[Talk-GB] On footpaths

[Robert Whittaker (OSM)]

On 5 May 2011 17:03, Nick Whitelegg <Nick.Whitelegg at solent.ac.uk> wrote:
> Not sure how widespread this is but I tag byways as
> designation=public_byway. Might be good to show these too.

Quite widespread, judging by taginfo [1]. For the byway-related
designation=* values, we have:
645 restricted_byway
248 byway_open_to_all_traffic
230 public_byway
 65 byway
 31 unknown_byway

However, since there are legally only four classes of public right of
way, designation=public_byway is presumably either being used to mean
a Byway Open to All Traffic (in which case it would be better agree on
and adopt a standard tagging) or it's being used for both types of
byway (in which case it would be better to avoid using it, and be more
specific).

I would guess it's probably the former, ie designation=public_byway is
a synonym for by designation=byway_open_to_all_traffic. If this is the
case, it would be good to settle on one option as the preferred
tagging, and convert any instances of the other.

Personally, I'd prefer to use "byway_open_to_all_traffic", partly as
it's based on the full legal name (though admittedly the signs
typically only say "Byway"), but more importantly because there's then
no room for any ambiguity or confusion with Restricted Byways. (In
common language, you might reasonably think that a "Restricted Byway"
was a type of "Public Byway".)

Robert.

[1] http://taginfo.openstreetmap.de/keys/designation#values

-- 
Robert Whittaker