Hi all,
I’ve noticed many motorway shoulders in Australia (especially in Sydney) being
mapped as cycle routes on OSM. Although this seems to be a common approach for
motorways/other high-speed roads in Australia of which cycling is allowed on, I
can hardly imagine it to be of any practical use (i.e. providing convenient and
safe connections for people cycling).
Foremostly, this mapping approach defies the general purpose of cycle routes
(both from an engineering perspective and the official OSM Wiki), that is,
guiding people onto safe & convenient ways. Although cycling on most motorway
shoulders in Australia is technically permitted and commonly done by the very
few “strong and fearless” people (only ~1%, as indicated in past transport
research), it’s both subjectively and statically quite unsafe, which gives no
use to most people when rendered on tiles such as OpenCycleMap.
Also, these mapped motorway/high-speed road routes aren’t officially endorsed
routes whatsoever, and are always referred to as separate pieces of
infrastructure (e.g. “… cycleway”) by cycle-lobbying groups.
Afterall, these “routes” probably shouldn’t be mapped at all, since they aren’t
much use to most people; tagging them with ‘cycling’: ‘designated’ and
‘cycleway’: ‘shoulder’ would be sufficient enough. What do you think of this
solution?
Thanks in advance,
Dongchen Yue
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