[Talk-us] USFS Roads - name and ref

[Mike Thompson]

Hello,

This question concerns ways maintained/operated by the US Forest Service
(USFS) and signed with vertical  markers, e.g. [0]. These signs typically
display a three digit number, with an optional decimal point (dot/period)
followed by another number and/or a letter.

Name:
The wiki [1] states that these should name=Forest Road + <what is on the
sign>.
In practice, either from other mappers, or from the original TIGER import,
I have seen:
* just what is on the sign
* Fire Road + <what is on the sign>
* FR + <what is on the sign>
* Forest Development Road + <what is on the sign>
* FDR + <What is on the sign>
* Forest Service Road + <what is on the sign>
* FS + <what is on the sign>
* United States Forest Service Road + <what is on the sign>
* ...(many more variations)
Does the wiki reflect the consensus of the US mapper community (which I am
part of) on how these should be named, or should they be named in some
other manner? To complicated matters, it seems that the Forest Service
itself is not consistent and the exact wording of a name will depend on
what brochure, map board, or dataset from the Forest Service you are
looking at. I don't really have a preference, except to say 1) Many of the
above examples include abbreviations, which OSM generally refrains from,
and 2) I think we should be consistent.

ref:
The wiki states that these should be ref=FR + <what is on the sign>. In
practice:
* ref:usfs=FS + <what is on the sign>
* ref=FS + <what is on the sign>
Most of the changesets that added a "ref:usfs" tag include a very helpful
comment that this issue was discussed on the tagging list at sometime in
the past and that this was the consensus, e.g. [2].  If this continues to
be the consensus, can we change the wiki?


Mike




[0] Left sign in this image:
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/File:US_Forest_Service_Vertical_Marker.png
[1]
wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/United_States_roads_tagging#Tagging_Forest_Roads
[2] https://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/73470389
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