[Talk-GB] What was the outcome of the discussion about C class roads with ref tags?

[Philip Barnes]

On Mon, 2015-05-04 at 08:35 +0100, Graham Jones wrote:
> I don't know where the discussion got to, but thought I should point
> out that at least one road in North Yorkshire is a C road that is
> signposted as such.
> The road here does have signs with the C designation.
> http://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=13/54.5696/-1.0016
> I don't think I added it so at least one other person must agree!

That will probably only last until the council realise and order a new
sign, there is government guidance to councils that these numbers should
not be used on signs. A satnav saying to turn onto the Cxxxx when it is
not signed makes OSM look quirky to bad to someone who has just
downloaded an app from the app store.

In this case if you have surveyed it and it is signed then it would be
helpful if it was tagged as signed=yes, or something similar.
SomeoneElse I think he has used similar tagging for unsigned A roads.

One obvious reason for not using C/D/U references is that they are not
unique, the number will be reused in different counties which would be
confusing. We would end up with a similar problems as France has after
turning most of their N (National) roads to D (Departmental) where
nearly every route now involves the D1 at some stage. Was so much easier
before they changed it.

I did do a test edit on changing ref=C/D/U to official_ref, however I
reverted it after some problems mostly with path number continuing onto
roads (which never happens) and I had not created a wiki page (have no
idea how to do that), just had general agreement here.

I have been surveying out the ones in Wrexham, but that takes time. I do
know that the guy who added them worked for the council, I suspect
Norfolk and Pembrokeshire are similar, I did no see any signed C roads
in Pembrokeshire last year.

I would like to see this issue resolved, obviously surveying is just too
big a task for a community of this size, so a mechanical edit is the
only way.