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pythongoogle-mapsgeopy

Geocoding non-addresses: Geopy

Using geopy to geocode alcohol outlets in NZ.

The problem I have is that some places do not have street addresses but are places in Google Maps. For example, plugging:

Furneaux Lodge, Endeavour Inlet, Queen Charlotte Sound, Marlborough 7250

into Google Maps via the browser GUI gives me

However, using that in Geopy I get a GQueryError saying this geographic location does not exist.

Here is the code for geocoding:

def GeoCode(address):
    g=geocoders.Google(domain="maps.google.co.nz") 
    geoloc = g.geocode(address, exactly_one=False)
    place, (lat, lng) = geoloc[0]
    GeoOut = []
    GeoOut.extend([place, lat, lng])
    return GeoOut

GeoCode("Furneaux Lodge, Endeavour Inlet, Queen Charlotte Sound, Marlboroguh 7250")

Meanwhile, I notice that "Eiffel Tower" works fine. Is there away to solve this and can someone explain the difference between The Eiffel Tower and Furneaux Lodge within Google 'locations'?

Solution

  • Maybe this is a Google Maps API limitation. GeoNames however seems to know about Furneaux Lodge, so you can use it as a fallback to Google Maps if the Google Maps query doesn't return an answer:

    >>> from geopy import geocoders
>>> gn = geocoders.GeoNames()  
>>> place, (lat, lng) = gn.geocode('Furneaux Lodge')
>>> print('{}: {:.5f}, {:.5f}'.format(place, lat, lng))
Furneaux Lodge, F4, NZ: -41.08826, 174.18019