[OSM-dev] New Map Style feedback

[Richard Fairhurst]

SimonPoole wrote:
> And in lots of countries in Europe they are signposted in green. I'm 
> not quite sure why we are being held ransom to a questionable 
> decision which was made (not so long ago) by an unrelated third 
> party. Which interesting enough however doesn't use every 
> imaginable colour for their road network either
> https://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/osmaps/#53.00818632749056,-1.4402046835289466

For the eighty gazillionth time:

The old OSM style did not use blue, green and red because these were
"Ordnance Survey" colours. The old OSM style used blue, green and red
because they were the standard British map colours. In particular, other UK
cartographers used green for non-primary roads long before OS did (I think
OS only switched in the late '90s).

If you want to find a commercial prototype for OSM then the AA maps are a
little closer, but actually the colours were directly taken from a map I did
for the Cotswold Canals Trust, slightly desaturated:
https://twitter.com/richardf/status/632185970037657600

I'm not saying that because I have a particular animus towards the new style
(I agree that a change was long overdue, and greatly respect the work that
the osm-carto team have put into it); I simply want to squash this erroneous
idea that the old colours were OS-derived.

Incidentally, the old shields (which should have been taken out back and
shot a long time ago, and I'm glad they're gone) were not remotely OS
either, as some people have excitedly claimed, but were an unintentional
echo of British Railways totem signs from the 1950s:
http://website.lineone.net/~alan.c.edwards/railsign.html

Richard




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