[josm-dev] Relation editor support for north/south and east/west similar to forward/backward

[SomeoneElse]

Richard Welty wrote:
> what Martjin is after is improving the situation for routing
> engines that use OSM data. in the US at least, highways,
> regardless of their actual direction, are assigned cardinal
> directions and signage frequently uses those directions.
> the premise is that if the cardinal directions are recorded
> in an appropriate manner (e.g., as the roles for ways in
> a route relation) then they are available for the spoken
> directions from a routing widget of some sort.
>

But surely the role of a way within a relation is a different thing 
entirely to the cardinal direction of a relation?

For example, imagine I'm near 2 ways that are both part of the I-80[1].  
For simplicity let's assume that the way that I would take to get to 
eastbound destinations actually goes in an eastbound direction at my 
location.

If it's important to recognise that there are two signed I-80 routes, 
one eastbound and one westbound, shouldn't there actually be two I-80 
relations?  The "eastboundness" is really a property of the route, 
rather than the individual way.

Now imagine a situation where an imaginary I-80 ran along a non-divided 
road for a while.  There'd only be one way, and it'd be part of both 
relations.  With normal OSM tagging, the way might have a "forward" role 
within the eastbound relation and a "backward" role within the westbound 
relation.  The US-style "west" or "east" tagging fails here because the 
way would need to have both "west" and "east" roles.

Also, perhaps a list other than josm-dev might be a better forum for 
discussing how best to map route relations?

Cheers,

Andy


[1] Example of how a bit of the I-80 is mapped now, for info:

http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/way/10473201
http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/way/30411369