nor what they really classify themselves as. When you fill out any form it asks, Name, Street Address, City, State, Zip Code. So everything is a city regardless.

So for you when asked for city I would enter in Castlecomer and I would not call that a false city. I understand you have separate distinctions in your country but you have to look at it from the perspective of the software and how it was written. Castlecomer is over 10.5 miles from Kilkenny. From a software perspective that is only asking you for city it doesn't make any sense for you think you are in Kilkenny.

Think of it this way. If someone wanted to now the weather at your location, would they be thinking of the city of Kilkenny or would they think of the townland of Castlecomer? I think they would probably think of the townland of Castlecomer. So use that for your city as there is no place for a separate townland in WU. And isn't that (Castlecomer) what you were using as a search anyway? So that settles that.

I'm in a similar situation. I live 12 miles from Orlando, FL (as the bird flies). If I meet someone that doesn't intimately know central Florida and they ask me where I'm from I tell them I'm from Orlando. But if I know I'm talking to a local person I tell them I'm from Winter Springs, FL.

As for wind data quality, yes you are correct. Seems WU doesn't judge wind as rigorously as temperature. They also don't mind humidity errors either.

In the U.S there is also a difference between the actual ordained city or municipality you live in and the name the Postal Service defines as your "city" for your official address. That is, the municipal boundaries and names, vs. the postal service area boundaries and names, can be quite different.

Rich K.

[Glenn]

I run into an issue with my VT station. It actually shows up named as a city/town to the south of us. I believe the root cause there is the zipcode.

[galfert]

I run into an issue with my VT station. It actually shows up named as a city/town to the south of us. I believe the root cause there is the zipcode.

What do you expect you live in Dumberston. Just kidding I couldn't resist. I'm sure you hear that a lot.

But seriously I think you are probably right. Dummerston has the same zip code as Brattleboro. In WU when you try and add a new station with your address and actually type out Dummerston it automatically changes the city Brattleboro. So Dummerston won't stick. Even if you try and move the red marker to your location the map is coded that the city at that location is Brattleboro. So it is a map error probably because of having the same zip code.

I guess you could call it a WU map bug.

What is intersting is that there is a station East of you and they have the city as East Dummerston. Every time I try and duplicate that to see if I can end up with East Dummerston in that area I end up with Brattleboro or Putney and never East Dummerston. According to Google Maps it should be just Dummerston and not East Dummerston anyway. Putney is North and Brattleboro is South. Maybe that person created their station when an older version of the WU map existed. So there is a WU map issue.

[havtrail]

I run into an issue with my VT station. It actually shows up named as a city/town to the south of us. I believe the root cause there is the zipcode.

What do you expect you live in Dumberston. Just kidding I couldn't resist. I'm sure you hear that a lot.

But seriously I think you are probably right. Dummerston has the same zip code as Brattleboro. In WU when you try and add a new station with your address and actually type out Dummerston it automatically changes the city Brattleboro. So Dummerston won't stick. Even if you try and move the red marker to your location the map is coded that the city at that location is Brattleboro. So it is a map error probably because of having the same zip code.

I guess you could call it a WU map bug.

What is intersting is that there is a station East of you and they have the city as East Dummerston. Every time I try and duplicate that to see if I can end up with East Dummerston in that area I end up with Brattleboro or Putney and never East Dummerston. According to Google Maps it should be just Dummerston and not East Dummerston anyway. Putney is North and Brattleboro is South. Maybe that person created their station when an older version of the WU map existed. So there is a WU map issue.

Then it is really a Mapbox/OpenStreetMap issue. That's the base map that WU uses.

Rich K.

[Glenn]

I run into an issue with my VT station. It actually shows up named as a city/town to the south of us. I believe the root cause there is the zipcode.

What do you expect you live in Dumberston. Just kidding I couldn't resist. I'm sure you hear that a lot.

 

Still makes me chuckle!

It's an interesting scenario up there. Our mail comes from Brattleboro. Our mailman told us to use the Brattleboro zip. If we used a Dummerston zip, it would end up at the small post office on the West side of town...and then end up back in Brattleboro.

The map theory is an interesting issue. Wonder if that's the route cause of it.

I took a look at the station close by that's actually tagged correctly in Dummerton. It's station ID is: KVTEASTD4  I did some goggling...no other IDs proceed that one. But if you google up a bit: KVTEASTD5 which is in East Dover, VT....a town miles away. KVTEASTD6, East Dorset, VT 

So maybe they had to use a different naming convention due to stations being in vastly different towns.

[wunderground-PWS]

Some history

Initially, we had no geolookup service, so you had to manually enter a town name.  These names were displayed on the site, and sometimes on TV. someone got cute, and some less than savory words got added to the station names.   
Then we used zip for naming stations
then we used some neighborhood location data
Then we used google for geolocating stations,
now we use mapbox.

All of the changes likely reflect different eras of location.

[galfert]

Thank you for the history lesson. Makes sense and puts things into perspective.

So now IBM need to open up those deep pockets (that is with they are called Big Blue) and pay to switch back to Google maps and get rid of all the Mapbox issues.

[BeaverMeadow]

Unfortunately the current setup yields incorrect town names in certain situations (like above). Is there anyway to have these incorrectly labeled towns corrected? Any specific contact at WU where this could be facilitated? I am in the same situation as Glenn, albeit 30 miles S in Mass.

[wunderground-PWS]

unfortunately not at this point.

we'll work on getting it corrected, but its lower in the priority list than other things

[BeaverMeadow]

Thanks anyway. I'm used to the town mix-up from many different companies. Some can fix it easily. Some have a very hard time getting it straightened out.

[Glenn]

Appreciate the feedback WU! Helps me understand how the names can vary slightly from area to area. New England can be a challenge it times. Some towns have towns within them!

[TheDutchman]

unfortunately not at this point.

we'll work on getting it corrected, but its lower in the priority list than other things

Hi WU, Is there a possibility at this stage to edit the geographical position of a weather station?

Regards,
Ed

[galfert]

unfortunately not at this point.

we'll work on getting it corrected, but its lower in the priority list than other things

Hi WU, Is there a possibility at this stage to edit the geographical position of a weather station?

Regards,
Ed

Don't bother trying to reach out to WU on this forum.....they left the forum. But maybe they will return someday. 

It makes little sense to be able to move your station. When you first created that station ID it should have been obvious that it was wrong. That would have been the time to delete it and create it at the correct location. After having had the station running for some time what would be a good reason for moving it? If you have moved to a different address then moving the station makes no sense, because the historical data would not be pertinent to the new location. Therefore if you have physically moved then you create a new station ID. You can have multiple station IDs. You can keep the old station ID and just not publish any new data to it so that you can have it as historical reference for the old location. Therefore I doubt you will ever be able to move your station location.