[Talk-us] Current Texas State Highway ref is incorrect

Shawn K. Quinn skquinn at rushpost.com
Fri Nov 6 04:52:18 UTC 2015


On Thu, 2015-11-05 at 18:47 -0600, Sam Iacullo wrote:
> The current setup for Texas State Highway ref tagging
> (See:http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/United_States_roads_tagging#Texas) There has already been some discussion as to what exists on the map (https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/talk-us/2014-September/013604.html), but this was based on the majority of relations being incorrectly added into OSM. As per the Texas Department of Transportation, the ref should be "ref=SH ##" instead of the current "ref=TX ##". 
[...]

> If there is no opposition to correcting this tagging error, I will
> change the appropriate page over. 

Consider this opposition. The majority of states seem to be using the
postal abbreviation for state highways. There are only a few that don't
or that only use a single letter (Kansas and Michigan come to mind).

More meaning is evident in "LA 8 becomes TX 63" (oh, we're crossing into
Texas) as opposed to "SH 8 becomes SH 63" (what, the highway department
can't make up their mind?). Also, seeing "TX 63" or "LA 8" makes it a
bit easier to figure out exactly what state highway shields I should be
looking for. (A pet peeve of mine are directions that just treat highway
numbers as one and the same. When I give directions, I always specify
I-10, Texas 288, US 59, FM 1960, LA 12, etc. so there is no ambiguity.
Maybe I am the odd one out though...)

Changing back to "SH xxx" is a huge step backwards and I don't see any
good reason for it.

-- 
Shawn K. Quinn <skquinn at rushpost.com>




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