[Tagging] Highway property proposal "covered=yes"

[Randy]

Anthony wrote:

>On Wed, Oct 28, 2009 at 5:04 PM, Randy 
><rwtnospam-newsgp at yahoo.com> wrote:
>>I propose that an additional property for highway of "covered=yes" be used
>>for this and similar situations, where a road extends under a building,
>>roof attached to a building, etc.
>
>Would that be used for this:
>http://images.loopnet.com/xnet/mainsite/attachments/viewImage.aspx?FileGuid=C138EA3D-33CE-4695-AA32-11C4C9C097EA&Extension=jpg&Width=631&Height=421
>
>Currently mapped as:
>http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=28.078461&lon=-82.505419&zoom=18&layers=B000FTF
>
>In this case there are four separate buildings (the two middle ones
>are shown in the image, and there are two others with smaller covered
>walkways).

I would say, yes. But, I'd also map the roof, so that the road wasn't just 
dashed across the ground.

There needs to be a tag for this type of structure, and I haven't found 
one. "building=shelter" would seem appropriate, but I think the Germans 
have sewed that one up for camping shelters. Possibly just "building=roof" 
would work (not my idea, someone else suggested it). If there is ever an 
effort to map the multiple layers of a building, this could also be used 
as the top layer. Or, for those who prefer not to differentiate building 
type in the key value, "building=yes, [shelter=roof, level=roof, or 
roof=yes]". I think level=roof, would lend itself to a better 
generalization of building interiors. (other levels could be numbers, zero 
not necessarily aligned to the exterior layer=0) But, this is all material 
for a different thread, isn't it?

Meanwhile, back on subject, since there are two buildings and the roof 
arching over the street is clearly not integral to either one, you could 
map that with layers, only, with the roof over the road as layer=1 and the 
road and buildings as layer=0 (default). But, you could also, in that 
case, do the "forbidden", and add "covered=yes" to the road, to aid the 
renderers.

I use the quoted "forbidden", because I agree that we should map to 
reality rather than for the renderers, but when we can add information 
that still tracks reality, but can also aid the renderers, I believe that 
is also appropriate. (However, I don't want to get into an ideology war on 
that topic.)

Regarding your current mapping, I think that it is useful information to 
tell the user that a road or pathway is covered, rather than just ignoring 
it, since it can, for example, help a driver in planning where to drop off 
or pickup a passenger, in inclement weather, or help a pedestrian to plan 
a walking route to avoid the weather.

-- 
Randy