ftp://ftp.dot.state.pa.us/public/pdf/BPR_pdf_files/Maps/GHS/Roadnames/ I've been noticing lately a user in PA has been doing copying from these and other online maps available on the State of PA website to add in a lot of the quadrant routes here in the state over the past several months. I'm not 100% sure this is allowed, is it? I mean, would he have to at least verify that the license for those maps is compatible with OSM first any then also mention this somewhere on the Wiki? It's been pretty obvious in some places that he's never been there, because recently, when I was out in the field in central PA, I came across a highway that had a ref tag with '2' false highways on it, a quadrant route ref, and the only real ref that it posted on the highway. [1] The only 'posted' ref there is the "US 22 Business" one. Both of those US 522 bannered refs do not exist in the real road, and I highly doubt that they ever did since that section of highway was bypassed and mainline US-522 was moved off of it, as well as mainline US-22 (but it's part became Business US-22). I think I did see the 'quadrant route' mentioned in the ref on one of the little white signs, but those don't count for the 'ref' tag (see below). Now sure, I myself have edited in areas I've never visited, but I don't go randomly adding 'ref' tags to highways unless I can back up the changes with a legit source (the extra 'name' tags from Tiger don't count). I know a few months ago, we had a discussion here on [talk-us] about the relatively hidden 'quadrant routes' that Pennsylvania has [2]. Pretty much everybody here agreed that they shouldn't be added to the 'ref' tag since they don't have any shields. I invited this user to join in the conversation here on [talk-us] several times via PM, and each time, he claimed he was too busy to even write a quick message, but would do it 'soon', as to why he thinks that the quadrant routes should be in the ref tag, and not 'ref:penndot' since he's the main person adding them that way so his side of the story/reasoning could be heard by everybody. Since the last messages I sent him in January/February on that subject, I think he's been intentionally ignoring any message he gets from me, since I do know he's still editing. The reason I'm suggesting that is because about a month ago, I discovered a route he added in NY in an area I'm pretty familiar with, even though I haven't been there in about 4-5 years. He added a 'NY 5 Alternate' in the Silver Creak, NY area [3] along US-20, and I found that highly illogical for NYDOT to have added since that route has a really bad hill on it for trucks (that's why there's a posted US-20 Truck posted there in the field along NY-5's main route). So, I asked him about that route to see when it might have been posted (if it was a real route). I kinda have a feeling he added it based off of the faulty Tiger data overlap there, as you can see NY-5 referenced in the Tiger tags on the way mentioned in my comments on that changeset. Still, as you can see in the changeset comments, he's completely ignored me on this subject. I've even send him a few polite messages via the internal PM system asking if he could take a moment and respond to that changeset. Got nothing back from him, even though he's continued to edit via Potlatch 2 since most of my comments/messages on the NY-5 Alternate subject, so I know he's had to have at least seen the new message icon for a new PM since he's responded to me in the past. Anyways, this wouldn't be the first time he's added a possible 'false'/'no longer exist' ref tag to the OSM database and have somebody ask him questions about it. [4] (He wouldn't have even responded to this note if I hadn't have sent him a message about it.) Anyways, enough back story on this user. So, does anybody have any idea about those PA maps? I mean, if they aren't legal to be used for our purposes in OSM, then there is a shit load of stuff that would need to be 'redacted', or just deleted from the database since this user used those maps a lot in the past to add quadrant routes. So, if anybody else wants to try to contact him to see if he'll respond to you and maybe finally post here on [talk-us], be my guest since he's just ignoring me. -James [1] - https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/14238074 [2] - https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/talk-us/2015-January/014157.html [3] - https://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/28741710#map=16/42.5471/-79.1594&layers=Q [4] - https://www.openstreetmap.org/note/309527
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