[Tagging] sidewalk unsuitable for wheelchair

[Tobias Knerr]

On 11.12.2017 01:25, Nick Bolten wrote:
>> Unfortunately, this breaks the semantic relationship between sidewalks
>> and the rest of the road ("this section of sidewalk belongs to that road
>> section").
[...]
> Absolutely, this is an open problem. However, there's no reason we can't
> tag streets with `sidewalk=left/right/yes/no` to keep that question
> answerable, while putting the pedestrian network itself (and its
> details) on proper ways.

No, keeping the tags sidewalk=left/right/yes/no in place would not
provide that relationship. (And neither does sidewalk=separate.)

For starters, these tags don't provide access to subtags like surface,
width, or wheelchair. But even if that was solved (e.g. by duplicating
those tags, too), it would still not be an option to just use the tags
and ignore the sidewalk way. Why? Because incoming footways will
typically only connect to the separately mapped sidewalk, and no longer
to the road itself. Filtering out all footway=sidewalk ways thus
disconnects the road network.