On Thu, Apr 8, 2010 at 1:36 PM, Dave F. <[email protected]> wrote:
> I disagree with this. I think they should be accurately mapped where > they actually are. > > This is an example I corrected yesterday: > http://osm.org/go/eukjJQRVR-- One could argue that your traffic signal placement is inaccurate. The signals on North Parade Road (687898571) are placed right on the way, but in reality they are on the left (north) side of the road. Similarly, the signals on southbound Pulteney Road (687898570) are on the way, rather than on the left (east) side of the road. The lights for northbound Pulteney Road (687898568) are in the middle of the street, so we can play along with your placement. What about the set of light underneath the railway overpass on the east side of the roadway? You never placed a node for them! (BTW, who is supposed to look at those lights?) As Richard indicated previously, the map is an abstract representation of the real world. Placing a single node at the intersection of the ways with the traffic signal associated with it tells us that this intersection is controlled by traffic signals. If you're going to micro map, then place the signals at the exact location of the poles, but then you should also be mapping the edges of the road, and not just a single line down the center of the roadway. You would have to map the edges of the sidewalk as well, to define its location. You couldn't just put a point down for a garbage can, but you would have to define a square or circle of the proper size so that it renders properly. When creating a map, we really need to decide if we are creating an abstract representation of the world, or a photo-realistic representation. This is probably the biggest downfall of the open concept of OSM. Each mapper has a different idea of what the OSM map should look like. I think there should be a single node at the intersection defining the traffic signals, and you think there should be three nodes depicting the four traffic signals. We can play editing war till the cows come home, and no one wins. Unless there's a uniform agreement, it ends up that the user is the one that loses. Have look at your example (http://osm.org/go/eukjJQRVR--), and then look at this example (http://osm.org/go/eu9d...@j--) Based on looking at the first intersection that you have mapped, I would assume that the lights on Rotherham Road in the second example would be controlling the intersection with Cliff Hill, where in fact the light on Rotherham is a pedestrian controlled light for a crosswalk, and there are no lights at Cliff Hill. What happens in commercial mapping, is that someone (or committee) comes up with a set of rules for the employees to follow (such as how to map a set of lights at an intersection), and then the employees follow the rule. If they deviate enough, they get shown the door. With OSM, we don't have a strictly defined set of rules. We kind of have a very loosely described set of suggestions. Because everyone is a volunteer, all we can do is ask everyone to try and play nice, and do their best. I can not force anyone to change what they are doing, or how they are mapping. I have no more power or influence than any one else. The best that I or anyone else can do, is enter into a discussion such as this one now. From this discussion, we might come to a consensus of how we should be mapping specific items. The biggest downfall of the OSM project is also it's largest asset... the community. The huge number of contributors are leveraged to spread the work out, and make the workload lower for each individual. This same huge pool of contributors each bring their own set of ideas of how things should be done. As a result, uniformity of the data representation suffers. Just my ever so humble opinion... James VE6SRV _______________________________________________ newbies mailing list [email protected] http://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/newbies
