[Talk-us] Announcing progress: Minnesota Highway classification project publishes first guidance

[Bob Gambrel]

This is a reply to some observations and questions by Ian:
Ian says:
>>> So as someone who?s not extremely versed on this: if we assume that
motorways should not end at at-grade intersections, how should US-61 be
tagged where it intersects with I-90 at Dakota (this is where I-90 turns
away from the Mississippi and heads west in the south half of Winona
County)?
>>> 61 has on/off ramps several hundred feet north of the split, but about
a half mile to mile north of the ramps there is an at-grade driveway to the
southbound lane and about a half mile north of that there is a turn lane
where the northbound lane can access a frontage road.
>>>Apologies I realize this is basic but I?ve just had a difficult time
getting my head around these tags.
No apologies needed! I am still getting my head around them!
This area seems to be mapped correctly already per Minnesota published
guidelines. This motorway stub ends exactly at the at-grade driveway you
mention. It is the first at-grade intersection encountered. And both sides
end there. Again, this is how it is mapped now and appears to conform to
Minnesota current standards.
Ian also says:
>>> I don?t know if it would matter for your tagging scheme there but the
way the road is generally maintained as well as the behavior of the users
is that north of the on-ramp from River street, US-14/61 is not treated
like an interstate, but between the junction with I-90 and the on/off ramp,
it generally is.
There is a difference visible on aerial photos. I have not driven that
stretch in a long time, so I have to rely on your local knowledge. No good
street-side imagery here, but squinting at Mapillary it almost looks like
there is no Jersey barrier between the two directions. I can't really tell
though. If there is none I wonder if that would have us downgrade to
expressway instead of motorway. I think based on your comments this stretch
should be better analyzed!
Ian also said:
>>> Or in more Minnesotan terms: it is generally considered acceptable to
pull over to the side of the road to observe the regions nesting bald
eagles immediately north of the on/off ramp regardless of whether you have
reached the first at-grade intersection. The same behavior between the
ramps and the junction with I-90 it would perhaps merit a huffy ?I don?t
know what they?re thinking? muttered under ones breath while you smile and
wave driving by, or a concerned local pulling over to offer assistance.
Hmmmm. Watching nesting bald eagles should be legal everywhere in
Minnesota! A huffy??? Hmmm. Am sure you are not talking about the bike
brand!
I will add to our queue of discussion topics to look more closely at this
stretch!
Thanks Ian.


On Thu, Jan 27, 2022 at 11:16 AM Bob Gambrel <rjgambrel at gmail.com> wrote:

> Mappers in Minnesota have just added agreed reclassification guidelines to
> their highway re-classification wiki page (
> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Minnesota/Minnesota_highway_classification
> )
> Proposals for handling motorways, expressways and trunk highways were
> published. Comments were invited and received and the parts of the proposal
> that did not receive critical comments were published in the wiki as agreed
> guidelines.
>
> Thanks to the 29 mappers from Minnesota and other places who watched and
> contributed to the discussion in the Slack #local-minnesota channel!  (
> https://osmus.slack.com/archives/CCV2P9QET)
>
> While the results of the first review are now published, we invite others
> with interest to jump into the discussion and provide additional insights,
> either by joining the Slack discussion or providing feedback on the wiki
> discussion page itself. Future work will include resolving some of the open
> issues and moving on to other highway classification tasks in the months to
> come.
>
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