[Talk-us] US Interstate exit junction exit_to tag

[Mike N]

On 4/7/2011 12:53 AM, Alan Mintz wrote:
> At 2011-04-06 15:26, Nathan Edgars II wrote:
>> On 4/6/2011 5:59 PM, Alan Mintz wrote:
>>> At 2011-03-28 12:40, Ian Dees wrote:
>>>> With that in mind I think it's important that the exit_to tag only
>>>> include verbage on the sign (and not stuff we make up).
>>>
>>> IMO, not all the verbage on the sign. I've been tagging name as the name
>>> of the exit according to the relevant authority (e.g. CalTrans in CA). I
>>> accept that people now want to change this to use exit_to instead of
>>> name. However, some exit signs also have destination information, like
>>> the name of the city or local tourist attraction. This secondary
>>> information I've been putting in a towards tag. I would also like to
>>> separate the name into a root and a directional component. e.g.
>> [snip]
>> This seems overly complex. The reason for including the text is so
>> routers can tell the driver to take the exit marked [foo]. What
>> benefit is there in separating street names/route numbers from other
>> destinations?
>
> Routers and renderers are not the only consumers. I'm trying to get the
> data modeled correctly. Logically, the name is the important part. If
> necessary, for reasons of speed or space, the towards part can be
> eliminated. If exit numbers are unimportant to a particular consumer,
> they can be eliminated to. That is the point of breaking it up into
> multiple fields. As far as complexity, it seems quite simple to speak
> "take " + iif($ref != "", "exit " + $ref + ", ", "") + $exit_to +
> iif($towards != ""," towards " + $towards, "").

   It's one thing to model the data correctly, but for a crowdsourced 
project like OSM, how do you translate that to thousands of people 
knowing how to correctly enter their local exit information?   I don't 
work for the DOT, and would have no idea how to enter the local exit 
information according to that model.   Who decides what 'towards'
is to be, and how is that clearer than just trying to match a sign?

>>> How do we ask the renderers to recognize the new schema?
>>
>> Why would we want the default rendering to display exit_to? The whole
>> point of the change was so the renderer will know whether the
>> interchange has a name to display.
>
> My point is that the exits in So Cal are known by those values that were
> in the name field, and were rendered correctly on the maps. Those _are_
> the names of the exits. Now, only the exit number (which few people
> use), is rendered, and the map has become less useful. I didn't see
> anybody object to the names being rendered. This started as a semantics
> issue, and it was then mentioned by user ponzu that there was some
> problem with Skobbler.

    The Skobbler problems only referred to the ramp tagging, not the 
junction tagging (which Skobbler does not use yet at all as far as I can 
tell).

    You have made a good point that the way locals refer to an exit 
could be valid as the name= tag.    If you have knowledge of the local 
designation of all exits you've tagged, it might be easier to ask for a 
rollback of just the edits where you are the author.