Buildings import 2026 from NLS

Buildings import for Finland with data from the National Land Survey of Finland (NLS) (https://www.maanmittauslaitos.fi/en/about-nls/organisation/about-national-land-survey-finland)x

Documentation

See process documentation version 2, it is much much faster and easier than one described in the forums.

Old version 1 https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/proposed-import-of-buildings-from-mml-mtk/145212/

Learned while doing

Ask for importer role to make such big imports. See Import/Guidelines > Dedicated User Account > importer role. Though Importer role has still rate limit of 1 million object/hour. This was not documented.

JOSM first uploads nodes, and ways only at last. This combined to OSM API rate limit made import looks like mess (only nodes at first).

-> Would be good to split uploads to smaller chunks, to fit both nodes and ways each rate lilmit. -> At the moment could not find a automated way to do this :(

OSM extracts (Geopackages for QGIS; it cannot open large .PBF) are good way to obtain OSM data for a country at once: https://download.geofabrik.de/europe/finland.html .

Seems like QGIS cannot handle "select by location" + again as "remove from current selection" if start selection is more than 100 000 features - process never finishes. -> Must process in sets of <100k.

QGIS fails to export whole MML OGC API > Buildings layer to local geopackage :( This whould be easiest way to get fresh building geometries. Maastotietokanta exports are update monthly or so, not too often.

-> Download NLS Topo Database (MML Maastotietokanta). That combined to OSM country Extract, in QGIS use "extract by location: disjoint" instead of "select by location" to make this process for whole Finland run in minutes instead of plenty manual work and many many days.

Account

https://www.openstreetmap.org/user/frspp%20import

Status

Todo

Finland clean up: <10 000 duplicates/non-existing buildings

6.9.2026

For unkown reason the source contained some buildings (<10 000) also on Sweden and Norway. Reverted those.

5.9.2026: Finished (the initial upload)

Finished uploads, the ways.

Still todo final clean up:

• Some duplicates possible (~10-20) due to OSM API rate limit stopped the uploads and other users made changes in between. Feel free to fix anything you find.
• At least one non-existing (already demolished) building was imported due Topo Database I used was 1,5 years old - thanks for noting @Tuplanolla . I will download fresh one and make automated comparision to remove non-existing. But as usual, feel free to fix anything you find.

Downloaded fresh Topo Database and added missing ~6 000 buildings, which has been added to source after 2.2025.

Started uploads of käyttötarkoitus>4 buildings

4.9.2026

~581 000 building import ongoing. -> OSM rate limit stopped upload -> Continued again and again after an hour. JOSM uploads all the nodes first, this made import look bad.

pohjois-pohjanmaa

kuusamo: 2026-07-24 done

taivalkoski: 2026-07-24 done

pudasjärvi: 2026-07-24 done

oulu: "kunta" geometry is invalid

ii: "Kunta" geometry is invalid

same also for others --> TBC, first need to fix geometries

kainuu: finished 2026-07-25

puolanka: 2026-07-24 done

suomussalmi: 2026-07-24 done

...

Lappi: Finished 2026-07-24

Place	Date	Source	Not in OSM	Comment
Kolari	2026-07-23	14095	5129	Whoopsie: uploaded with normal account.
Muonio	2026-07-23	8981	4666	only 1k done, then hit rate limit of new account -> finished later

Enontekiö 2026-07-24

inari 2026-07-24

kemijärvi 2026-07-24

keminmaa

kemi

kittilä 2026-07-24

muonio 2026-07-24

pello

pelkosenniemi 2026-07-24

posio

ranua

rovaniemi 2026-07-24

salla 2026-07-24

savukoski 2026-07-24

simo

sodankylä 2026-07-24

tervola

tornio,

utsjoki 2026-07-24

ylitornio