[Talk-us] Highway Tagging Consensus to Improve OSM (and address some of 41 latitude's concerns)

[Mike N.]

>> This is really just a problem with map coverage, not tagging convention,
>> but I'd like to ask about consensus on name= and ref= tags for
>> motorway_junctions.  ref= is pretty obviously the exit number, but
>> although some wiki pages (Interstate Highways, in particular) say or 
>> imply
>> that everything on the exit sign should go into the name= tag (including
>> the junction road but also further destinations like towns and distant
>> roads).  I think it makes more sense to just have the junctioned road (or
>> really significant destination road, like when the junctioned road is
>> almost always just a means to get to another major road) in the name= tag
>> and use the destination sign relation for the other information.
>> Thoughts?
>
> I believe exit_to is for the text on the sign, and name is for an
> actual name *if one exists*. Often a toll road will have named
> interchanges, but this is rare otherwise.

  exit_to has never been used by the JOSM preset, and I cannot find it 
mentioned on the Wiki, so I don't see any reason to start something new.   I 
think the scheme mentioned in the Wiki for Interstate highway tagging makes 
sense to continue.    There are so few cases of a proper "named exit" 
separate from the exit_to information that it is not worth keeping them 
separate.   Continuing to match all the destination information mentioned on 
the sign makes sense because it allows an advance nav system to possibly 
construct the exit sign as the sign to watch out for on a heads up display. 
And of course, ref= contains the exit number.