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OSMForge

A self-hosted OpenStreetMap stack that downloads regional OSM extracts, ingests them into a local PostGIS database, and serves a GeoJSON API optimised for spatial analysis — particularly radio-frequency propagation modelling.

Public OSM APIs (Overpass, Nominatim) have strict rate limits and aren't suited to bulk or repeated spatial queries. OSMForge gives you unlimited local access to the same data.

Installation

pip install osmforge

Architecture

Geofabrik  ──download──▶  *.osm.pbf
                               │
                          osm2pgsql
                               │
                          PostGIS DB
                               │
                          FastAPI  ◀──  OSMClient (Python)

Quick start

1 — Download a region

osmforge-download europe/united-kingdom/england/isle-of-wight

Or download multiple regions in one call:

osmforge-download \
    europe/united-kingdom/england/west-midlands \
    europe/united-kingdom/england/staffordshire

Re-download (overwrite existing file):

osmforge-download --force europe/united-kingdom/england/isle-of-wight

2 — Start the stack

make up

3 — Query with the Python client

from osmforge import OSMClient

client = OSMClient()  # defaults to http://localhost:8000

# All propagation-classified features in a bounding box
gdf = client.propagation_bbox(
    min_lon=-1.6, min_lat=50.55,
    max_lon=-1.0, max_lat=50.85,
)
print(gdf.head())

Available data layers

Layer Description
buildings All building footprints
roads Highways, paths, tracks
water Rivers, lakes, sea areas
vegetation Woods, forests, scrub
landuse Farmland, industrial, residential
structures Bridges, walls, barriers
terrain Cliffs, embankments, peaks 
from osmforge import ALL_LAYERS
print(ALL_LAYERS)
# ['buildings', 'roads', 'water', 'vegetation', 'landuse', 'structures', 'terrain']