

Ask HN: Need help with Libya address system - ca98am79

Hello HN community - my friend who lives in Libya says that it is a huge problem that there is no street address system in Libya.  It is really difficult to find a business or location without stopping to ask many people along the way.  He says that many of the streets do not even have names.<p>We were trying to think of a technical solution to this - many Libyans have cell phones and smart phones.  If there was a way that a business could add their name, category, and geo location on a map it would be really helpful to everyone.<p>Does something like this already exist that they can try to get people to adopt?  If not, are there resources that he could tap in to to help to build this?<p>He reached out to me for help and I am reaching out to the HN community - this is an opportunity to try to solve a very real problem that affects millions of people every day.<p>Thanks!
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akg_67
Have you researched the Libyan addressing system? A quick google search gave
quite a few results. First you need to confirm the existing system and how
people find a business.

I can understand asking people for directions once in neighborhood but how do
people get to neighborhood first. How do they know which neighborhood has a
particular business. For example, it appears Canadian embassy is in Tripoli
Tower but how people know where is Tripoli Tower.

This is a very common way to find places in developing countries. Landmark
based, block based, direction based, ...

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mschuster91
I do not believe that a cellphone/a phone number should directly be tied to a
geographical address.

If lost or stolen, there's no real way to "disown" a number without also
inducing fraudulent disown announcements; also if a thief snatches e.g. a
purse with key and phone, he will immediately know where to break in.

