[Talk-in] tagging roads in India

[Kenneth Gonsalves]

On 09-Aug-08, at 1:11 AM, PlaneMad wrote:

> Im not so sure tagging the road according to its condition is the  
> best way to go. i feel its better if we tag it based on importance.  
> there is a reason why national highways are designated so, because  
> of its importance in connectivity. There is a minimum construction  
> standard for every nh unlike fore state highways. a two lane nh  
> would be better maintained and have signages that are superior to a  
> four lane sh. Also, roads are getting upgraded all across the  
> country as we speak and it would be really difficult to accurately  
> tag it if we used such an approach.

sorry for the delay in replying - was on a mapping trip, and have  
collected almost 1000 km of tracks. When deciding how to tag, we have  
to decide why we are tagging and also look at how we are mapping.  
When mapping from satellite data, we cannot know the condition of the  
road, whereas mapping by gps we can see the condition. And, important  
is to show the roads as they currently exist. For example I strongly  
disagree with the mapping of katipara junction, which is shown as it  
will exist in the future and not as it exists now.

to illustrate the problem, in my recent trip:
nh 67 from ooty to the tamilnadu border and nh 212 upto Mysore,  
starts as a two lane well marked highway upto Gudalur and then  
becomes one-lane up to Gundlupet and again two lane poorly marked  
upto Mysore. I propose to map the two-lane parts as secondary and the  
one lane part as tertiary.

sh 88 - Mysore-Madikere-BC Road: The first 50 km upto Hunsur is a  
fourlane divided highway. From Hunsur to the Coorg border it is a  
well marked two lane highway. From Coorg border to BC Road it is a  
one lane badly maintained road. So I would tag this as Primary,  
secondary and tertiary.

nh 48 from Mangalore to Hassan: From Mangalore to BC Road, 4-laning  
work has commenced and the existing road is a single lane string of  
potholes. BC Road to the foot of Sakhleshpur Ghat is two-lane well  
marked road. The Ghat road upto Sakhleshpur is a shambles and only an  
army tank can really negotiate it. Construction is going on - but  
this looks like taking at least a year. I would map this stretch as  
unclassified road. Sakhleshpur to Hassan is a well marked two lane road.

sh 57 from Hassan to Bilikere: twolane highway built with world bank  
funds, marking is of NH standard - can be marked as secondary.

As a motorist, I would need this kind of information for planning a  
trip. A 4 lane divided highway means that I can average about 80  
kmph. 2 lane well marked highway would give me an average speed of  
50. Single lane roads - no way of judging average speed. Unclassified  
road means that all bets are off.


>
>
> I am for tagging based on its official designation as nh or sh  
> rather than its width because there is no way to verify the current  
> width of any road in the country. Another point is that at minimum  
> zoom only motorways and trunk highways are rendered. tagging an  
> important 2 lane nh as primary would make it invisible when at  
> country level zoom.


-- 
regards

Kenneth Gonsalves
Associate, NRC-FOSS
lawgon at au-kbc.org
http://nrcfosshelpline.in/code/