[OSM-newbies] How to map routes

[Dave Stubbs]

On Thu, Jul 24, 2008 at 12:36 PM, Eric Ladner <eric.ladner at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 23, 2008 at 10:21 PM, Germán Buela <gbuela at gmail.com> wrote:
> ...
>>
>> The problem with this is that ways are mostly made as whole streets,
>> end to end, and bus routes go along segments of those ways. Does this
>> mean that ways should be created as smaller units (ie one per block)
>> in order to create routes? Otherwise, I don't see how this model can
>> be used to represent real world routes...
>
> Split the street where the bus route turns.  Just like you would split a
> way to indicate a bridge.  Make sure the street is tagged correctly
> before you split it so you don't have to go back and re-tag multiple
> parts.
>
> The only other alternative is to create a new way using existing
> nodes (and overlapping previous ways) to get your route.  I
> personally don't think that's a bad thing.  You get one complete
> way that's a single entity instead of pieces of other entities to
> create your way.

The downside here is that it disconnects the route from the streets
the route follows.. you can piece this back together by working out
where it follows the same nodes as a street, but this is quite
complicated to do, and not necessarily reliable. For certain uses such
as automatically describing a route, it makes much more sense if the
proper street object is used.