topic Re: Locate Addresses with Units in ArcGIS Pro Questions

Locate Addresses with Units

BryanLynn1 — Mon, 22 Jul 2019 20:18:45 GMT

I have created a locator using the Point Address Role. The locator works but it will not locate or provide candidates for addresses that contain units. For example: 606 Main St will work but 606 Main St Suite 150 will not. This is a big problem when all of the addresses on a parcel have unit addresses. For example: 10001 Kingston Pike only exists with units (e.g. Suite 100 - 150) and since all the address points have unit values it will not show up in the candidates list.

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

MichaelVolz — Mon, 22 Jul 2019 21:51:17 GMT

Which locator style are you using? Did you account for the field(s) that hold the units in address locator data source?

I have tried to use the Create Locator tool to recreate a locator from ArcMap based on 1 concatenated field. It appears with the Point Address role you only have 1 required field (Street Name) that I populated with the concatenated field. Unfortunately, when I do this I get the following error message:

So it appears that even though the tool shows that there is only 1 required field, in reality there appears to be more than 1 required field.

Is the intent of the Point Address role to have your point data broken out into individual fields as opposed to 1 concatenated field?

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

EricAnderson17 — Mon, 22 Jul 2019 22:30:50 GMT

Hi Bryan,

To answer Michael Volz's first question (and confirm my own understanding), it sounds like you are using the new Create Locator tool in ArcGIS Pro and using the Point Address role (comparable to the "US Address - Single House" and "US Address - Single House Subaddress" styles with the older Create Address Locator tool).

What version of ArcGIS Pro are you currently using, and which version was the locator created in?

Are you using points or polygons as the input reference data?

Have you tested with other unit types ("#", "Unit", "Apt", "Bldg", etc.)?

I would also like to see how you defined the reference data when creating the locator. Do you have screenshots of how your unit/suite information is structured in the reference data's attribute table, and how you defined it in the Create Locator tool?

Thank you!

Eric

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

BryanLynn1 — Tue, 23 Jul 2019 15:02:23 GMT

Yes, I was using the new Create Locator tool in ArcGIS Pro 2.4.

Addresses are from a point feature class stored in an Oracle SDE database.

"Have you tested with other unit types ("#", "Unit", "Apt", "Bldg", etc.)?" Not sure I understand this question. We have a variety of unit types stored in the UNIT_TYPE field. Values include SUITE, APT, UNIT, etc. So when you say "have you tested.." I am not sure what you are asking. I have tested addresses with both a SUITE and an APT unit type. I am expecting to put in "606 MAIN" and have candidates with units show up in the candidates list. What I am seeing is just the primary 606 MAIN ST address (see third image below).

I have attached some screen shots showing how I defined the locator and what I am seeing when using it. I only showed

the "Field Mapping" values that I thought were relevant. If you need to see all of them I can create more screen shots.

Using the locator in Pro - I would have expected to see all of the 606 Main St addresses in the list box (or at least the first 6 addresses).

Even worse, the address points for 2220 CLINCH AVE, which all have unit numbers, never show up in the list of candidates.

Thanks for the help.

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

MichaelVolz — Tue, 23 Jul 2019 15:20:35 GMT

What version of Pro are you using?

What is the data format of your Unit field (e.g. text, numeric)?

What is the data format of your Unit Type field (e.g. text, numeric)?

Do you have any other fields mapped that you are not showing in your screenshot?

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

BryanLynn1 — Tue, 23 Jul 2019 16:03:21 GMT

What version of Pro are you using? 2.4

What is the data format of your Unit field (e.g. text, numeric)? Text

What is the data format of your Unit Type field (e.g. text, numeric)? Text

Do you have any other fields mapped that you are not showing in your screenshot? Yes - see image below

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

EricAnderson17 — Tue, 23 Jul 2019 16:27:19 GMT

Hi Bryan,

Sorry for the confusion, your initial description only mentioned "Suite", so I was just curious if you're seeing this issue with other unit types as well.

To confirm, is the issue that the units are not appearing as suggestions, or you are unable to actually locate using a unit as well?

Here is some sample data I mocked up that is nearly identical to yours, and the locating functionality seems to be working successfully:

I can search "#100", "Suite 100", etc. - all successful.

-Eric

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

BryanLynn1 — Tue, 23 Jul 2019 17:53:20 GMT

To confirm, is the issue that the units are not appearing as suggestions, or you are unable to actually locate using a unit as well? Both actually. Address points with units do not appear as suggestions and I am unable to locate them. It is like it simply doesn't know they exist. Which is odd because they work fine in our ArcMap/ArcGIS Server locator.

Let me create a local dataset and give it a whirl.

Thanks for the help!!

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

EricAnderson17 — Wed, 24 Jul 2019 14:36:37 GMT

My pleasure Bryan. Based on the screenshots, it looks like your reference data is structured correctly and you are setting up the locator field mapping correctly as well. I agree that maybe testing outside of Oracle (in a local file geodatabase) would be a good next test.

If you'd like to send me a copy of the data to help take a look at, I'd be happy to do so. My email is eanderson@esri.com. Otherwise, I recommend reaching out to Esri Support so we can investigate this a bit more thoroughly.

Best regards,

Eric

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

BryanLynn1 — Wed, 24 Jul 2019 17:59:40 GMT

Thanks. I will reach out to Esri Support.

Here is some more info in case it sparks an idea:

I created a local copy of the data and I was able to find the address on the map but the units still didn't show up as suggestions or candidates.
In the locator created from the local data, I was able to locate the address on the map but I had to key-in the house number, street name, and unit number. For example: 606 Main St #150
I use the Oracle SDE data to create a locator with the "Create Address Locator" geoprocessing task. Since suggestions don't work with those I wasn't able to test that functionality, however I was able to find the unit addresses.

Here is a screen shot showing the results:

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

MichaelVolz — Wed, 24 Jul 2019 18:19:44 GMT

Bryan:

When you are using the "US Address - Single House Subaddress" style for the Create Address Locator tool, do you not have a checkbox that allows you to enable suggestions like in the below screenshot? Or do the suggestions just not work properly?

For the new Create Locator tool I do not see a checkbox to Enable suggestions. Would you or anyone else know if suggestions are just automatically enabled for the Create Locator address locator?

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

BryanLynn1 — Wed, 24 Jul 2019 18:42:33 GMT

I did "Enable Suggestions" for the "Create Address Locator" but they seem to be disabled for those locators. The "Create Locator" tool doesn't have a "Use Suggestions" option that I noticed - it just works automatically.

Here is a shot of the Locate Settings: KnoxCo_AddrPnt_OldStyle was built using the "Create Address Locator". You can enable the locator but not the Use Suggestions option. It is always disabled for that locator.

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

EricAnderson17 — Wed, 24 Jul 2019 19:44:57 GMT

Suggestions for a local, file-based, locator will only be available for those created with the Create Locator tool (enabled by default).

The Create Address Locator tool does not support suggestions for a local, file-based locator, and only supports suggestions when shared as a service. So you could test sharing the locator you created with the Create Address Locator tool to Portal, then bring in the geocode service (not the local locator) to ArcGIS Pro and test the suggestion functionality there.

I do understand the point you are making though Bryan, searching for "606 Main St" does not yield any candidates with unit numbers, and you would need to actually include the unit number in the search, e.g. "606 Main St #100". I thought the issue was that you were searching for the address with the unit number and still not returning any results.

I cannot say for certain that what we are seeing here is expected behavior, but I see the same on my end. Bryan - I'd recommend we work through your Support case to maybe see if we can get an enhancement logged to provide similar functionality to what you're seeing with the Create Address Locator tool with the Create Locator tool (ability to search for the base address and see all associated subaddresses as well). I'll track down your case and work with the analyst to see if we can get something like this logged.

Best regards,

Eric

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

BryanLynn1 — Thu, 25 Jul 2019 12:47:29 GMT

I thought the issue was that you were searching for the address with the unit number and still not returning any results.

If I use the Create Locator tool against our Oracle SDE database, then yes, this is exactly the problem. I can key in the address with the unit number and it isn't found (not as a suggestion or candidate). It only finds the address without a unit number (see screen shot below). This is a real problem when all the addresses on the parcel have unit numbers (see the 2220 Clinch Ave screen shot above). The screen shot below is showing the results when using a locator created from the Oracle SDE feature class:

Locators created using a local copy of the data will locate the addresses with units.

I wanted to add this note for clarification for anyone else reading the thread.

Thanks and I will open a support ticket today.

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

JoeBorgione — Thu, 25 Jul 2019 14:04:40 GMT

This is a good discussion regarding the new approach to creating locators. It's nice to see ESRI ready to join the dialogue as we all make the adjustments.

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

EricAnderson17 — Thu, 25 Jul 2019 14:13:00 GMT

Hi Bryan,

The issue you are describing definitely sounds like a defect. I'll do some testing this morning and see if I can reproduce the issue if I use reference data that is sourced from an Oracle geodatabase.

Thank you for bringing this up!

Eric

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

MichaelVolz — Thu, 25 Jul 2019 14:21:49 GMT

What version of Oracle are you currently using to store your data (e.g. Oracle 11.2.0.4, Oracle 12.1.0.2, other)?

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

EricAnderson17 — Thu, 25 Jul 2019 19:37:01 GMT

Hi Bryan,

To follow up, I tested the same feature class I used successfully in a file geodatabase and moved it to an Oracle 12.2 (12C) geodatabase and can reproduce the issue you are reporting. Searching for "606 MAIN ST #100" only returns a candidate for "606 MAIN ST".

Let's continue to work through your Support case and hopefully get something logged for this if the analyst working with you can reproduce the issue as well.

-Eric

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

ShanaBritt — Thu, 01 Aug 2019 08:00:04 GMT

The behavior in the original post is expected behavior for subaddress addresses, a unit indicator (#, APT, UNIT...) is required to return address matches. This is noted in the Subaddress section in the help, https://pro.arcgis.com/en/pro-app/help/data/geocoding/introduction-to-locator-roles.htm#GUID-BA06C3FE-2210-4634-9E61-CA5BAA6E2E5E.

Suggestions for subaddresses are currently not supported for locators based on the PointAddress role created with the Create Locator tool whether local or as a service. It would be great to understand the use case for providing suggestions for subaddress, as well as, returning all units associated with the base address when searching for the base address. At what point in typing the address do you expect the unit suggestion be returned? If you are searching an address for a building with 1,000 units, are you expecting to scroll through all 1,000 unit candidates to find what you are looking for?

The PointAddress role does require one of three field mappings outside of street name: building name or house number, or house number to and from fields. This is why you are getting the error when only mapping street name. I'm not sure what values you had in the street name field, but the PointAddress role requires the address components to be separated just like street centerlines. See link to help topic above.

Re: Locate Addresses with Units

BryanLynn1 — Thu, 01 Aug 2019 14:05:08 GMT

The behavior in the original post is expected behavior for subaddress addresses, a unit indicator (#, APT, UNIT...) is required to return address matches.

The problem I am seeing is - I can't find the subaddress addresses even if I use a unit indicator (#, APT, UNIT...). The locator only will find an address match that doesn't have a subaddress. Here is screen shot showing a search for 606 main st #150 - which results in the locator ONLY finding 606 MAIN ST and not the subaddress.

It would be great to understand the use case for providing suggestions for subaddress, as well as, returning all units associated with the base address when searching for the base address.

The image below actually shows 2 problems. First, the need for subaddresses in suggestions. Without subaddresses in suggestions - you won't know that 2220 CLINCH AVE #1 even exists. Second, and the bigger problem here, even if you know 2220 CLINCH AVE #1 exists you can't find it. Now, should you have a parcel with out a base address of 2220 CLINCH AVE? I don't know, I am not over addressing.....I just type on my little keyboard and try to make things work

At what point in typing the address do you expect the unit suggestion be returned? If you are searching an address for a building with 1,000 units, are you expecting to scroll through all 1,000 unit candidates to find what you are looking for?

I guess in my mind, when you type 606 MAIN it would be nice to see a list of suggestions that included 606 MAIN ST, 606 MAIN ST #100, 606 MAIN ST #150, 606 MAINTENANCE LN.... at least you would know there are several units at 606 MAIN ST. Now, as a programmer, I can see a couple of problems on how to make this work well in all situations (especially if you have a building with 1000 units), but you are only showing a few suggestions (like 6 -10 or so). I really don't think anyone is expecting to scroll through a 1000 suggestions. I can also see an argument that the unit numbers keep you from seeing 606 MAINTENANCE LN as a suggestion because all of the unit suggestions from 606 MAIN ST push it off the list. However, once you get to 606 MAINT the MAIN ST suggestions drop off the suggestion list and you will see what you need. So, I am not sure what the best solution is here for including units in the list of suggestions but going back to image #2 above - having units in the suggestion list would help you find 2220 CLINCH AVE #1.

Thanks for taking the time to look at this. I have to say the dialog with the Esri staff on this issue has been outstanding.

I know I need to open a support ticket - I have just been sidetracked on a couple of priority tasks.