Hmmm, interesting. I'm not sure they compact very many roads around
here (CO). Maybe a regional difference. It seems like they put a thick
layer of gravel on and let the traffic compact it. Not fun to ride on
with a bike, or a motorcycle.
Do rocks tend to come to the surface of a compacted road and create a
ball bearing interface? If they grade it after initial construction,
do they subsequently compact it again too?
On 7/19/20 9:27 PM, Kevin Kenny wrote:
On Sun, Jul 19, 2020 at 9:29 PM brad <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Thanks for diving in. If it's a very minor unimproved road and
not clearly service, I usually tag it track. I would suggest
adding some indication of road quality. If it's an improved
gravel road, I consider surface=gravel sufficient. If it's
rougher than an improved gravel road, surface=unpaved (in my area
the surface is usually a mix of dirt, rocks, gravel, so unpaved
seems best), and smoothness=very_bad (high clearance), or
horrible (4wd)
[https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:smoothness], or
4wd_only=yes .
A nit: most 'improved' gravel roads are surface=compacted. 'gravel'
is like rail ballast; a compacted surface ordinarily has a mix of fine
gravel and even finer material such as sand, and is rolled. Americans
will often refer to a compacted road as a 'dirt' or 'gravel' road but
the difference is like night and day when you're driving on one!
For the rougher stuff, 'smoothness' is essential. Consider also
'tracktype', which addresses more the firmness of the surface rather
than its smoothness. A clay surface may be lovely in a dry season and
impassable in a wet one, despite having a fast enough slump that the
surface is deceptively smooth.
Some National Forests separate Forest Highway (a regular access road)
and Forest Road (usually a logging track, might be inaccessible in any
given season, and often passable only to logging trucks and similar
high-clearance off-road vehicles). I don't know if any of them overlay
the numbering of the two systems.
_Please_ create route relations!
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