[Talk-GB] Road route relations in the UK

[Andy Street]

On Thu, 2011-06-02 at 09:29 +0100, Andy Allan wrote:
> On Thu, Jun 2, 2011 at 1:17 AM, Frederik Ramm <frederik at remote.org> wrote:
> 
> >> 2) Why the need for even one?  After all, the "ref" tag on all the
> >> component parts of the A1 should identify them without the need for a
> >> relation.
> >
> > True. A relation should only be needed if a stretch of road is shared by
> > several numbered routes (don't know if that happens at all in the UK).
> 
> It doesn't, although I'll lay money on some people arguing about some
> exception somewhere or another that turns out to be wrong anyway.

Is that my cue? ;)

I suppose it depends on whether you consider the ref to belong to to a
road or a route. While it is true that each piece of road will only have
a single ref the traffic using that road might be following several
routes. For example, I think most people would consider there to be only
one A32 rather than two despite the fact that it looses it's number as
it multiplexes with the A27 for about half a mile in Fareham[0].

If those A1 relations describe a route I'd keep them otherwise I'd
delete them. Either way I can't see why we need four of them.

Cheers,
Andy

[0] http://www.openstreetmap.org/?way=11847682