[Talk-us] OSM US Trails Working Group

Sat Oct 9 13:25:12 UTC 2021

This has been something that people have been discussing since at least the
first SOTMUS. I remember discussions about how rescuers prefer OSM because
it includes the "social trails", where people may be getting injured, or
may be useful in fire fighting. I've personally always liked having a map
with more information on it, even if it just helps with waypointing. I've
been joking that an initiative like this *could* result in something that I
called "Closed Authoritative Map", which is nobody's goal. The DOI already
manages a trails dataset anyway.

There have been some really good ideas that have come out of this,
including better tagging and better rendering. Greg Troxel pointed out that
changing the default renderer is also important, because people may be less
likely to mark a trail as "unmaintained" or "unofficial" if they don't see
any difference on osm.org.

I also agree with Tod, that the #1 rule for mapping in OSM is to "map
what's on the ground". Even though it would be difficult for staff to go
out to each and label each new trailhead as "unmaintained", these trails
are usually discernable from official trails. I also am of the opinion that
more information is better.

I think the best approach here is the add a new tag to the trails that are
officially supported, and to work with the popular renderers to make sure
that these new tags work for them and can be rendered properly. There's no
need to remove data that is correct, but people on the trails should have
the information to know which is the best trail for them to take.

Along with tagging and rendering, there could be a maproulette or tasking
manager project to help tag official trails from the DOI trails digital
network project. The end goal should be to provide the best information
possible to keep people safe with both recreational uses and emergency
services.

--
Jim McAndrew

On Fri, Oct 8, 2021 at 2:36 PM Tod Fitch <tod at fitchfamily.org> wrote:

> I am a bit miffed that this discussion will be on Slack. OSM has way too
> many ways for discussions to be hidden from the typical mapper (should this
> be on one of a huge number of mail lists, on the help website, the forum
> website, slack, or ???). I guess I will need to join the OSM US Slack group
> as this topic is of interest to me.
>
> For background, in addition to being an amateur mapper I am a volunteer
> with the US Forest Service and I make hiking maps with OSM data being one
> of the sources. Most of my USFS volunteer work is with an emergency
> response group so I have had quite a few joint training sessions with
> various SAR teams over the years.
>
> In my experience there is quite a gulf between the desires and resources
> available to the entities involved. In a nutshell:
>
> 1. OSM’s philosophy is to “map what is on the ground”.
> 2. The land manager’s need to protect and preserve natural resources.
> 3. The land manager’s desire to nudge people away from dangerous
> situations.
> 4. A search team’s need to know all the places a missing person might have
> gone and the ways those areas can be accessed.
> 5. The companies and/or projects that create the actual maps or apps are
> not under the control of OSM or the land managers.
>
> OSM’s philosophy encourages mapping of informal or social trails. But
> those trails may go through sensitive habitats or downright dangerous
> areas. If a trail is mapped in OSM some hiking app will show the trail. If
> the trail is shown on a hiking app then people will use it. That is not a
> good thing as it can do permanent damage or get people killed. But SAR
> teams want and need a map that shows everything in order to be effective in
> searches.
>
> I suspect the partial solution is to come up with a tagging scheme that
> the land managers can assure is enforced on their land. This will require
> them to monitor changesets affecting their land and to fix them as needed
> to fit the agreed upon tagging. Note that they can’t just remove the trails
> as some mapper somewhere will add it back in. The next step would be to get
> the projects and companies that make hiking maps and apps for the general
> public agree to de-emphasize these trails in some way. In the extreme case
> just not show them. In a less extreme case show them but in a way that is
> less prominent than the official trails. Finally, projects like SarTopo
> that produce maps and apps targeted to SAR teams would show these trails.
>
> But there is no way that any of this can be mandated or forced given the
> current structure of things. Which leads to my final thought: In addition
> to OSM mappers and land managers discussing this there should be
> representatives of the major hiking apps involved.
>
> Cheers,
> Tod
>
>
> On Oct 8, 2021, at 9:55 AM, Mike Thompson <miketho16 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> In OSM we map what is actually on the ground, not what someone would like
> to be on the ground.  We are like "spatial journalists", and like
> journalists, we report (map) the facts (does the US Government try to tell
> the NY Times what to publish? Only in extreme circumstances.).  There will
> always be those who claim that the "facts are dangerous" and therefore
> should not be reported, and I am sure one can find isolated cases where
> this is true (this is not limited to trails or OSM, it seems that every few
> months there is a story of someone in their Honda Civic (e.g.) taking a
> "shortcut" that appears on their navigation app as a 4x4 road that only a
> rock crawler could traverse - no substitute for common sense).   But more
> often than not, the danger is to the particular group that desires these
> facts be suppressed.
>
> If there really is a problem, land managers can post signs "no off trail
> use", "not a trail", etc., and enforce such.
>
> I have talked to a number of search and rescue people that actually use
> OSM because it does contain so called "social trails."  It may also help
> legal land users remain safe.  A few years ago there were a number of
> deaths on Capitol Peak in Colorado because hikers had gotten off route.  I
> and another mapper added the "trail" to the peak to OSM (note, not NPS
> land).
>
> In addition, my experience with the NPS trail data is that it is often in
> error, and they refuse to fix it, and even acknowledge that it could be
> wrong.
>
> Finally, removing this valuable content from OSM will not achieve the ends
> the NPS and others want to achieve as it appears independently in a number
> of apps.
>
> Mike
>
>
> On Fri, Oct 8, 2021 at 10:30 AM Zeke Farwell <ezekielf at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Recently a number of us attended the "Mappy Hour" presentation "Trails
>> in OpenStreetMap <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TXXGkBVJK-o>" by Keri
>> Nelson of the National Park Service.  Keri described the damages our public
>> land managers are seeing from visitors following informal/social trails and
>> non-trail routes shown on popular hiking maps that use OpenStreetMap data
>> such as AllTrails, CalTopo, and GaiaGPS.
>>
>> This has initiated a public discussion on the OSM US slack
>> <https://slack.openstreetmap.us/>  #trails channel
>> <https://osmus.slack.com/archives/C1US5SFUH> on how to better support
>> responsible recreation through OpenStreetMap.  OSM US is also forming a
>> trails working group focused on these issues.  The group is made up of OSM
>> mappers, trail map providers, and land managers.  The first meeting is next
>> Wednesday 10/13.  Anyone who is interested in helping resolve these issues
>> is welcome to join the discussion on slack
>> <https://slack.openstreetmap.us/>, and/or contact Maggie Crawley
>> <maggie at openstreetmap.us> to participate in the working group meetings.
>> We have also started a United States Trail Access wiki page
>> <https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/United_States/Trail_Access_Project>
>> to document this effort.
>>
>> --
>> Zeke Farwell
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