Re: [OSM-talk] [tagging] updated RFC: Highway administrative and physical descriptions
in the UK some main A roads have single lane passing places and 10 MPH speed limits while others are much higher quality than most motorways. Are these not edge cases? Any general case model of classification will fail at the edge cases. No classification system will map cleanly onto the real world, where there are always extremes. The current model is simple, and allows for extra tags to describe a road that differs from what the highway= tag might lead one to expect. (primary road with low bridges or narrow lanes, secondary road with dual carriageway). With our current model, we can reasonably assume for any country that a road tagged highway=motorway is of higher quality than trunk primary secondary etc. We can make assumptions for each different country or even region that a given tag will specify a higher or lower quality than in another country i.e. you don't go from Northern France to Iceland expecting highway=primary roads to be of the same quality. But the principle that one highway type is better than another, *in* *general*, is true everywhere. In the UK, in general, the administrative classifications Motorway green-signed A-road white-signed A-road B road unclassified road - so these reasonably map to motorway, trunk, primary etc. The current model is simple, and *generally* does not surprise the user. The guiding principles of OSM. - Dan ___ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/talk
Re: [OSM-talk] [tagging] updated RFC: Highway administrative and physical descriptions
Andy Robinson (blackadder) wrote: It's a whole lot easier to add additional tags that are logical and describe the physical properties of the highway specifically. For the physical you I disagree that it's a whole lot easier. As you mention below, who wants to spend hours adding 20 tags to each piece of road. Much better IMO to have a tag which can shorthand those twenty tags. Just need to figure out how best to give a general idea of the road physically, without the need to break out the tape measures. You can do the same for administrative designations that go beyond the simple highway= approach we started with. These don't supersede the existing tags, they simply add to the overall definition of the object. That's exactly what I'm going for here. For example, highway=secondary tells nothing at all about the road, besides that it is at a lower level (in some way, administratively or physically) than a primary, trunk, or motorway. This proposal allows a basic description of the physical road (from a glance) and also (hopefully) gives a way to indicate the administrative designation, in a way that can be used globally (perhaps with slight modification at some point to add a level or two) ___ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/talk
Re: [OSM-talk] [tagging] updated RFC: Highway administrative and physical descriptions
Alex Mauer wrote: Lester Caine wrote: Hmm, that's not what I was going for. I was going for the administrative designation of the road (that is, M, A, B [I gather] in the UK, I-, US, [state abbrev] in the US) . In the US this is closely tied to who maintains it. In Europe it seems to be much more closely tied to its physical characteristics, and varies wildly from country to country. The basic problem is the lack of any clarity between countries on road definitions. The 'designation' of a road adds little to knowledge of its structure in the UK some main A roads have single lane passing places and 10 MPH speed limits while others are much higher quality than most motorways. Just keep the road designation as it reference number and then worry about such things as 3 4 or 5 lanes each way without reference to 'different types of motorway'. But is there any easy/consistent way to determine whether a road is a national route, regional route, county route or something similar to that, in the UK? based upon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Britain_road_numbering_scheme it seems to me that A roads correspond with a national route, and B with a regional route. Motorways are also national routes, but both motorways and A roads may only cover a few miles while adjacent B roads can cover many counties and be used as national routes simply because there is no other road going in the right direction. The 'history' from that page explains well why a distinction between national, regional and county routes simple does not map to motorway, A, B ( and unclassified ). While government may like reclassifying roads to move responsibility for who maintains them, simply renumbering a major regional link as a B road does not change its impotence. So bottom line - no there is not a consistent way to map M, A and B to national route, regional route, county route The M32 is a county route into Bristol, the B4058 is an alternative regional route that connects with towns and villages north of the M4, which the M32 does not allow access to, but the M32 is simply a short bypass not a national or regional route. Currently sat nav systems simply ignore any distinction anyway so we currently have a major problem with large vehicles using roads because that is the given route, but it is totally unsuitable. The road classifications simply add to this confusion, hence the need to identify roads ( in the UK ) against their ACTUAL physical state rather than grouping things by an inappropriate global tagging. -- Lester Caine - G8HFL - Contact - http://home.lsces.co.uk/lsces/wiki/?page=contact L.S.Caine Electronic Services - http://home.lsces.co.uk MEDW - http://home.lsces.co.uk/ModelEngineersDigitalWorkshop/ Firebird - http://www.firebirdsql.org/index.php ___ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/talk
Re: [OSM-talk] [tagging] updated RFC: Highway administrative and physical descriptions
Lester Caine wrote: Alex Mauer wrote: I've added a decision tree to the physical section of the page, as well as removed the boulevard designation (since it didn't really add much) I'd like to have some more comments from the UK and german end, as to whether or not A and B roads (and others?) fit into the highway:admin scheme. Again, the proposal location is: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Proposed_features/Highway_administrative_and_physical_descriptions :admin is appropriate for the UK - but not laid out as it is at present. Motorways may be under different administration to the 'Highways Agency' and the 'Highways Agency' is also responsible for other main roads, but private companies will actually be responsible for managing those roads. Basically WHO admins a road is a bit of a lottery, so trying to create a simple list as currently proposed is wrong for the UK :( :admin SHOULD be the company responsible for maintaining the road. Hmm, that's not what I was going for. I was going for the administrative designation of the road (that is, M, A, B [I gather] in the UK, I-, US, [state abbrev] in the US) . In the US this is closely tied to who maintains it. In Europe it seems to be much more closely tied to its physical characteristics, and varies wildly from country to country. :physical simply adds complications without actually fixing anything. Trying to add _almost and _twolane does not provide ANY useful information, and a UK dual_carriageway is unlikely to have shoulders. Infact HAVING hard shoulders is part of the definition that makes it a motorway, and may result in it being A...(M) - OK a motorway_almost except that the A1(M) has three lanes in areas. So it does not fit the decision tree and if it does not have two lanes why is it a (motorway_twolane) ? it's motorway_singlelane but then it would probably not be a motorway ) OK, I made some corrections; I realized that I was taking the designation into account in the decision of motorway vs. motorway_almost (because in the US that's the only way to tell/be sure) If physical adds complications without fixing anything, then it itself needs to be modified to cover the situations that it doesn't. What kind of physical roads are not covered by highway:physical? Many people are saying things like just use highway as-is, but that's really not tenable. trunk (and even primary, secondary, tertiary or A,B,C) says nothing whatever about the physical characteristics of the road. And then anywhere below those designations, there's no description of the physical characteristics of the road. Yes I know I should put this on the talk page - but I can't get in at the moment :( Meh, mailing lists are better for discussion anyway. ___ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/talk
Re: [OSM-talk] [tagging] updated RFC: Highway administrative and physical descriptions
Alex Mauer wrote: Sent: 18 February 2008 11:16 PM To: talk@openstreetmap.org Subject: Re: [OSM-talk] [tagging] updated RFC: Highway administrative and physical descriptions I've added a decision tree to the physical section of the page, as well as removed the boulevard designation (since it didn't really add much) I'd like to have some more comments from the UK and german end, as to whether or not A and B roads (and others?) fit into the highway:admin scheme. Again, the proposal location is: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Proposed_features/Highway_administr ative_and_physical_descriptions It's a whole lot easier to add additional tags that are logical and describe the physical properties of the highway specifically. For the physical you might have: 1. The number of lanes -- (lanes=) 2. The lane width (standardised in most countries). Or a measurement if not standard. -- (lane_width=) 3. The surface construction (asphalt, concrete, dirt etc) -- (construction=) You can then go further and add additional tags that define all the other street furniture and attributes. None need to be complicated or difficult to understand. You can do the same for administrative designations that go beyond the simple highway= approach we started with. These don't supersede the existing tags, they simply add to the overall definition of the object. The big question though is who wants to spend hours adding 20 tags to each piece of road. Maybe when I have finished mapping my whole area I'll look at it again and start to add more tags, but for now I just use the basics and its good enough for now. Cheers Andy ___ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/talk
Re: [OSM-talk] [tagging] updated RFC: Highway administrative and physical descriptions
Alex Mauer wrote: Lester Caine wrote: Alex Mauer wrote: I've added a decision tree to the physical section of the page, as well as removed the boulevard designation (since it didn't really add much) I'd like to have some more comments from the UK and german end, as to whether or not A and B roads (and others?) fit into the highway:admin scheme. Again, the proposal location is: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Proposed_features/Highway_administrative_and_physical_descriptions :admin is appropriate for the UK - but not laid out as it is at present. Motorways may be under different administration to the 'Highways Agency' and the 'Highways Agency' is also responsible for other main roads, but private companies will actually be responsible for managing those roads. Basically WHO admins a road is a bit of a lottery, so trying to create a simple list as currently proposed is wrong for the UK :( :admin SHOULD be the company responsible for maintaining the road. Hmm, that's not what I was going for. I was going for the administrative designation of the road (that is, M, A, B [I gather] in the UK, I-, US, [state abbrev] in the US) . In the US this is closely tied to who maintains it. In Europe it seems to be much more closely tied to its physical characteristics, and varies wildly from country to country. The basic problem is the lack of any clarity between countries on road definitions. The 'designation' of a road adds little to knowledge of its structure in the UK some main A roads have single lane passing places and 10 MPH speed limits while others are much higher quality than most motorways. Just keep the road designation as it reference number and then worry about such things as 3 4 or 5 lanes each way without reference to 'different types of motorway'. I don't think it applies so much elsewhere - but UK motorways have no pedestrian access - does the same apply on any American routes? -- Lester Caine - G8HFL - Contact - http://home.lsces.co.uk/lsces/wiki/?page=contact L.S.Caine Electronic Services - http://home.lsces.co.uk MEDW - http://home.lsces.co.uk/ModelEngineersDigitalWorkshop/ Firebird - http://www.firebirdsql.org/index.php ___ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/talk
Re: [OSM-talk] [tagging] updated RFC: Highway administrative and physical descriptions
Lester Caine wrote: I don't think it applies so much elsewhere - but UK motorways have no pedestrian access - does the same apply on any American routes? US freeways (interstate, etc) do not allow foot traffic, in general. Outside of cities, however, cycles are allowed (inside of cities there's an alternate route ;) ). ___ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/talk
Re: [OSM-talk] [tagging] updated RFC: Highway administrative and physical descriptions
On Feb 19, 2008 3:16 PM, Alex S. [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Lester Caine wrote: I don't think it applies so much elsewhere - but UK motorways have no pedestrian access - does the same apply on any American routes? US freeways (interstate, etc) do not allow foot traffic, in general. Outside of cities, however, cycles are allowed (inside of cities there's an alternate route ;) ). Some US national (non-interstate) and state highways don't allow foot or bicycle traffic, either, but there's always an alternate route. ___ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/talk
Re: [OSM-talk] [tagging] updated RFC: Highway administrative and physical descriptions
I've added a decision tree to the physical section of the page, as well as removed the boulevard designation (since it didn't really add much) I'd like to have some more comments from the UK and german end, as to whether or not A and B roads (and others?) fit into the highway:admin scheme. Again, the proposal location is: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Proposed_features/Highway_administrative_and_physical_descriptions ___ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/talk
