[Talk-GB] Advice please: Goat tracks in mountain areas

Sat Feb 5 16:57:06 UTC 2022

As a relatively experienced walker this looks like an interesting alternative route which I might want to take.   I wouldn't remove it or any sections of it but ensure it is tagged as accurately as possible.   A sac_scale would be a good idea.  I would leave this to those with experience of this route in terms of the grade.  The only thing to note is that this scale is not something that most walkers in the UK have any real knowledge of.  The is mainly because OS maps don't use it and hence one of the arguments for having walking maps based on OSM data.    Most footways/paths aren't that visible on the ground and if this is an issue I would use trail_visibility rather than removing the section of the highway.  Looking at it on Bing imagery it seems to be visible along most of its length.

What I would also consider doing is adding features with regard to the terrain.  The western end looks like scree so I would add this area.  You could also add areas of rock.  There are tags for natural=earth_bank and natural=gully (this is just a single line and I'm not actually sure a good way to map gullies) and I would also consider using natural=cliff where you would need to climb/scramble up/down a rock face.  i.e. possibly the sides of a gully.  If it is a near vertical rock face that you don't want to walk over natural=cliff is a reasonably tag to be used to warn me to look where I am going and I might hurt myself if I don't!!

If there is an issue of this becoming popular then I guess the land owner will need to make a decision about whether they want to discourage access on the ground by putting up notices/fences to avoid further erosion of the landscape.  I have seen this done by the National Trust and other organisations.

Again, if safety is a real issue a warning notice on the ground might be a consideration.   We don't tend to do this in the UK as most footpaths are public rights of way and if there is a significant safety issue the local authority will close it and put up notices accordingly.

I think there is a reasonably amount you can down do to improve the mapping along this path that should make it easier to interpret the degree of difficulty.   If you're able to walk this route with a good gps I would consider taking pictures only the way and doing some photo mapping to improve the detail.

Dudley

________________________________
From: nathan case <nathancase at outlook.com>
Sent: 05 February 2022 15:56
To: Talk-GB <talk-gb at openstreetmap.org>
Subject: Re: [Talk-GB] Advice please: Goat tracks in mountain areas

Gruff,

In addition to the sac_scale tag, you may wish to add a suitable value for the hazard tag: https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:hazard There are also a bunch of undocumented values which might work for you: https://taginfo.openstreetmap.org/keys/?key=hazard#values

These secondary tags won’t stop the path being rendered on the “standard” OSM page and possibly not in Strava either but at least the data is recorded if routers/renderers wanted to pay attention to it. (You could contact Strava and ask them not to render it.)

Also, a bit of a wider discussion, this has cropped up in the past but with no resolution. See: https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Talk:Tag:highway%3Dpath#highway.3Dpath_is_defined_too_broadly_and_it_is_now_resulting_in_unnecessary_Search_and_Rescue_calls

Thanks.

From: Nick Whitelegg via Talk-GB <talk-gb at openstreetmap.org>
Sent: 05 February 2022 15:48
To: Talk-GB <talk-gb at openstreetmap.org>
Subject: Re: [Talk-GB] Advice please: Goat tracks in mountain areas

I don't know this path but if it's visible on the ground throughout, it should be mapped. I tend to use width=narrow for these sorts of paths which are very vague, and agree that sac_scale=difficult_mountain_hiking would indicate that it is not for casual hikers.

If on the other hand it disappears in the middle, don't map that bit.

bicycle=no and horse=no would mean that it is illegal for bikes and horses to use the path. I'm not sure what the rights are here, so not sure whether these should be used or not.

Nick

________________________________

From: Philip Barnes <phil at trigpoint.me.uk<mailto:phil at trigpoint.me.uk>>
Sent: 05 February 2022 15:37
To: talk-gb at openstreetmap.org<mailto:talk-gb at openstreetmap.org> <talk-gb at openstreetmap.org<mailto:talk-gb at openstreetmap.org>>
Subject: Re: [Talk-GB] Advice please: Goat tracks in mountain areas

On Sat, 2022-02-05 at 15:04 +0000, David Woolley wrote:
> On 05/02/2022 14:26, Gruff Owen wrote:
> >
> > It has been tagged as:
> > bicycle:no
> > highway:path
> > horse:no
> >
>
> What would initially concern me is that bicycle=no and horse=no
> probably
> represent the mapper's view of its suitability, and are therefore
> very
> subjective, which is wrong.
>
> Not mapping it would be wrong.  The correct way is to provide
> attributes, e.g tracktype=Grade 5; surface=ground; width=70cm;
> smoothness=horrible; sac_scale=difficult_mountain_hiking, that allow
> a
> router to make its own judgements (although some of these could also
> be
> considered too subjective).  I'm not sure though, to what extent
> routers
> actually look for such contraindications, but there is a principle
> that
> you do not tag for the renderer, which means it is the router's job
> to
> assess suitability and one must not try to influence it by
> misdescriptions.
>
> Pyg Trail, to which this path is attached, is classified as
> sac_scale=mountain_hiking, in OSM, which is the second least onerous.
> The description for sac_scale says that paper maps often do not
> include
> paths with the most onerous values.
>
> Total omission doesn't work, if the feature is visible, because
> people
> will, eventually, remap it.
>
This sounds a good approach, although in my experience goat or sheep
tracks end up with a width more like a sunken 10cm path on a steep
slope where it becomes difficult to get one boot in front of the other.

Could be worth a changeset comment pointing out the problems with
mapping this type of path without careful tagging and determine
motivation/sources used.

Phil (trigpoint)

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