#179 - Greece railways + stations: GAIAOSE Railnet is a national source (#171 says ABSENT

art-bot commented

2026-08-20 06:44:42 +00:00

Collaborator

docs/country-gr.md (issue #171) records railways as an ABSENT layer — "no official
national rail-line geometry (only an 8-segment Athens fragment and regional GAIA-OSE WFS)"
— and stations as GO only via Athens/Thessaloniki GTFS. Both are wrong. GAIAOSE (ΓΑΙΑΟΣΕ,
OSE's own state-owned subsidiary) publishes the national rail network from a public,
anonymous ArcGIS Server.

The source

https://gaiaweb.gaiaose.gr/server/rest/services/Hosted/Railnet/FeatureServer

access: public, no credentials, capabilities: Query,Extract, maxRecordCount: 2000
(so paged resultOffset fetches), native EPSG:2100 — the same Greek Grid the ΥΠΕΝ
sources already use. Three layers:

id	layer	geom	count	verified
0	Milleage and Itersections	point	26 665	mileposts / junctions
1	Stations	point	443	Greek names, `line_id`, `importance`
2	RailNetwork	polyline	8 865	4 635 km, national extent

Verified live 2026-08-20 (counts and lengths are outStatistics sums from the service,
not estimates):

Extent x 246 195..719 819, y 4 099 295..4 623 750 (EPSG:2100) — mainland + Peloponnese
- Thrace; matches the national rail bbox exactly.
in_use: 1 = 3 720 km / 8 135 segs, 2 = 487 km, 3 = 281 km, 0 = 147 km
(disused). The live figure exceeds OSE's ~2 550 km route length because this is
track geometry — multiple tracks per route, plus yards and sidings.
type: M main line 3 593 km / 3 507 segs, B secondary-or-siding 884 km / 5 347 segs.
type = 'M' AND in_use = 1 is approximately the operational main network.
line_id — 23 real line codes, not opaque ids: ATH-SAL, PEI-PTR, SAL-IDM,
SAL-FLO, LAR-VOL, KIA-PTR, THE-ALX, PROAST, AIR-SKA, …
Stations carry name in Greek (ΑΓΙΟΙ ΑΝΑΡΓΥΡΟΙ, ΑΝΩ ΛΙΟΣΙΑ, ΕΛΕΥΣΙΝΑ, ΜΕΓΑΡΑ…),
line_id, chainage pos, and an importance integer — an R82-shaped ranking signal
that arrives with the data instead of having to be argued into it.

Independent corroboration (and the non-OSM proof)

geodata.gov.gr's Σιδηροδρομικό δίκτυο Ελλάδας is the same network at lower resolution:
110 lines / 2 461 km, bbox x 246 039..719 812 / y 4 099 343..4 610 776 — the same
national footprint. Retrieved from the Internet Archive and measured directly. Its ESRI
lineage is

CreateFeatureclass "…\DLEAD.Siemens-250000" Rail_Network # NGI_DATA_Layer

— an official 1:250 000 enterprise geodatabase. No OSM anywhere in the lineage (R1), and
that CKAN record asserts a per-dataset licence of CC-BY-3.0, which the ΥΠΕΝ records
notably do not.

What this unblocks

railways — GO. Line geometry with a live/disused flag and a line taxonomy.
stations — GO nationally, not just Athens/Thessaloniki GTFS. 443 named points with an
importance signal.

The one open question (R2)

The GAIAOSE portal item asserts no licence (licenseInfo is empty). The CC BY 4.0 you
see on the municipal republications of this layer (e.g. Δήμος Ωραιοκάστρου's
trn_lin_rail_network_gaia_ose on data.gov.gr, which cites gaiaweb.gaiaose.gr as its
source) is the municipality's assertion about someone else's data and does not bind
GAIAOSE. Confirm with GAIAOSE before this goes live — the same class of gap #171 already
flags for ΥΠΕΝ. The explicitly CC-BY-3.0 geodata.gov.gr copy is the fallback if the answer
is unsatisfactory, at the cost of resolution and a dead portal (see the roads issue for the
geodata.gov.gr availability story).

Blocks the railways and stations rows of the Greece catalogue; part of #44.

`docs/country-gr.md` (issue #171) records `railways` as an **ABSENT** layer — "no official national rail-line geometry (only an 8-segment Athens fragment and regional GAIA-OSE WFS)" — and `stations` as GO only via Athens/Thessaloniki GTFS. Both are wrong. GAIAOSE (ΓΑΙΑΟΣΕ, OSE's own state-owned subsidiary) publishes the **national** rail network from a public, anonymous ArcGIS Server. ## The source ``` https://gaiaweb.gaiaose.gr/server/rest/services/Hosted/Railnet/FeatureServer ``` `access: public`, no credentials, `capabilities: Query,Extract`, `maxRecordCount: 2000` (so paged `resultOffset` fetches), native **EPSG:2100** — the same Greek Grid the ΥΠΕΝ sources already use. Three layers: | id | layer | geom | count | verified | |---|---|---|---|---| | 0 | Milleage and Itersections | point | 26 665 | mileposts / junctions | | 1 | **Stations** | point | **443** | Greek names, `line_id`, **`importance`** | | 2 | **RailNetwork** | polyline | **8 865** | **4 635 km**, national extent | Verified live 2026-08-20 (counts and lengths are `outStatistics` sums from the service, not estimates): - **Extent** x 246 195..719 819, y 4 099 295..4 623 750 (EPSG:2100) — mainland + Peloponnese + Thrace; matches the national rail bbox exactly. - **`in_use`**: `1` = 3 720 km / 8 135 segs, `2` = 487 km, `3` = 281 km, `0` = 147 km (disused). The live figure exceeds OSE's ~2 550 km *route* length because this is **track** geometry — multiple tracks per route, plus yards and sidings. - **`type`**: `M` main line 3 593 km / 3 507 segs, `B` secondary-or-siding 884 km / 5 347 segs. `type = 'M' AND in_use = 1` is approximately the operational main network. - **`line_id`** — 23 real line codes, not opaque ids: `ATH-SAL`, `PEI-PTR`, `SAL-IDM`, `SAL-FLO`, `LAR-VOL`, `KIA-PTR`, `THE-ALX`, `PROAST`, `AIR-SKA`, … - **Stations** carry `name` in Greek (ΑΓΙΟΙ ΑΝΑΡΓΥΡΟΙ, ΑΝΩ ΛΙΟΣΙΑ, ΕΛΕΥΣΙΝΑ, ΜΕΓΑΡΑ…), `line_id`, chainage `pos`, and an **`importance`** integer — an R82-shaped ranking signal that arrives with the data instead of having to be argued into it. ## Independent corroboration (and the non-OSM proof) geodata.gov.gr's `Σιδηροδρομικό δίκτυο Ελλάδας` is the same network at lower resolution: 110 lines / **2 461 km**, bbox x 246 039..719 812 / y 4 099 343..4 610 776 — the same national footprint. Retrieved from the Internet Archive and measured directly. Its ESRI lineage is ``` CreateFeatureclass "…\DLEAD.Siemens-250000" Rail_Network # NGI_DATA_Layer ``` — an official 1:250 000 enterprise geodatabase. **No OSM anywhere in the lineage** (R1), and that CKAN record asserts a per-dataset licence of **CC-BY-3.0**, which the ΥΠΕΝ records notably do not. ## What this unblocks - `railways` — GO. Line geometry with a live/disused flag and a line taxonomy. - `stations` — GO nationally, not just Athens/Thessaloniki GTFS. 443 named points with an importance signal. ## The one open question (R2) The GAIAOSE portal item asserts **no licence** (`licenseInfo` is empty). The CC BY 4.0 you see on the municipal republications of this layer (e.g. Δήμος Ωραιοκάστρου's `trn_lin_rail_network_gaia_ose` on data.gov.gr, which cites gaiaweb.gaiaose.gr as its source) is *the municipality's* assertion about someone else's data and does not bind GAIAOSE. Confirm with GAIAOSE before this goes live — the same class of gap #171 already flags for ΥΠΕΝ. The explicitly CC-BY-3.0 geodata.gov.gr copy is the fallback if the answer is unsatisfactory, at the cost of resolution and a dead portal (see the roads issue for the geodata.gov.gr availability story). Blocks the `railways` and `stations` rows of the Greece catalogue; part of #44.

art-bot self-assigned this

2026-08-20 06:44:42 +00:00

art-bot referenced this issue from a commit

2026-08-20 06:49:41 +00:00

docs: correct the Greece catalogue — roads and rail are not absences (#179, #180, #182)

art-bot referenced this issue

2026-08-20 06:50:16 +00:00

docs: correct the Greece catalogue — roads and rail are not absences (#179, #180, #182) #183

art-bot referenced this issue

2026-08-20 06:58:48 +00:00

# add-country: the repeatable shape for onboarding a country #178