Great discussion! I think we're discussing two different things here. One is about differentiating *trail* (not necessarily hiking trail) from other kinds of highway=path and the other is about *difficulty of a (hiking) trail* in terms of how technical and demanding it is (and thus who can use it and how it will affect walking/hiking/running pace).
I'd like to elaborate on the suggestion *path=trail*, which I think is super!! According to the Cambridge dictionary, a trail is "*a path through a countryside, mountain, or forest area, often made or used for a particular purpose:* *- a forest/mountain trail* *- a walking/snowshoeing/cross-country skiing trail*" Other dictionaries use "*beaten path*", "*a track made by passage especially through a wilderness*" or similar. To me, the main difference is between a *beaten path vs a path that has been purposely groomed*. Could path=trail be used for this distinction? Unlike path=mtb, it would not be for trails created for a specific purpose, but any beaten path, usually in a forest or mountaineous region. Regarding *trail difficulty*, I agree that sac_scale is more for different levels of alpinism (and not really relevant for non-mountain trails) and that other measures are needed to separate everything that on the SAC scale would simply be hiking. One challenge here is about verifiability. Another is about basing such a tag on a scale that is only used in a small part of the world. For people in the Alps it may be easy to use the SAC scale, because they walk on trails where it's used IRL. Similar with the other suggested scales (what's "bush" for someone outside of Australia?). I started the other tread about trail technicality for this particular reason. But maybe we can separate the discussions and keep this one about how to differentiate trail from other highway=path? /Daniel Den sön 24 maj 2020 04:00Kevin Kenny <kevin.b.ke...@gmail.com> skrev: > On Sat, May 23, 2020 at 9:52 PM Graeme Fitzpatrick > <graemefi...@gmail.com> wrote: > > We have a similar system here > > > > The Australian Walking Track Grading System > > > > Grade 1 is suitable for the disabled with assistance > > Grade 2 is suitable for families with young children > > Grade 3 is recommended for people with some bushwalking experience > > Grade 4 is recommended for experienced bushwalkers, and > > Grade 5 is recommended for very experienced bushwalkers > > And all five of those grades are sac_scale=hiking, which is why I say > that's an impossible scale to use for the purpose we're considering. > > -- > 73 de ke9tv/2, Kevin > > _______________________________________________ > Tagging mailing list > Tagging@openstreetmap.org > https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/tagging >
_______________________________________________ Tagging mailing list Tagging@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/tagging
