[Talk-us] US-wide highway reclassifications by Fluffy89502

[John A. Leuenhagen]

On Sat, Oct 16, 2021 at 06:46:03PM +0200, Frederik Ramm wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> the DWG has received a complaint about recent highway reclassifications by
> user https://www.openstreetmap.org/user/Fluffy89502 - these seem to affect
> various states; there's no rationale given about the reclassifcations, and
> comments from different users remain unanswered.

I've noticed this as well, especially in the southern New York State
region. I've left a comment on every changeset in my area that is
questionable, and have not yet received a response. I additionally sent
a message to the user suggesting that they join the OSMUS Slack, to
which I also have not received a response.
 
> Could I have an assessment from the community about this? Wholesale revert?
> User block and request to engage with critical voices? ...?

I have already reverted the changesets made by the user in areas I know
well. The user has made some legitimate changes, such as downgrading
short segments of trunk or motorway that really shouldn't be classified
as such. I think it's worth looking at each changeset individually, and
only reverting those that are questionable.

I was planning on requesting a 0 hour block if the user made another
changeset without responding to my communications, but it's been over a
week now, so maybe we should just go through with the block. I phrased
my message more as an offer to join the conversation, but I think it's
warranted to actually require them to talk with the community. That
should be reflected in the message for the block.

> The user has been blocked for similar activities last year, and been asked
> to be more responsive to changeset comments.

This is worth reminding the user about, along with noting that they'll
receive a harsher punishment if they keep making these edits while
ignoring us.