Useful summary (wish I had seen it before I just posted mine!) ... I agree - mostly - with "unjoining designated" in "solution 1" ... I am less happy with introducing "=official" as we already seem to have made some recent progress in Ekkehart's direction with the use of "designated".
Mike Harris -----Original Message----- From: Nop [mailto:ekkeh...@gmx.de] Sent: 13 August 2009 10:02 To: talk Subject: Re: [OSM-talk] Proliferation of path vs. footway Hi! This discussion seems to be going the same way as it always does - in circles. :-) So I'd like to try again for a more general statement and summary. The need for change First of all, we would need to agree that there actually is a problem and that we need to (re)define something to clarify it. There have again been many mails along the line "It is easy and can all be done following existing definitions - if it is done my way". But this is simply not true, the wiki _is_ contradicting itself. The Fuzziness If I summarize all different, contradicitory positions mentioned, what is the meaning if we see footway or cycleway today if we don't know who has tagged it according to which interpretation? highway=cycleway : road-signed or waymarked or suitable/allowed for bicycles or intended for bicycles or intended for mixed use with primary use bicycle bicycle=designated : the same as highway=cycleway by wiki definition highway=footway : road-signed or waymarked or suitable/allowed for pedestrians or intended for pedestrians or intended for mixed use with primary use pedestrians foot=designated : the same as highway=footway by wiki definition In theory, bridleway has the same problems, but it seems that so far nobody has cared about bridleways and so there are not as many contradicting interpretations attached. Conclusion If you don't really care about foot/cycleways or if you are in a country where the rules of traffic generally allow mixed use, this is ok. If you want to tag the strict use cases of legal dedication in Germany or France, this is insufficient. The basic problem is also apparent: A good definition should be unambigous and not include the word "or". :-) Solution attempts Finally, I cannot resist the temptation anymore and have to present the two possible solutions I have arrived at. Both are minimum impact solutions and only take into account the currently known use cases. Proposal #1: Unjoin designated Get rid of the idea that cycleway is the same thing as bicycle=designated. Accept that foot/cycleway is fuzzy. Redefine designated to be only used for legally dedicated ways. Likewise seperate foot=designated from footway. This way, foot/cycleway can be used for the lenient use cases like today, but designated can be used to tag the strict use cases. Proposal #2: Introduce offical dedication Leave old tags as they are and accept that foot/cycleway and designated are as fuzzy as described above. Clarify that these tags only give information on possible use, but not about the legal situation. Introduce a new tag biclyce/foot=official to tag the strict use case of road-signed ways or corresponding legal dedication. This way, nothing needs to be changed in existing fuzzy tagging, but real foot/cycleways are simply tagged by adding an "official" or changing designated to official if appropriate. And again: I believe that these two ways would work as a solution and that they would cause little impact. But I will be happy with any complete and workable solution. In any way we would still have to come to an agreement and implement it the same way in renderers and editors - which seem near impossible. bye Nop _______________________________________________ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk