On February 9, 2015 4:32:36 AM CST, Paul Johnson <[email protected]> wrote: > On Fri, Feb 6, 2015 at 7:00 AM, Bryce Nesbitt <[email protected]> > wrote: > > > In the USA occasional sections of even Interstate highways are open > to > > bicycles, > > where no equivalent route exists. There's some argument to tag these > as > > bike paths to avoid the tag soup of lanes, > > and ensure the (unusual) situation is perfectly clear. > > > > This is not a sensible assumption and I'm frankly getting a little > sick of > having to mythbust this every few weeks just because 98% of America > happens > to live next to the few, largely urban, exceptions to the norm. It's > not > anywhere as rare as you make it out to be. The Federal Highway > Administration indicates that the default for any way in the US unless > otherwise locally defined, even freeways, is bicycle=yes > <http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/bicycle_pedestrian/guidance/design_guidance/freeways.cfm>. > Bicycles even qualify for the HOV lane unless it presents a hazard. > > Even in car-centric regions like California, the number of freeway > miles > that ban bikes is greatly overshadowed by the vast majority of miles > that > go by the default of allowing bicycles. In my experience, with a few > goofball exceptions largely in the midwest (such as, say, various > sections > of US 75, US 412 and (to a far lesser extent) I 40 in Oklahoma that > have a > minimum speed limit, yet is the only sensible route and in some cases > the > only physically possible route, and thus the ban is both routinely > ignored > and rarely enforced for the same reason it isn't enforced on farm > equipment > (which poses a far greater hazard as this equipment often spans > multiple > lanes) either; however I do try to tag anything that isn't a bike > route and > has a minimum speed limit as bicycle=no per Oklahoma's legal > idiosyncrasy), > there's very few segments except for the most urban settings where a > ban is > even a sensible suggestion in the first place. Wyoming could be > retagged > right now if it isn't already: There's not one spot in the freeway > system > in that state that bans bicycles > <http://www.pedbikeinfo.org/data/state.cfm?ID=51#state>. > > Can we finally bury this myth that bicycle=no is somehow even remotely > the > norm for American freeways? That said, regardless of the restriction, > it's > a good idea to tag bicycle=* and foot=* explicitly on trunk and > motorway > routes as there still seems to be widespread misconception on this and > could interfere with ideal routing if excluded. > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > _______________________________________________ > Tagging mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/tagging
According to <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-motorized_access_on_freeways>, 14 US states out of 50 allow bicycle use on Interstate highways. Wyoming is the only state that allows it state-wide. So, 72% of US states don't allow bicycles on Interstates. I don't have the percentages by highway mile available, but I would call a 72% majority the norm. -- John F. Eldredge -- [email protected] "Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that." -- Martin Luther King, Jr.
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