On Wed, Jul 9, 2014 at 12:50 PM, Elliott Plack <elliott.pl...@gmail.com> wrote: > OSM US: > > I've been using some routing engines to map fitness routes (e.g. Strava) > that use OSM data. Along our US coasts, there are beaches. The beaches I'm > familiar with are popular with walkers and joggers to go up and down the > shore, since access is generally open to anyone along the water's edge. I'm > considering adding a `highway=path` along the beach to facilitate this. I'd > add the connections to the walking paths between parking lots and the beach > as well. > > For uninterrupted strips of sandy beach, would a path be appropriate to > indicate walkability?
Adding a single arbitrary path where an area exists seems a bit of a hack. I recognize that part of the problem that you are trying to address is that routers aren't routing across areas. And that is surely a difficult problem to solve. Is the creation of arbitrary fake-paths a worse problem than not being able to route with specific routing software? Perhaps. A similar situation exists in (micro-)mapping golf courses. Some courses have cart paths with discontinuities. Often those discontinuities direct you to drive the cart (or walk, I'm not "judging" here) on the fairway, until the next section of physical cart path begins. In that situation, I only map the real path, not the virtual path. The another similarity is that users will select different paths for different reasons. Beach walkers may divert towards interesting items on the beach, or away from waves, washouts or debris. Golf players will be guided by course rules, weather rules and the location of their ball. The golf player is probably more likely to complete a predictable circuit. Beach walkers might follow an "out and back" of entirely arbitrary length. Using a router to select a, let's say, 5km stroll, out and back on a beach, seems of limited utility. I suggest, "no path on the beach". Map a boardwalk where one exists, by all means. And adding those access ramps / paths is awesome. ;-) _______________________________________________ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us
