[Talk-us] Gravel roads and surface tags in the US

[Dave Swarthout]

"I'm totally open to suggestions for alternatives.  Gravel certainly
doesn't describe that kind of coarse crushed rock to most people, but what
do you call that concisely?"

The roadway in the OP's opening post has what I would definitely tag as a
gravel surface but it has obviously been groomed to carry heavier traffic
than many similar roads. Thus surface=gravel or surface=unpaved along with
tracktype=grade1 (wiki: grade1 = Usually a paved or heavily compacted
hardcore surface). Whether such roads have actually been mechanically
compacted isn't obvious from their appearance. Perhaps some sort of
final step was employed to prepare them for use.

On Thu, Apr 19, 2018 at 2:48 PM, Paul Johnson <baloo at ursamundi.org> wrote:

>
>
> On Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 16:41 Dave Swarthout <daveswarthout at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> " I'm kind of thinking that the gravel surface in the wiki would be
>> better redone as surface=ballast. "
>>
>> -1
>>
>> I hope you won't push for this.
>>
>
> I'm totally open to suggestions for alternatives.  Gravel certainly
> doesn't describe that kind of coarse crushed rock to most people, but what
> do you call that concisely?
>
> In my experience, the only association the word "ballast" has with any
>> sort of roadway is with railroads.
>>
>
> It is definitely a thing for pretty much any kind of improved road, though
> there are some exceptions that usually turn out worse than unimproved.
> Many paths in metro Portland were paved in asphalt without ballast and have
> degraded rapidly as gophers have dug out the dirt under the asphalt
> allowing the asphalt to collapse into the gopher tunnels over the years.
> And generally, the more ballast under the surface, the heavier the loads
> and higher the speed the road is capable of handling reasonably.
>
> And, as I said before, the idea of actual railroad ballast being used as
>> the surface of a road is totally foreign to me.
>>
>
> It is relatively rare, largely limited to agricultural and temporary
> applications, at least in the US.
>
>
>


-- 
Dave Swarthout
Homer, Alaska
Chiang Mai, Thailand
Travel Blog at http://dswarthout.blogspot.com
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